462 APPENDIX. 



tering the condition of the poor, and enabling them to rear 

 more of their children, the vacancies in cottages in propor- 

 tion to the number of expectants would happen slower than 

 at present, and the age of marriage must inevitably be later. 



With regard to the expression of later marriages, it should 

 always be recollected that it refers to no particular age, but 

 is entirely comparative. The marriages in England are 

 later than in France, the natural consequence of that pru- 

 dence and respectability generated by a better government; 

 and can we doubt that good has been the result ? The 

 marriages in this country now are later than they were be- 

 fore the revolution ; and I feel firmly persuaded, that the 

 increased healthiness observed of late years could not pos- 

 sibly have taken place without this accompanying circum- 

 stance.* Two or three years i» the average age of marriage, 

 by lengthening each generation, and tending, in a small de- 

 gree, both to diminish the prolifickness of marriages, and 

 the number of born living to be married, may make a con- 

 siderable difference in the rate of increase, and be adequate 

 to allow for a considerably diminished mortality. But I 

 would on no account talk of any limits whatever. The only 

 plain and intelligible measure with regard to marriage, 

 is the having a fair prospect of being able to maintain a 

 family. If the possession of one of Mr. Young's cottages 

 would give the labourer this prospect, he would be quite 

 right to marry ; but if it did not, or if he could only obtain 

 a rented house without land, and the wages of labour were 

 only sufficient to maintain two children, does Mr. Young, 

 who cuts him off from the influence of the poor-laws, pre- 

 sume to say, that he would still be right in marrying ?'|- 



Mr. Young has asserted that I have made perfect chastity 

 in the single state absolutely necessary to the success of my 

 plan; but this surely is a misrepresentation. Perfect virtue 

 is, indeed, necessary to enable man to avoid (til the moral 

 and physical evils which (Jepend upon his own conduct ; 

 but who ever expected perfect virtue upon earth? I have 

 said, what I conceive to be strictly true, that it is our duty to 

 defer marriage till we can feed our children ; and that it is 



* (1825). It appears fi'onl the three returns of the Population Act, in 1801, 

 1811, and 1821, that tlie proportion of marriages lias been diminishing with the 

 increasing heahh of the country, i.otwithstanding the augmented rate of in- 

 crease in tlie population. 



\ The lowest prospect, with which a man can be justified in marrying, seems 

 to be the power, when in health, of earning such wages as, at the average price 

 of corn, will maintain the average nuiulnr of living children to a marriage. 



