446 APPENDIX. 



measures the power of states. It is only as to the mode of 

 obtahiing a vigorous and efficient population that I differ 

 from them ; and in thus differing I conceive myself entirely 

 borne out by experience, that great test of all human specu- 

 lations. 



It appears from the undoubted testimony of registers, 

 that a large proportion of marriages and births is by no 

 means necessarily connected with a rapid increase of popu- 

 lation, but is often found in countries where it is either sta- 

 tionary or increasing very slowly. The population of such 

 countries is not only comparatively inefficient from the ge- 

 neral poverty and misery of the inhabitants, but invariably 

 contains a much larger proportion of persons in those stages 

 of life, in which they are unable to contribute their share to 

 the resources or the defence of the state. 



This is most strikingly illustrated in an instance which I 

 have quoted from M. Muret, in a chapter on Switzerland, 

 where it appeared, that in proportion to the same popula- 

 tion, the Lyonais produced lO births, the Pays de Vaud I I, 

 and a particular parish in the Alps only 8 ; but that at the 

 age of 10 these three very different numbers were all re- 

 duced to the same.* In the Lyonais nearly half of the po- 

 pulation was under the age of puberty, in the Pays de Vaud 

 one-third, and in the parish of the Alps only one- fourth. 

 The inference from such facts is unavoidable, and of the 

 highest importance to society. 



"^I'he power of a country to increase its resources or de- 

 fend its possessions must depend principally upon its effi- 

 cient population, upon that part of the population which is 

 of an age to be employed effectually in agriculture, com- 

 merce or war ; but it appears with an evidence little short 

 of demonstration, that in a country, the resources of w hich 

 do not naturally call for a larger proportion of births, such 

 an increase, so far from tending to increase this efficient po- 

 pulation, would tend materially to diminish it. It would 

 undoubtedly, at first, increase the number of souls in pro- 

 portion to the means of subsistence, and therefore cruelly 

 increase the pressure of want ; but the numbers of persons 

 rising annually to the age of puberty might not be so great 

 as before, a larger part of the produce would be distributed 

 without return to children who would never reach manhood, 



• Page 271, 4to. edit, and p. 342. vol. i. of this edit, (tlic flth.) 



