294 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. 



tionof land; and when, from an unfavourable sea- 

 son, their crops fail, or their cattle die, they see 

 the cause of their want, and bear it as the visita- 

 tion of Providence. Every man will submit with 

 becoming patience to evils which he believes to 

 arise from the general laws of nature; but when 

 the vanity and mistaken benevolence of the go- 

 vernment and the higher classes of society have, 

 by a perpetual interference with the concerns of 

 the lower classes, endeavoured to persuade them, 

 that all the good which they enjoy is conferred 

 upon them by their rulers and rich benefactors, it 

 is very natural that they should attribute all the 

 evil which they suffer to the same sources ; and 

 patience under such circumstances cannot reason- 

 ably be expected. Though to avoid still greater 

 evils, we may be allowed to repress this impatience 

 by force, if it shew itself in overt acts; yet the 

 impatience itself appears to be clearly justified in 

 this case : and those are in a great degree an- 

 swerable for its consequences, whose conduct has 

 tended evidently to encourage it. 



Though the Swedes had supported the severe 

 dearth of 1799 with extraordinary resignation; 

 yet afterwards, on an edict of the government to 

 prohibit the distillation of spirits, it is said that 

 there were considerable commotions in the coun- 

 try. The measure itself was certainly calculated 

 to benefit the people ; and the manner in which it 

 was received, affords a curious proof of the dif- 

 ferent temper with which people bear an evil 



