Ch. V. Of the Consequences, 8^c. 30 1 



of the plague. In the country, we should build 

 our villages near stagnant pools, and particularly 

 encourage settlements in all marshy and unwhole- 

 some situations.* But above all, Ave should re- 

 probate specific remedies for ravaging diseases ; 

 and those benevolent, but much mistaken men, 

 who have thought they were doing a service to 

 mankind by projecting schemes for the total ex- 

 tirpation of particular disorders. If by these and 

 similar means the annual mortality were increased 

 from 1 in 36 or 40, to 1 in 18 or 20, we might 

 probably every one of us marry at the age of pu- 

 berty, and yet few be absolutely starved. 



If, however, we all marry at this age, and yet 

 still continue our exertions to impede the opera- 

 tions of nature, we may rest assured that all our 

 efforts will be vain. Nature will not, nor cannot, 

 be defeated in her purposes. The necessary mor- 

 tality must come, in some form or other ; and the 

 extirpation of one disease will only be the signal 



* Necker, speaking of the proportion of the births in France, 

 makes use of a new and instructive expression on this subject, 

 though he hardly seems to be sufficiently aware of it himself. He 

 says, " Le nombre des naissances est k celui des habitans de un k 

 " vingt-trois et vingt-quatre dans les lieux contraries par la nature, 

 " ou par des circonstances morales ; ce meme rapport, dans la plus 

 " grande partie de la France, est de un a 25, 25^, & 26." Ad- 

 minist. des Finances, torn. i. ch. ix. p. 254. 12mo. It appears, 

 therefore, that we have nothing more to do, than to settle people 

 in marshy situations, and oppress them by a bad government, in 

 order to attain what politicians have hitherto considered as so de- 

 sirable—a great proportion of marriages and a great proportion of 

 births. 



