initial commit of ebook 4239HEADmain

2 files changed, 6118 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/old/prppl10.txt b/old/prppl10.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c9f8dac
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/prppl10.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,6118 @@
+The Project Gutenberg Etext of An Essay on the Principle of Population
+by Thomas Malthus
+
+Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the
+copyright laws for your country before distributing this or any other
+Project Gutenberg file.
+
+We encourage you to keep this file, exactly as it is, on your
+own disk, thereby keeping an electronic path open for future
+readers.  Please do not remove this.
+
+This header should be the first thing seen when anyone starts to
+view the etext. Do not change or edit it without written permission.
+The words are carefully chosen to provide users with the
+information they need to understand what they may and may not
+do with the etext.
+
+
+**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
+
+**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971**
+
+*****These Etexts Are Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!*****
+
+Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get etexts, and
+further information, is included below.  We need your donations.
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a 501(c)(3)
+organization with EIN [Employee Identification Number] 64-6221541
+
+
+
+Title: An Essay on the Principle of Population
+
+Author: Thomas Malthus
+
+Release Date: July, 2003 [Etext# 4239]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on December 14, 2001]
+[Date last updated: June 30, 2007]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+The Project Gutenberg Etext of An Essay on the Principle of Population
+by Thomas Malthus
+********This file should be named prppl10.txt or prppl10.zip**********
+
+Corrected EDITIONS of our etexts get a new NUMBER, prppl11.txt
+VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, prppl10a.txt
+
+This etext was produced by Charles Aldarondo Aldarondo@yahoo.com
+
+
+Project Gutenberg Etexts are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US
+unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we usually do not
+keep etexts in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+We are now trying to release all our etexts one year in advance
+of the official release dates, leaving time for better editing.
+Please be encouraged to tell us about any error or corrections,
+even years after the official publication date.
+
+Please note neither this listing nor its contents are final til
+midnight of the last day of the month of any such announcement.
+The official release date of all Project Gutenberg Etexts is at
+Midnight, Central Time, of the last day of the stated month.  A
+preliminary version may often be posted for suggestion, comment
+and editing by those who wish to do so.
+
+Most people start at our sites at:
+http://gutenberg.net or
+http://promo.net/pg
+
+These Web sites include award-winning information about Project
+Gutenberg, including how to donate, how to help produce our new
+etexts, and how to subscribe to our email newsletter (free!).
+
+
+Those of you who want to download any Etext before announcement
+can get to them as follows, and just download by date.  This is
+also a good way to get them instantly upon announcement, as the
+indexes our cataloguers produce obviously take a while after an
+announcement goes out in the Project Gutenberg Newsletter.
+
+http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext03 or
+ftp://ftp.ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/etext03
+
+Or /etext02, 01, 00, 99, 98, 97, 96, 95, 94, 93, 92, 92, 91 or 90
+
+Just search by the first five letters of the filename you want,
+as it appears in our Newsletters.
+
+
+Information about Project Gutenberg (one page)
+
+We produce about two million dollars for each hour we work.  The
+time it takes us, a rather conservative estimate, is fifty hours
+to get any etext selected, entered, proofread, edited, copyright
+searched and analyzed, the copyright letters written, etc.   Our
+projected audience is one hundred million readers.  If the value
+per text is nominally estimated at one dollar then we produce $2
+million dollars per hour in 2001 as we release over 50 new Etext
+files per month, or 500 more Etexts in 2000 for a total of 4000+
+If they reach just 1-2% of the world's population then the total
+should reach over 300 billion Etexts given away by year's end.
+
+The Goal of Project Gutenberg is to Give Away One Trillion Etext
+Files by December 31, 2001.  [10,000 x 100,000,000 = 1 Trillion]
+This is ten thousand titles each to one hundred million readers,
+which is only about 4% of the present number of computer users.
+
+At our revised rates of production, we will reach only one-third
+of that goal by the end of 2001, or about 4,000 Etexts.  We need
+funding, as well as continued efforts by volunteers, to maintain
+or increase our production and reach our goals.
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation has been created
+to secure a future for Project Gutenberg into the next millennium.
+
+We need your donations more than ever!
+
+As of November, 2001, contributions are being solicited from people
+and organizations in: Alabama, Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware,
+Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky,
+Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New
+Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon,
+Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee,
+Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin,
+and Wyoming.
+
+*In Progress
+
+We have filed in about 45 states now, but these are the only ones
+that have responded.
+
+As the requirements for other states are met, additions to this list
+will be made and fund raising will begin in the additional states.
+Please feel free to ask to check the status of your state.
+
+In answer to various questions we have received on this:
+
+We are constantly working on finishing the paperwork to legally
+request donations in all 50 states.  If your state is not listed and
+you would like to know if we have added it since the list you have,
+just ask.
+
+While we cannot solicit donations from people in states where we are
+not yet registered, we know of no prohibition against accepting
+donations from donors in these states who approach us with an offer to
+donate.
+
+International donations are accepted, but we don't know ANYTHING about
+how to make them tax-deductible, or even if they CAN be made
+deductible, and don't have the staff to handle it even if there are
+ways.
+
+All donations should be made to:
+
+Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
+PMB 113
+1739 University Ave.
+Oxford, MS 38655-4109
+
+Contact us if you want to arrange for a wire transfer or payment
+method other than by check or money order.
+
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation has been approved by
+the US Internal Revenue Service as a 501(c)(3) organization with EIN
+[Employee Identification Number] 64-622154.  Donations are
+tax-deductible to the maximum extent permitted by law.  As fundraising
+requirements for other states are met, additions to this list will be
+made and fundraising will begin in the additional states.
+
+We need your donations more than ever!
+
+You can get up to date donation information at:
+
+http://www.gutenberg.net/donation.html
+
+
+***
+
+If you can't reach Project Gutenberg,
+you can always email directly to:
+
+Michael S. Hart <hart@pobox.com>
+
+Prof. Hart will answer or forward your message.
+
+We would prefer to send you information by email.
+
+
+**The Legal Small Print**
+
+
+(Three Pages)
+
+***START**THE SMALL PRINT!**FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS**START***
+Why is this "Small Print!" statement here? You know: lawyers.
+They tell us you might sue us if there is something wrong with
+your copy of this etext, even if you got it for free from
+someone other than us, and even if what's wrong is not our
+fault. So, among other things, this "Small Print!" statement
+disclaims most of our liability to you. It also tells you how
+you may distribute copies of this etext if you want to.
+
+*BEFORE!* YOU USE OR READ THIS ETEXT
+By using or reading any part of this PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm
+etext, you indicate that you understand, agree to and accept
+this "Small Print!" statement. If you do not, you can receive
+a refund of the money (if any) you paid for this etext by
+sending a request within 30 days of receiving it to the person
+you got it from. If you received this etext on a physical
+medium (such as a disk), you must return it with your request.
+
+ABOUT PROJECT GUTENBERG-TM ETEXTS
+This PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext, like most PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etexts,
+is a "public domain" work distributed by Professor Michael S. Hart
+through the Project Gutenberg Association (the "Project").
+Among other things, this means that no one owns a United States copyright
+on or for this work, so the Project (and you!) can copy and
+distribute it in the United States without permission and
+without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth
+below, apply if you wish to copy and distribute this etext
+under the "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark.
+
+Please do not use the "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark to market
+any commercial products without permission.
+
+To create these etexts, the Project expends considerable
+efforts to identify, transcribe and proofread public domain
+works. Despite these efforts, the Project's etexts and any
+medium they may be on may contain "Defects". Among other
+things, Defects may take the form of incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
+intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged
+disk or other etext medium, a computer virus, or computer
+codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment.
+
+LIMITED WARRANTY; DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES
+But for the "Right of Replacement or Refund" described below,
+[1] Michael Hart and the Foundation (and any other party you may
+receive this etext from as a PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext) disclaims
+all liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including
+legal fees, and [2] YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE OR
+UNDER STRICT LIABILITY, OR FOR BREACH OF WARRANTY OR CONTRACT,
+INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE
+OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE
+POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
+
+If you discover a Defect in this etext within 90 days of
+receiving it, you can receive a refund of the money (if any)
+you paid for it by sending an explanatory note within that
+time to the person you received it from. If you received it
+on a physical medium, you must return it with your note, and
+such person may choose to alternatively give you a replacement
+copy. If you received it electronically, such person may
+choose to alternatively give you a second opportunity to
+receive it electronically.
+
+THIS ETEXT IS OTHERWISE PROVIDED TO YOU "AS-IS". NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ARE MADE TO YOU AS
+TO THE ETEXT OR ANY MEDIUM IT MAY BE ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT
+LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A
+PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
+
+Some states do not allow disclaimers of implied warranties or
+the exclusion or limitation of consequential damages, so the
+above disclaimers and exclusions may not apply to you, and you
+may have other legal rights.
+
+INDEMNITY
+You will indemnify and hold Michael Hart, the Foundation,
+and its trustees and agents, and any volunteers associated
+with the production and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm
+texts harmless, from all liability, cost and expense, including
+legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of the
+following that you do or cause:  [1] distribution of this etext,
+[2] alteration, modification, or addition to the etext,
+or [3] any Defect.
+
+DISTRIBUTION UNDER "PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm"
+You may distribute copies of this etext electronically, or by
+disk, book or any other medium if you either delete this
+"Small Print!" and all other references to Project Gutenberg,
+or:
+
+[1]  Only give exact copies of it.  Among other things, this
+     requires that you do not remove, alter or modify the
+     etext or this "small print!" statement.  You may however,
+     if you wish, distribute this etext in machine readable
+     binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form,
+     including any form resulting from conversion by word
+     processing or hypertext software, but only so long as
+     *EITHER*:
+
+     [*]  The etext, when displayed, is clearly readable, and
+          does *not* contain characters other than those
+          intended by the author of the work, although tilde
+          (~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may
+          be used to convey punctuation intended by the
+          author, and additional characters may be used to
+          indicate hypertext links; OR
+
+     [*]  The etext may be readily converted by the reader at
+          no expense into plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent
+          form by the program that displays the etext (as is
+          the case, for instance, with most word processors);
+          OR
+
+     [*]  You provide, or agree to also provide on request at
+          no additional cost, fee or expense, a copy of the
+          etext in its original plain ASCII form (or in EBCDIC
+          or other equivalent proprietary form).
+
+[2]  Honor the etext refund and replacement provisions of this
+     "Small Print!" statement.
+
+[3]  Pay a trademark license fee to the Foundation of 20% of the
+     gross profits you derive calculated using the method you
+     already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  If you
+     don't derive profits, no royalty is due.  Royalties are
+     payable to "Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation"
+     the 60 days following each date you prepare (or were
+     legally required to prepare) your annual (or equivalent
+     periodic) tax return.  Please contact us beforehand to
+     let us know your plans and to work out the details.
+
+WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO?
+Project Gutenberg is dedicated to increasing the number of
+public domain and licensed works that can be freely distributed
+in machine readable form.
+
+The Project gratefully accepts contributions of money, time,
+public domain materials, or royalty free copyright licenses.
+Money should be paid to the:
+"Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."
+
+If you are interested in contributing scanning equipment or
+software or other items, please contact Michael Hart at:
+hart@pobox.com
+
+[Portions of this header are copyright (C) 2001 by Michael S. Hart
+and may be reprinted only when these Etexts are free of all fees.]
+[Project Gutenberg is a TradeMark and may not be used in any sales
+of Project Gutenberg Etexts or other materials be they hardware or
+software or any other related product without express permission.]
+
+*END THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.10/04/01*END*
+
+
+
+
+
+
+This etext was produced by Charles Aldarondo Aldarondo@yahoo.com
+
+
+
+
+
+Thomas Malthus
+An Essay on the Principle of Population
+1798
+
+
+
+
+
+AN ESSAY ON THE PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION, AS IT AFFECTS THE FUTURE
+IMPROVEMENT OF SOCIETY WITH REMARKS ON THE SPECULATIONS OF MR.
+GODWIN, M. CONDORCET, AND OTHER WRITERS.
+
+LONDON, PRINTED FOR J. JOHNSON, IN ST. PAUL'S CHURCH-YARD, 1798.
+
+
+
+
+Preface
+
+
+The following Essay owes its origin to a conversation with a
+friend, on the subject of Mr Godwin's essay on avarice and
+profusion, in his Enquirer. The discussion started the general
+question of the future improvement of society, and the Author at
+first sat down with an intention of merely stating his thoughts
+to his friend, upon paper, in a clearer manner than he thought he
+could do in conversation. But as the subject opened upon him,
+some ideas occurred, which he did not recollect to have met with
+before; and as he conceived that every least light, on a topic so
+generally interesting, might be received with candour, he
+determined to put his thoughts in a form for publication.
+
+The Essay might, undoubtedly, have been rendered much more
+complete by a collection of a greater number of facts in
+elucidation of the general argument. But a long and almost total
+interruption from very particular business, joined to a desire
+(perhaps imprudent) of not delaying the publication much beyond
+the time that he originally proposed, prevented the Author from
+giving to the subject an undivided attention. He presumes,
+however, that the facts which he has adduced will be found to
+form no inconsiderable evidence for the truth of his opinion
+respecting the future improvement of mankind. As the Author
+contemplates this opinion at present, little more appears to him
+to be necessary than a plain statement, in addition to the most
+cursory view of society, to establish it.
+
+It is an obvious truth, which has been taken notice of by
+many writers, that population must always be kept down to the
+level of the means of subsistence; but no writer that the Author
+recollects has inquired particularly into the means by which this
+level is effected: and it is a view of these means which forms,
+to his mind, the strongest obstacle in the way to any very great
+future improvement of society. He hopes it will appear that, in
+the discussion of this interesting subject, he is actuated solely
+by a love of truth, and not by any prejudices against any
+particular set of men, or of opinions. He professes to have read
+some of the speculations on the future improvement of society in
+a temper very different from a wish to find them visionary, but
+he has not acquired that command over his understanding which
+would enable him to believe what he wishes, without evidence, or
+to refuse his assent to what might be unpleasing, when
+accompanied with evidence.
+
+The view which he has given of human life has a melancholy
+hue, but he feels conscious that he has drawn these dark tints
+from a conviction that they are really in the picture, and not
+from a jaundiced eye or an inherent spleen of disposition. The
+theory of mind which he has sketched in the two last chapters
+accounts to his own understanding in a satisfactory manner for
+the existence of most of the evils of life, but whether it will
+have the same effect upon others must be left to the judgement of
+his readers.
+
+If he should succeed in drawing the attention of more able
+men to what he conceives to be the principal difficulty in the
+way to the improvement of society and should, in consequence, see
+this difficulty removed, even in theory, he will gladly retract
+his present opinions and rejoice in a conviction of his error.
+
+                                     7 June 1798
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 1
+
+Question stated--Little prospect of a determination of it, from
+the enmity of the opposing parties--The principal argument
+against the perfectibility of man and of society has never been
+fairly answered--Nature of the difficulty arising from
+population--Outline of the principal argument of the Essay
+
+
+The great and unlooked for discoveries that have taken place of
+late years in natural philosophy, the increasing diffusion of
+general knowledge from the extension of the art of printing, the
+ardent and unshackled spirit of inquiry that prevails throughout
+the lettered and even unlettered world, the new and extraordinary
+lights that have been thrown on political subjects which dazzle
+and astonish the understanding, and particularly that tremendous
+phenomenon in the political horizon, the French Revolution,
+which, like a blazing comet, seems destined either to inspire
+with fresh life and vigour, or to scorch up and destroy the
+shrinking inhabitants of the earth, have all concurred to lead
+many able men into the opinion that we were touching on a period
+big with the most important changes, changes that would in some
+measure be decisive of the future fate of mankind.
+
+It has been said that the great question is now at issue,
+whether man shall henceforth start forwards with accelerated
+velocity towards illimitable, and hitherto unconceived
+improvement, or be condemned to a perpetual oscillation between
+happiness and misery, and after every effort remain still at an
+immeasurable distance from the wished-for goal.
+
+Yet, anxiously as every friend of mankind must look forwards
+to the termination of this painful suspense, and eagerly as the
+inquiring mind would hail every ray of light that might assist
+its view into futurity, it is much to be lamented that the
+writers on each side of this momentous question still keep far
+aloof from each other. Their mutual arguments do not meet with a
+candid examination. The question is not brought to rest on fewer
+points, and even in theory scarcely seems to be approaching to a
+decision.
+
+The advocate for the present order of things is apt to treat
+the sect of speculative philosophers either as a set of artful
+and designing knaves who preach up ardent benevolence and draw
+captivating pictures of a happier state of society only the
+better to enable them to destroy the present establishments and
+to forward their own deep-laid schemes of ambition, or as wild
+and mad-headed enthusiasts whose silly speculations and absurd
+paradoxes are not worthy the attention of any reasonable man.
+
+The advocate for the perfectibility of man, and of society,
+retorts on the defender of establishments a more than equal
+contempt. He brands him as the slave of the most miserable and
+narrow prejudices; or as the defender of the abuses of civil
+society only because he profits by them. He paints him either as
+a character who prostitutes his understanding to his interest, or
+as one whose powers of mind are not of a size to grasp any thing
+great and noble, who cannot see above five yards before him, and
+who must therefore be utterly unable to take in the views of the
+enlightened benefactor of mankind.
+
+In this unamicable contest the cause of truth cannot but
+suffer. The really good arguments on each side of the question
+are not allowed to have their proper weight. Each pursues his own
+theory, little solicitous to correct or improve it by an
+attention to what is advanced by his opponents.
+
+The friend of the present order of things condemns all
+political speculations in the gross. He will not even condescend
+to examine the grounds from which the perfectibility of society
+is inferred. Much less will he give himself the trouble in a fair
+and candid manner to attempt an exposition of their fallacy.
+
+The speculative philosopher equally offends against the cause
+of truth. With eyes fixed on a happier state of society, the
+blessings of which he paints in the most captivating colours, he
+allows himself to indulge in the most bitter invectives against
+every present establishment, without applying his talents to
+consider the best and safest means of removing abuses and without
+seeming to be aware of the tremendous obstacles that threaten,
+even in theory, to oppose the progress of man towards perfection.
+
+It is an acknowledged truth in philosophy that a just theory
+will always be confirmed by experiment. Yet so much friction, and
+so many minute circumstances occur in practice, which it is next
+to impossible for the most enlarged and penetrating mind to
+foresee, that on few subjects can any theory be pronounced just,
+till all the arguments against it have been maturely weighed and
+clearly and consistently refuted.
+
+I have read some of the speculations on the perfectibility of
+man and of society with great pleasure. I have been warmed and
+delighted with the enchanting picture which they hold forth. I
+ardently wish for such happy improvements. But I see great, and,
+to my understanding, unconquerable difficulties in the way to
+them. These difficulties it is my present purpose to state,
+declaring, at the same time, that so far from exulting in them,
+as a cause of triumph over the friends of innovation, nothing
+would give me greater pleasure than to see them completely
+removed.
+
+The most important argument that I shall adduce is certainly
+not new. The principles on which it depends have been explained
+in part by Hume, and more at large by Dr Adam Smith. It has been
+advanced and applied to the present subject, though not with its
+proper weight, or in the most forcible point of view, by Mr
+Wallace, and it may probably have been stated by many writers
+that I have never met with. I should certainly therefore not
+think of advancing it again, though I mean to place it in a point
+of view in some degree different from any that I have hitherto
+seen, if it had ever been fairly and satisfactorily answered.
+
+The cause of this neglect on the part of the advocates for
+the perfectibility of mankind is not easily accounted for. I
+cannot doubt the talents of such men as Godwin and Condorcet. I
+am unwilling to doubt their candour. To my understanding, and
+probably to that of most others, the difficulty appears
+insurmountable. Yet these men of acknowledged ability and
+penetration scarcely deign to notice it, and hold on their course
+in such speculations with unabated ardour and undiminished
+confidence. I have certainly no right to say that they purposely
+shut their eyes to such arguments. I ought rather to doubt the
+validity of them, when neglected by such men, however forcibly
+their truth may strike my own mind. Yet in this respect it must
+be acknowledged that we are all of us too prone to err. If I saw
+a glass of wine repeatedly presented to a man, and he took no
+notice of it, I should be apt to think that he was blind or
+uncivil. A juster philosophy might teach me rather to think that
+my eyes deceived me and that the offer was not really what I
+conceived it to be.
+
+In entering upon the argument I must premise that I put out
+of the question, at present, all mere conjectures, that is, all
+suppositions, the probable realization of which cannot be
+inferred upon any just philosophical grounds. A writer may tell
+me that he thinks man will ultimately become an ostrich. I cannot
+properly contradict him. But before he can expect to bring any
+reasonable person over to his opinion, he ought to shew that the
+necks of mankind have been gradually elongating, that the lips
+have grown harder and more prominent, that the legs and feet are
+daily altering their shape, and that the hair is beginning to
+change into stubs of feathers. And till the probability of so
+wonderful a conversion can be shewn, it is surely lost time and
+lost eloquence to expatiate on the happiness of man in such a
+state; to describe his powers, both of running and flying, to
+paint him in a condition where all narrow luxuries would be
+contemned, where he would be employed only in collecting the
+necessaries of life, and where, consequently, each man's share of
+labour would be light, and his portion of leisure ample.
+
+I think I may fairly make two postulata.
+
+First, That food is necessary to the existence of man.
+
+Secondly, That the passion between the sexes is necessary and
+will remain nearly in its present state.
+
+These two laws, ever since we have had any knowledge of
+mankind, appear to have been fixed laws of our nature, and, as we
+have not hitherto seen any alteration in them, we have no right
+to conclude that they will ever cease to be what they now are,
+without an immediate act of power in that Being who first
+arranged the system of the universe, and for the advantage of his
+creatures, still executes, according to fixed laws, all its
+various operations.
+
+I do not know that any writer has supposed that on this earth
+man will ultimately be able to live without food. But Mr Godwin
+has conjectured that the passion between the sexes may in time be
+extinguished. As, however, he calls this part of his work a
+deviation into the land of conjecture, I will not dwell longer
+upon it at present than to say that the best arguments for the
+perfectibility of man are drawn from a contemplation of the great
+progress that he has already made from the savage state and the
+difficulty of saying where he is to stop. But towards the
+extinction of the passion between the sexes, no progress whatever
+has hitherto been made. It appears to exist in as much force at
+present as it did two thousand or four thousand years ago. There
+are individual exceptions now as there always have been. But, as
+these exceptions do not appear to increase in number, it would
+surely be a very unphilosophical mode of arguing to infer, merely
+from the existence of an exception, that the exception would, in
+time, become the rule, and the rule the exception.
+
+Assuming then my postulata as granted, I say, that the power
+of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth
+to produce subsistence for man.
+
+Population, when unchecked, increases in a geometrical ratio.
+Subsistence increases only in an arithmetical ratio. A slight
+acquaintance with numbers will shew the immensity of the first
+power in comparison of the second.
+
+By that law of our nature which makes food necessary to the
+life of man, the effects of these two unequal powers must be kept
+equal.
+
+This implies a strong and constantly operating check on
+population from the difficulty of subsistence. This difficulty
+must fall somewhere and must necessarily be severely felt by a
+large portion of mankind.
+
+Through the animal and vegetable kingdoms, nature has
+scattered the seeds of life abroad with the most profuse and
+liberal hand. She has been comparatively sparing in the room and
+the nourishment necessary to rear them. The germs of existence
+contained in this spot of earth, with ample food, and ample room
+to expand in, would fill millions of worlds in the course of a
+few thousand years. Necessity, that imperious all pervading law
+of nature, restrains them within the prescribed bounds. The race
+of plants and the race of animals shrink under this great
+restrictive law. And the race of man cannot, by any efforts of
+reason, escape from it. Among plants and animals its effects are
+waste of seed, sickness, and premature death. Among mankind,
+misery and vice. The former, misery, is an absolutely necessary
+consequence of it. Vice is a highly probable consequence, and we
+therefore see it abundantly prevail, but it ought not, perhaps,
+to be called an absolutely necessary consequence. The ordeal of
+virtue is to resist all temptation to evil.
+
+This natural inequality of the two powers of population and
+of production in the earth, and that great law of our nature
+which must constantly keep their effects equal, form the great
+difficulty that to me appears insurmountable in the way to the
+perfectibility of society. All other arguments are of slight and
+subordinate consideration in comparison of this. I see no way by
+which man can escape from the weight of this law which pervades
+all animated nature. No fancied equality, no agrarian regulations
+in their utmost extent, could remove the pressure of it even for
+a single century. And it appears, therefore, to be decisive
+against the possible existence of a society, all the members of
+which should live in ease, happiness, and comparative leisure;
+and feel no anxiety about providing the means of subsistence for
+themselves and families.
+
+Consequently, if the premises are just, the argument is
+conclusive against the perfectibility of the mass of mankind.
+
+I have thus sketched the general outline of the argument, but
+I will examine it more particularly, and I think it will be found
+that experience, the true source and foundation of all knowledge,
+invariably confirms its truth.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 2
+
+The different ratio in which population and food increase--The
+necessary effects of these different ratios of increase--
+Oscillation produced by them in the condition of the lower
+classes of society--Reasons why this oscillation has not been so
+much observed as might be expected--Three propositions on which
+the general argument of the Essay depends--The different states
+in which mankind have been known to exist proposed to be examined
+with reference to these three propositions.
+
+
+I said that population, when unchecked, increased in a
+geometrical ratio, and subsistence for man in an arithmetical
+ratio.
+
+Let us examine whether this position be just. I think it will
+be allowed, that no state has hitherto existed (at least that we
+have any account of) where the manners were so pure and simple,
+and the means of subsistence so abundant, that no check whatever
+has existed to early marriages, among the lower classes, from a
+fear of not providing well for their families, or among the
+higher classes, from a fear of lowering their condition in life.
+Consequently in no state that we have yet known has the power of
+population been left to exert itself with perfect freedom.
+
+Whether the law of marriage be instituted or not, the dictate
+of nature and virtue seems to be an early attachment to one
+woman. Supposing a liberty of changing in the case of an
+unfortunate choice, this liberty would not affect population till
+it arose to a height greatly vicious; and we are now supposing
+the existence of a society where vice is scarcely known.
+
+In a state therefore of great equality and virtue, where pure
+and simple manners prevailed, and where the means of subsistence
+were so abundant that no part of the society could have any fears
+about providing amply for a family, the power of population being
+left to exert itself unchecked, the increase of the human species
+would evidently be much greater than any increase that has been
+hitherto known.
+
+In the United States of America, where the means of
+subsistence have been more ample, the manners of the people more
+pure, and consequently the checks to early marriages fewer, than
+in any of the modern states of Europe, the population has been
+found to double itself in twenty-five years.
+
+This ratio of increase, though short of the utmost power of
+population, yet as the result of actual experience, we will take
+as our rule, and say, that population, when unchecked, goes on
+doubling itself every twenty-five years or increases in a
+geometrical ratio.
+
+Let us now take any spot of earth, this Island for instance,
+and see in what ratio the subsistence it affords can be supposed
+to increase. We will begin with it under its present state of
+cultivation.
+
+If I allow that by the best possible policy, by breaking up
+more land and by great encouragements to agriculture, the produce
+of this Island may be doubled in the first twenty-five years, I
+think it will be allowing as much as any person can well demand.
+
+In the next twenty-five years, it is impossible to suppose
+that the produce could be quadrupled. It would be contrary to all
+our knowledge of the qualities of land. The very utmost that we
+can conceive, is, that the increase in the second twenty-five
+years might equal the present produce. Let us then take this for
+our rule, though certainly far beyond the truth, and allow that,
+by great exertion, the whole produce of the Island might be
+increased every twenty-five years, by a quantity of subsistence
+equal to what it at present produces. The most enthusiastic
+speculator cannot suppose a greater increase than this. In a few
+centuries it would make every acre of land in the Island like a
+garden.
+
+Yet this ratio of increase is evidently arithmetical.
+
+It may be fairly said, therefore, that the means of
+subsistence increase in an arithmetical ratio. Let us now bring
+the effects of these two ratios together.
+
+The population of the Island is computed to be about seven
+millions, and we will suppose the present produce equal to the
+support of such a number. In the first twenty-five years the
+population would be fourteen millions, and the food being also
+doubled, the means of subsistence would be equal to this
+increase. In the next twenty-five years the population would be
+twenty-eight millions, and the means of subsistence only equal to
+the support of twenty-one millions. In the next period, the
+population would be fifty-six millions, and the means of
+subsistence just sufficient for half that number. And at the
+conclusion of the first century the population would be one
+hundred and twelve millions and the means of subsistence only
+equal to the support of thirty-five millions, which would leave a
+population of seventy-seven millions totally unprovided for.
+
+A great emigration necessarily implies unhappiness of some
+kind or other in the country that is deserted. For few persons
+will leave their families, connections, friends, and native land,
+to seek a settlement in untried foreign climes, without some
+strong subsisting causes of uneasiness where they are, or the
+hope of some great advantages in the place to which they are
+going.
+
+But to make the argument more general and less interrupted by
+the partial views of emigration, let us take the whole earth,
+instead of one spot, and suppose that the restraints to
+population were universally removed. If the subsistence for man
+that the earth affords was to be increased every twenty-five
+years by a quantity equal to what the whole world at present
+produces, this would allow the power of production in the earth
+to be absolutely unlimited, and its ratio of increase much
+greater than we can conceive that any possible exertions of
+mankind could make it.
+
+Taking the population of the world at any number, a thousand
+millions, for instance, the human species would increase in the
+ratio of--1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, etc. and
+subsistence as--1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, etc. In two
+centuries and a quarter, the population would be to the means of
+subsistence as 512 to 10: in three centuries as 4096 to 13, and
+in two thousand years the difference would be almost
+incalculable, though the produce in that time would have
+increased to an immense extent.
+
+No limits whatever are placed to the productions of the
+earth; they may increase for ever and be greater than any
+assignable quantity, yet still the power of population being a
+power of a superior order, the increase of the human species can
+only be kept commensurate to the increase of the means of
+subsistence by the constant operation of the strong law of
+necessity acting as a check upon the greater power.
+
+The effects of this check remain now to be considered.
+
+Among plants and animals the view of the subject is simple.
+They are all impelled by a powerful instinct to the increase of
+their species, and this instinct is interrupted by no reasoning
+or doubts about providing for their offspring. Wherever therefore
+there is liberty, the power of increase is exerted, and the
+superabundant effects are repressed afterwards by want of room
+and nourishment, which is common to animals and plants, and among
+animals by becoming the prey of others.
+
+The effects of this check on man are more complicated.
+Impelled to the increase of his species by an equally powerful
+instinct, reason interrupts his career and asks him whether he
+may not bring beings into the world for whom he cannot provide
+the means of subsistence. In a state of equality, this would be
+the simple question. In the present state of society, other
+considerations occur. Will he not lower his rank in life? Will he
+not subject himself to greater difficulties than he at present
+feels? Will he not be obliged to labour harder? and if he has a
+large family, will his utmost exertions enable him to support
+them? May he not see his offspring in rags and misery, and
+clamouring for bread that he cannot give them? And may he not be
+reduced to the grating necessity of forfeiting his independence,
+and of being obliged to the sparing hand of charity for support?
+
+These considerations are calculated to prevent, and certainly
+do prevent, a very great number in all civilized nations from
+pursuing the dictate of nature in an early attachment to one
+woman. And this restraint almost necessarily, though not
+absolutely so, produces vice. Yet in all societies, even those
+that are most vicious, the tendency to a virtuous attachment is
+so strong that there is a constant effort towards an increase of
+population. This constant effort as constantly tends to subject
+the lower classes of the society to distress and to prevent any
+great permanent amelioration of their condition.
+
+The way in which, these effects are produced seems to be
+this. We will suppose the means of subsistence in any country
+just equal to the easy support of its inhabitants. The constant
+effort towards population, which is found to act even in the most
+vicious societies, increases the number of people before the
+means of subsistence are increased. The food therefore which
+before supported seven millions must now be divided among seven
+millions and a half or eight millions. The poor consequently must
+live much worse, and many of them be reduced to severe distress.
+The number of labourers also being above the proportion of the
+work in the market, the price of labour must tend toward a
+decrease, while the price of provisions would at the same time
+tend to rise. The labourer therefore must work harder to earn the
+same as he did before. During this season of distress, the
+discouragements to marriage, and the difficulty of rearing a
+family are so great that population is at a stand. In the mean
+time the cheapness of labour, the plenty of labourers, and the
+necessity of an increased industry amongst them, encourage
+cultivators to employ more labour upon their land, to turn up
+fresh soil, and to manure and improve more completely what is
+already in tillage, till ultimately the means of subsistence
+become in the same proportion to the population as at the period
+from which we set out. The situation of the labourer being then
+again tolerably comfortable, the restraints to population are in
+some degree loosened, and the same retrograde and progressive
+movements with respect to happiness are repeated.
+
+This sort of oscillation will not be remarked by superficial
+observers, and it may be difficult even for the most penetrating
+mind to calculate its periods. Yet that in all old states some
+such vibration does exist, though from various transverse causes,
+in a much less marked, and in a much more irregular manner than I
+have described it, no reflecting man who considers the subject
+deeply can well doubt.
+
+Many reasons occur why this oscillation has been less
+obvious, and less decidedly confirmed by experience, than might
+naturally be expected.
+
+One principal reason is that the histories of mankind that we
+possess are histories only of the higher classes. We have but few
+accounts that can be depended upon of the manners and customs of
+that part of mankind where these retrograde and progressive
+movements chiefly take place. A satisfactory history of this
+kind, on one people, and of one period, would require the
+constant and minute attention of an observing mind during a long
+life. Some of the objects of inquiry would be, in what proportion
+to the number of adults was the number of marriages, to what
+extent vicious customs prevailed in consequence of the restraints
+upon matrimony, what was the comparative mortality among the
+children of the most distressed part of the community and those
+who lived rather more at their ease, what were the variations in
+the real price of labour, and what were the observable
+differences in the state of the lower classes of society with
+respect to ease and happiness, at different times during a
+certain period.
+
+Such a history would tend greatly to elucidate the manner in
+which the constant check upon population acts and would probably
+prove the existence of the retrograde and progressive movements
+that have been mentioned, though the times of their vibrations
+must necessarily be rendered irregular from the operation of many
+interrupting causes, such as the introduction or failure of
+certain manufactures, a greater or less prevalent spirit of
+agricultural enterprise, years of plenty, or years of scarcity,
+wars and pestilence, poor laws, the invention of processes for
+shortening labour without the proportional extension of the
+market for the commodity, and, particularly, the difference
+between the nominal and real price of labour, a circumstance
+which has perhaps more than any other contributed to conceal this
+oscillation from common view.
+
+It very rarely happens that the nominal price of labour
+universally falls, but we well know that it frequently remains
+the same, while the nominal price of provisions has been
+gradually increasing. This is, in effect, a real fall in the
+price of labour, and during this period the condition of the
+lower orders of the community must gradually grow worse and
+worse. But the farmers and capitalists are growing rich from the
+real cheapness of labour. Their increased capitals enable them to
+employ a greater number of men. Work therefore may be plentiful,
+and the price of labour would consequently rise. But the want of
+freedom in the market of labour, which occurs more or less in all
+communities, either from parish laws, or the more general cause
+of the facility of combination among the rich, and its difficulty
+among the poor, operates to prevent the price of labour from
+rising at the natural period, and keeps it down some time longer;
+perhaps till a year of scarcity, when the clamour is too loud and
+the necessity too apparent to be resisted.
+
+The true cause of the advance in the price of labour is thus
+concealed, and the rich affect to grant it as an act of
+compassion and favour to the poor, in consideration of a year of
+scarcity, and, when plenty returns, indulge themselves in the
+most unreasonable of all complaints, that the price does not
+again fall, when a little rejection would shew them that it must
+have risen long before but from an unjust conspiracy of their
+own.
+
+But though the rich by unfair combinations contribute
+frequently to prolong a season of distress among the poor, yet no
+possible form of society could prevent the almost constant action
+of misery upon a great part of mankind, if in a state of
+inequality, and upon all, if all were equal.
+
+The theory on which the truth of this position depends
+appears to me so extremely clear that I feel at a loss to
+conjecture what part of it can be denied.
+
+That population cannot increase without the means of
+subsistence is a proposition so evident that it needs no
+illustration.
+
+That population does invariably increase where there are the
+means of subsistence, the history of every people that have ever
+existed will abundantly prove.
+
+And that the superior power of population cannot be checked
+without producing misery or vice, the ample portion of these too
+bitter ingredients in the cup of human life and the continuance
+of the physical causes that seem to have produced them bear too
+convincing a testimony.
+
+But, in order more fully to ascertain the validity of these
+three propositions, let us examine the different states in which
+mankind have been known to exist. Even a cursory review will, I
+think, be sufficient to convince us that these propositions are
+incontrovertible truths.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 3
+
+The savage or hunter state shortly reviewed--The shepherd state,
+or the tribes of barbarians that overran the Roman Empire--The
+superiority of the power of population to the means of
+subsistence--the cause of the great tide of Northern Emigration.
+
+
+In the rudest state of mankind, in which hunting is the principal
+occupation, and the only mode of acquiring food; the means of
+subsistence being scattered over a large extent of territory, the
+comparative population must necessarily be thin. It is said that
+the passion between the sexes is less ardent among the North
+American Indians, than among any other race of men. Yet,
+notwithstanding this apathy, the effort towards population, even
+in this people, seems to be always greater than the means to
+support it. This appears, from the comparatively rapid population
+that takes place, whenever any of the tribes happen to settle in
+some fertile spot, and to draw nourishment from more fruitful
+sources than that of hunting; and it has been frequently remarked
+that when an Indian family has taken up its abode near any
+European settlement, and adopted a more easy and civilized mode of
+life, that one woman has reared five, or six, or more children;
+though in the savage state it rarely happens that above one or
+two in a family grow up to maturity. The same observation has
+been made with regard to the Hottentots near the Cape. These
+facts prove the superior power of population to the means of
+subsistence in nations of hunters, and that this power always
+shews itself the moment it is left to act with freedom.
+
+It remains to inquire whether this power can be checked, and
+its effects kept equal to the means of subsistence, without vice
+or misery.
+
+The North American Indians, considered as a people, cannot
+justly be called free and equal. In all the accounts we have of
+them, and, indeed, of most other savage nations, the women are
+represented as much more completely in a state of slavery to the
+men than the poor are to the rich in civilized countries. One
+half the nation appears to act as Helots to the other half, and
+the misery that checks population falls chiefly, as it always
+must do, upon that part whose condition is lowest in the scale of
+society. The infancy of man in the simplest state requires
+considerable attention, but this necessary attention the women
+cannot give, condemned as they are to the inconveniences and
+hardships of frequent change of place and to the constant and
+unremitting drudgery of preparing every thing for the reception
+of their tyrannic lords. These exertions, sometimes during
+pregnancy or with children at their backs, must occasion frequent
+miscarriages, and prevent any but the most robust infants from
+growing to maturity. Add to these hardships of the women the
+constant war that prevails among savages, and the necessity which
+they frequently labour under of exposing their aged and helpless
+parents, and of thus violating the first feelings of nature, and
+the picture will not appear very free from the blot of misery. In
+estimating the happiness of a savage nation, we must not fix our
+eyes only on the warrior in the prime of life: he is one of a
+hundred: he is the gentleman, the man of fortune, the chances
+have been in his favour and many efforts have failed ere this
+fortunate being was produced, whose guardian genius should
+preserve him through the numberless dangers with which he would
+be surrounded from infancy to manhood. The true points of
+comparison between two nations seem to be the ranks in each which
+appear nearest to answer to each other. And in this view, I
+should compare the warriors in the prime of life with the
+gentlemen, and the women, children, and aged, with the lower
+classes of the community in civilized states.
+
+May we not then fairly infer from this short review, or
+rather, from the accounts that may be referred to of nations of
+hunters, that their population is thin from the scarcity of food,
+that it would immediately increase if food was in greater plenty,
+and that, putting vice out of the question among savages, misery
+is the check that represses the superior power of population and
+keeps its effects equal to the means of subsistence. Actual
+observation and experience tell us that this check, with a few
+local and temporary exceptions, is constantly acting now upon all
+savage nations, and the theory indicates that it probably acted
+with nearly equal strength a thousand years ago, and it may not
+be much greater a thousand years hence.
+
+Of the manners and habits that prevail among nations of
+shepherds, the next state of mankind, we are even more ignorant
+than of the savage state. But that these nations could not escape
+the general lot of misery arising from the want of subsistence,
+Europe, and all the fairest countries in the world, bear ample
+testimony. Want was the goad that drove the Scythian shepherds
+from their native haunts, like so many famished wolves in search
+of prey. Set in motion by this all powerful cause, clouds of
+Barbarians seemed to collect from all points of the northern
+hemisphere. Gathering fresh darkness and terror as they rolled
+on, the congregated bodies at length obscured the sun of Italy
+and sunk the whole world in universal night. These tremendous
+effects, so long and so deeply felt throughout the fairest
+portions of the earth, may be traced to the simple cause of the
+superior power of population to the means of subsistence.
+
+It is well known that a country in pasture cannot support so
+many inhabitants as a country in tillage, but what renders
+nations of shepherds so formidable is the power which they
+possess of moving all together and the necessity they frequently
+feel of exerting this power in search of fresh pasture for their
+herds. A tribe that was rich in cattle had an immediate plenty of
+food. Even the parent stock might be devoured in a case of
+absolute necessity. The women lived in greater ease than among
+nations of hunters. The men bold in their united strength and
+confiding in their power of procuring pasture for their cattle by
+change of place, felt, probably, but few fears about providing
+for a family. These combined causes soon produced their natural
+and invariable effect, an extended population. A more frequent
+and rapid change of place became then necessary. A wider and more
+extensive territory was successively occupied. A broader
+desolation extended all around them. Want pinched the less
+fortunate members of the society, and, at length, the
+impossibility of supporting such a number together became too
+evident to be resisted. Young scions were then pushed out from
+the parent-stock and instructed to explore fresh regions and to
+gain happier seats for themselves by their swords. 'The world was
+all before them where to choose.' Restless from present distress,
+flushed with the hope of fairer prospects, and animated with the
+spirit of hardy enterprise, these daring adventurers were likely
+to become formidable adversaries to all who opposed them. The
+peaceful inhabitants of the countries on which they rushed could
+not long withstand the energy of men acting under such powerful
+motives of exertion. And when they fell in with any tribes like
+their own, the contest was a struggle for existence, and they
+fought with a desperate courage, inspired by the rejection that
+death was the punishment of defeat and life the prize of victory.
+
+In these savage contests many tribes must have been utterly
+exterminated. Some, probably, perished by hardship and famine.
+Others, whose leading star had given them a happier direction,
+became great and powerful tribes, and, in their turns, sent off
+fresh adventurers in search of still more fertile seats. The
+prodigious waste of human life occasioned by this perpetual
+struggle for room and food was more than supplied by the mighty
+power of population, acting, in some degree, unshackled from the
+consent habit of emigration. The tribes that migrated towards the
+South, though they won these more fruitful regions by continual
+battles, rapidly increased in number and power, from the
+increased means of subsistence. Till at length the whole
+territory, from the confines of China to the shores of the
+Baltic, was peopled by a various race of Barbarians, brave,
+robust, and enterprising, inured to hardship, and delighting in
+war. Some tribes maintained their independence. Others ranged
+themselves under the standard of some barbaric chieftain who led
+them to victory after victory, and what was of more importance,
+to regions abounding in corn, wine, and oil, the long wished for
+consummation, and great reward of their labours. An Alaric, an
+Attila, or a Zingis Khan, and the chiefs around them, might fight
+for glory, for the fame of extensive conquests, but the true
+cause that set in motion the great tide of northern emigration,
+and that continued to propel it till it rolled at different
+periods against China, Persia, Italy, and even Egypt, was a
+scarcity of food, a population extended beyond the means of
+supporting it.
+
+The absolute population at any one period, in proportion to
+the extent of territory, could never be great, on account of the
+unproductive nature of some of the regions occupied; but there
+appears to have been a most rapid succession of human beings, and
+as fast as some were mowed down by the scythe of war or of
+famine, others rose in increased numbers to supply their place.
+Among these bold and improvident Barbarians, population was
+probably but little checked, as in modern states, from a fear of
+future difficulties. A prevailing hope of bettering their
+condition by change of place, a constant expectation of plunder,
+a power even, if distressed, of selling their children as slaves,
+added to the natural carelessness of the barbaric character, all
+conspired to raise a population which remained to be repressed
+afterwards by famine or war.
+
+Where there is any inequality of conditions, and among
+nations of shepherds this soon takes place, the distress arising
+from a scarcity of provisions must fall hardest upon the least
+fortunate members of the society. This distress also must
+frequently have been felt by the women, exposed to casual plunder
+in the absence of their husbands, and subject to continual
+disappointments in their expected return.
+
+But without knowing enough of the minute and intimate history
+of these people, to point out precisely on what part the distress
+for want of food chiefly fell, and to what extent it was
+generally felt, I think we may fairly say, from all the accounts
+that we have of nations of shepherds, that population invariably
+increased among them whenever, by emigration or any other cause,
+the means of subsistence were increased, and that a further
+population was checked, and the actual population kept equal to
+the means of subsistence, by misery and vice.
+
+For, independently of any vicious customs that might have
+prevailed amongst them with regard to women, which always operate
+as checks to population, it must be acknowledged, I think, that
+the commission of war is vice, and the effect of it misery, and
+none can doubt the misery of want of food.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 4
+
+State of civilized nations--Probability that Europe is much more
+populous now than in the time of Julius Caesar--Best criterion
+of population--Probable error of Hume in one the criterions that
+he proposes as assisting in an estimate of population--Slow
+increase of population at present in most of the states of Europe
+--The two principal checks to population--The first, or
+preventive check examined with regard to England.
+
+
+In examining the next state of mankind with relation to the
+question before us, the state of mixed pasture and tillage, in
+which with some variation in the proportions the most civilized
+nations must always remain, we shall be assisted in our review by
+what we daily see around us, by actual experience, by facts that
+come within the scope of every man's observation.
+
+Notwithstanding the exaggerations of some old historians,
+there can remain no doubt in the mind of any thinking man that
+the population of the principal countries of Europe, France,
+England, Germany, Russia, Poland, Sweden, and Denmark is much
+greater than ever it was in former times. The obvious reason of
+these exaggerations is the formidable aspect that even a thinly
+peopled nation must have, when collected together and moving all
+at once in search of fresh seats. If to this tremendous
+appearance be added a succession at certain intervals of similar
+emigrations, we shall not be much surprised that the fears of
+the timid nations of the South represented the North as a region
+absolutely swarming with human beings. A nearer and juster view
+of the subject at present enables us to see that the inference
+was as absurd as if a man in this country, who was continually
+meeting on the road droves of cattle from Wales and the North,
+was immediately to conclude that these countries were the most
+productive of all the parts of the kingdom.
+
+The reason that the greater part of Europe is more populous
+now than it was in former times, is that the industry of the
+inhabitants has made these countries produce a greater quantity
+of human subsistence. For I conceive that it may be laid down as
+a position not to be controverted, that, taking a sufficient
+extent of territory to include within it exportation and
+importation, and allowing some variation for the prevalence of
+luxury, or of frugal habits, that population constantly bears a
+regular proportion to the food that the earth is made to produce.
+In the controversy concerning the populousness of ancient and
+modern nations, could it be clearly ascertained that the average
+produce of the countries in question, taken altogether, is
+greater now than it was in the times of Julius Caesar, the
+dispute would be at once determined.
+
+When we are assured that China is the most fertile country in
+the world, that almost all the land is in tillage, and that a
+great part of it bears two crops every year, and further, that
+the people live very frugally, we may infer with certainty that
+the population must be immense, without busying ourselves in
+inquiries into the manners and habits of the lower classes and
+the encouragements to early marriages. But these inquiries are of
+the utmost importance, and a minute history of the customs of the
+lower Chinese would be of the greatest use in ascertaining in
+what manner the checks to a further population operate; what are
+the vices, and what are the distresses that prevent an increase
+of numbers beyond the ability of the country to support.
+
+Hume, in his essay on the populousness of ancient and modern
+nations, when he intermingles, as he says, an inquiry concerning
+causes with that concerning facts, does not seem to see with his
+usual penetration how very little some of the causes he alludes
+to could enable him to form any judgement of the actual
+population of ancient nations. If any inference can be drawn from
+them, perhaps it should be directly the reverse of what Hume
+draws, though I certainly ought to speak with great diffidence in
+dissenting from a man who of all others on such subjects was the
+least likely to be deceived by first appearances. If I find that
+at a certain period in ancient history, the encouragements to
+have a family were great, that early marriages were consequently
+very prevalent, and that few persons remained single, I should
+infer with certainty that population was rapidly increasing, but
+by no means that it was then actually very great, rather; indeed,
+the contrary, that it was then thin and that there was room and
+food for a much greater number. On the other hand, if I find that
+at this period the difficulties attending a family were very
+great, that, consequently, few early marriages took place, and
+that a great number of both sexes remained single, I infer with
+certainty that population was at a stand, and, probably, because
+the actual population was very great in proportion to the
+fertility of the land and that there was scarcely room and food
+for more. The number of footmen, housemaids, and other persons
+remaining unmarried in modern states, Hume allows to be rather an
+argument against their population. I should rather draw a
+contrary inference and consider it an argument of their fullness,
+though this inference is not certain, because there are many
+thinly inhabited states that are yet stationary in their
+population. To speak, therefore, correctly, perhaps it may be
+said that the number of unmarried persons in proportion to the
+whole number, existing at different periods, in the same or
+different states will enable us to judge whether population at
+these periods was increasing, stationary, or decreasing, but will
+form no criterion by which we can determine the actual
+population.
+
+There is, however, a circumstance taken notice of in most of
+the accounts we have of China that it seems difficult to
+reconcile with this reasoning. It is said that early marriages
+very generally prevail through all the ranks of the Chinese. Yet
+Dr Adam Smith supposes that population in China is stationary.
+These two circumstances appear to be irreconcilable. It certainly
+seems very little probable that the population of China is fast
+increasing. Every acre of land has been so long in cultivation
+that we can hardly conceive there is any great yearly addition to
+the average produce. The fact, perhaps, of the universality of
+early marriages may not be sufficiently ascertained. If it be
+supposed true, the only way of accounting for the difficulty,
+with our present knowledge of the subject, appears to be that the
+redundant population, necessarily occasioned by the prevalence of
+early marriages, must be repressed by occasional famines, and by
+the custom of exposing children, which, in times of distress, is
+probably more frequent than is ever acknowledged to Europeans.
+Relative to this barbarous practice, it is difficult to avoid
+remarking, that there cannot be a stronger proof of the
+distresses that have been felt by mankind for want of food, than
+the existence of a custom that thus violates the most natural
+principle of the human heart. It appears to have been very
+general among ancient nations, and certainly tended rather to
+increase population.
+
+In examining the principal states of modern Europe, we shall
+find that though they have increased very considerably in
+population since they were nations of shepherds, yet that at
+present their progress is but slow, and instead of doubling their
+numbers every twenty-five years they require three or four
+hundred years, or more, for that purpose. Some, indeed, may be
+absolutely stationary, and others even retrograde. The cause of
+this slow progress in population cannot be traced to a decay of
+the passion between the sexes. We have sufficient reason to think
+that this natural propensity exists still in undiminished vigour.
+Why then do not its effects appear in a rapid increase of the
+human species? An intimate view of the state of society in any
+one country in Europe, which may serve equally for all, will
+enable us to answer this question, and to say that a foresight of
+the difficulties attending the rearing of a family acts as a
+preventive check, and the actual distresses of some of the lower
+classes, by which they are disabled from giving the proper food
+and attention to their children, act as a positive check to the
+natural increase of population.
+
+England, as one of the most flourishing states of Europe, may
+be fairly taken for an example, and the observations made will
+apply with but little variation to any other country where the
+population increases slowly.
+
+The preventive check appears to operate in some degree
+through all the ranks of society in England. There are some men,
+even in the highest rank, who are prevented from marrying by the
+idea of the expenses that they must retrench, and the fancied
+pleasures that they must deprive themselves of, on the
+supposition of having a family. These considerations are
+certainly trivial, but a preventive foresight of this kind has
+objects of much greater weight for its contemplation as we go
+lower.
+
+A man of liberal education, but with an income only just
+sufficient to enable him to associate in the rank of gentlemen,
+must feel absolutely certain that if he marries and has a family
+he shall be obliged, if he mixes at all in society, to rank
+himself with moderate farmers and the lower class of tradesmen.
+The woman that a man of education would naturally make the object
+of his choice would be one brought up in the same tastes and
+sentiments with himself and used to the familiar intercourse of a
+society totally different from that to which she must be reduced
+by marriage. Can a man consent to place the object of his
+affection in a situation so discordant, probably, to her tastes
+and inclinations? Two or three steps of descent in society,
+particularly at this round of the ladder, where education ends
+and ignorance begins, will not be considered by the generality of
+people as a fancied and chimerical, but a real and essential
+evil. If society be held desirable, it surely must be free,
+equal, and reciprocal society, where benefits are conferred as
+well as received, and not such as the dependent finds with his
+patron or the poor with the rich.
+
+These considerations undoubtedly prevent a great number in
+this rank of life from following the bent of their inclinations
+in an early attachment. Others, guided either by a stronger
+passion, or a weaker judgement, break through these restraints,
+and it would be hard indeed, if the gratification of so
+delightful a passion as virtuous love, did not, sometimes, more
+than counterbalance all its attendant evils. But I fear it must
+be owned that the more general consequences of such marriages are
+rather calculated to justify than to repress the forebodings of
+the prudent.
+
+The sons of tradesmen and farmers are exhorted not to marry,
+and generally find it necessary to pursue this advice till they
+are settled in some business or farm that may enable them to
+support a family. These events may not, perhaps, occur till they
+are far advanced in life. The scarcity of farms is a very general
+complaint in England. And the competition in every kind of
+business is so great that it is not possible that all should be
+successful.
+
+The labourer who earns eighteen pence a day and lives with
+some degree of comfort as a single man, will hesitate a little
+before he divides that pittance among four or five, which seems
+to be but just sufficient for one. Harder fare and harder labour
+he would submit to for the sake of living with the woman that he
+loves, but he must feel conscious, if he thinks at all, that
+should he have a large family, and any ill luck whatever, no
+degree of frugality, no possible exertion of his manual strength
+could preserve him from the heart-rending sensation of seeing his
+children starve, or of forfeiting his independence, and being
+obliged to the parish for their support. The love of independence
+is a sentiment that surely none would wish to be erased from the
+breast of man, though the parish law of England, it must be
+confessed, is a system of all others the most calculated
+gradually to weaken this sentiment, and in the end may eradicate
+it completely.
+
+The servants who live in gentlemen's families have restraints
+that are yet stronger to break through in venturing upon
+marriage. They possess the necessaries, and even the comforts of
+life, almost in as great plenty as their masters. Their work is
+easy and their food luxurious compared with the class of
+labourers. And their sense of dependence is weakened by the
+conscious power of changing their masters, if they feel
+themselves offended. Thus comfortably situated at present, what
+are their prospects in marrying? Without knowledge or capital,
+either for business, or farming, and unused and therefore unable,
+to earn a subsistence by daily labour, their only refuge seems to
+be a miserable ale-house, which certainly offers no very
+enchanting prospect of a happy evening to their lives. By much
+the greater part, therefore, deterred by this uninviting view of
+their future situation, content themselves with remaining single
+where they are.
+
+If this sketch of the state of society in England be near the
+truth, and I do not conceive that it is exaggerated, it will be
+allowed that the preventive check to population in this country
+operates, though with varied force, through all the classes of
+the community. The same observation will hold true with regard to
+all old states. The effects, indeed, of these restraints upon
+marriage are but too conspicuous in the consequent vices that are
+produced in almost every part of the world, vices that are
+continually involving both sexes in inextricable unhappiness.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 5
+
+The second, or positive check to population examined, in England
+--The true cause why the immense sum collected in England for the
+poor does not better their condition--The powerful tendency of
+the poor laws to defeat their own purpose--Palliative of the
+distresses of the poor proposed--The absolute impossibility,
+from the fixed laws of our nature, that the pressure of want can
+ever be completely removed from the lower classes of society--
+All the checks to population may be resolved into misery or vice.
+
+
+The positive check to population, by which I mean the check that
+represses an increase which is already begun, is confined
+chiefly, though not perhaps solely, to the lowest orders of
+society.
+
+This check is not so obvious to common view as the other I have
+mentioned, and, to prove distinctly the force and extent of its
+operation would require, perhaps, more data than we are in
+possession of. But I believe it has been very generally remarked
+by those who have attended to bills of mortality that of the
+number of children who die annually, much too great a proportion
+belongs to those who may be supposed unable to give their
+offspring proper food and attention, exposed as they are
+occasionally to severe distress and confined, perhaps, to
+unwholesome habitations and hard labour. This mortality among the
+children of the poor has been constantly taken notice of in all
+towns. It certainly does not prevail in an equal degree in the
+country, but the subject has not hitherto received sufficient
+attention to enable anyone to say that there are not more deaths
+in proportion among the children of the poor, even in the
+country, than among those of the middling and higher classes.
+Indeed, it seems difficult to suppose that a labourer's wife who
+has six children, and who is sometimes in absolute want of bread,
+should be able always to give them the food and attention
+necessary to support life. The sons and daughters of peasants
+will not be found such rosy cherubs in real life as they are
+described to be in romances. It cannot fail to be remarked by
+those who live much in the country that the sons of labourers are
+very apt to be stunted in their growth, and are a long while
+arriving at maturity. Boys that you would guess to be fourteen or
+fifteen are, upon inquiry, frequently found to be eighteen or
+nineteen. And the lads who drive plough, which must certainly be
+a healthy exercise, are very rarely seen with any appearance of
+calves to their legs: a circumstance which can only be attributed
+to a want either of proper or of sufficient nourishment.
+
+To remedy the frequent distresses of the common people, the
+poor laws of England have been instituted; but it is to be
+feared, that though they may have alleviated a little the
+intensity of individual misfortune, they have spread the general
+evil over a much larger surface. It is a subject often started in
+conversation and mentioned always as a matter of great surprise
+that, notwithstanding the immense sum that is annually collected
+for the poor in England, there is still so much distress among
+them. Some think that the money must be embezzled, others that
+the church-wardens and overseers consume the greater part of it
+in dinners. All agree that somehow or other it must be very
+ill-managed. In short the fact that nearly three millions are
+collected annually for the poor and yet that their distresses are
+not removed is the subject of continual astonishment. But a man
+who sees a little below the surface of things would be very much
+more astonished if the fact were otherwise than it is observed to
+be, or even if a collection universally of eighteen shillings in
+the pound, instead of four, were materially to alter it. I will
+state a case which I hope will elucidate my meaning.
+
+Suppose that by a subscription of the rich the eighteen pence
+a day which men earn now was made up five shillings, it might be
+imagined, perhaps, that they would then be able to live
+comfortably and have a piece of meat every day for their dinners.
+But this would be a very false conclusion. The transfer of three
+shillings and sixpence a day to every labourer would not increase
+the quantity of meat in the country. There is not at present
+enough for all to have a decent share. What would then be the
+consequence? The competition among the buyers in the market of
+meat would rapidly raise the price from sixpence or sevenpence,
+to two or three shillings in the pound, and the commodity would
+not be divided among many more than it is at present. When an
+article is scarce, and cannot be distributed to all, he that can
+shew the most valid patent, that is, he that offers most money,
+becomes the possessor. If we can suppose the competition among
+the buyers of meat to continue long enough for a greater number
+of cattle to be reared annually, this could only be done at the
+expense of the corn, which would be a very disadvantagous
+exchange, for it is well known that the country could not then
+support the same population, and when subsistence is scarce in
+proportion to the number of people, it is of little consequence
+whether the lowest members of the society possess eighteen pence
+or five shillings. They must at all events be reduced to live
+upon the hardest fare and in the smallest quantity.
+
+It will be said, perhaps, that the increased number of
+purchasers in every article would give a spur to productive
+industry and that the whole produce of the island would be
+increased. This might in some degree be the case. But the spur
+that these fancied riches would give to population would more
+than counterbalance it, and the increased produce would be to be
+divided among a more than proportionably increased number of
+people. All this time I am supposing that the same quantity of
+work would be done as before. But this would not really take
+place. The receipt of five shillings a day, instead of eighteen
+pence, would make every man fancy himself comparatively rich and
+able to indulge himself in many hours or days of leisure. This
+would give a strong and immediate check to productive industry,
+and, in a short time, not only the nation would be poorer, but
+the lower classes themselves would be much more distressed than
+when they received only eighteen pence a day.
+
+A collection from the rich of eighteen shillings in the
+pound, even if distributed in the most judicious manner, would
+have a little the same effect as that resulting from the
+supposition I have just made, and no possible contributions or
+sacrifices of the rich, particularly in money, could for any time
+prevent the recurrence of distress among the lower members of
+society, whoever they were. Great changes might, indeed, be made.
+The rich might become poor, and some of the poor rich, but a part
+of the society must necessarily feel a difficulty of living, and
+this difficulty will naturally fall on the least fortunate
+members.
+
+It may at first appear strange, but I believe it is true,
+that I cannot by means of money raise a poor man and enable him
+to live much better than he did before, without proportionably
+depressing others in the same class. If I retrench the quantity
+of food consumed in my house, and give him what I have cut off, I
+then benefit him, without depressing any but myself and family,
+who, perhaps, may be well able to bear it. If I turn up a piece
+of uncultivated land, and give him the produce, I then benefit
+both him and all the members of the society, because what he
+before consumed is thrown into the common stock, and probably
+some of the new produce with it. But if I only give him money,
+supposing the produce of the country to remain the same, I give
+him a title to a larger share of that produce than formerly,
+which share he cannot receive without diminishing the shares of
+others. It is evident that this effect, in individual instances,
+must be so small as to be totally imperceptible; but still it
+must exist, as many other effects do, which, like some of the
+insects that people the air, elude our grosser perceptions.
+
+Supposing the quantity of food in any country to remain the
+same for many years together, it is evident that this food must
+be divided according to the value of each man's patent, or the
+sum of money that he can afford to spend on this commodity so
+universally in request. (Mr Godwin calls the wealth that a man
+receives from his ancestors a mouldy patent. It may, I think,
+very properly be termed a patent, but I hardly see the propriety
+of calling it a mouldy one, as it is an article in such constant
+use.) It is a demonstrative truth, therefore, that the patents of
+one set of men could not be increased in value without
+diminishing the value of the patents of some other set of men. If
+the rich were to subscribe and give five shillings a day to five
+hundred thousand men without retrenching their own tables, no
+doubt can exist, that as these men would naturally live more at
+their ease and consume a greater quantity of provisions, there
+would be less food remaining to divide among the rest, and
+consequently each man's patent would be diminished in value or
+the same number of pieces of silver would purchase a smaller
+quantity of subsistence.
+
+An increase of population without a proportional increase of
+food will evidently have the same effect in lowering the value of
+each man's patent. The food must necessarily be distributed in
+smaller quantities, and consequently a day's labour will purchase
+a smaller quantity of provisions. An increase in the price of
+provisions would arise either from an increase of population
+faster than the means of subsistence, or from a different
+distribution of the money of the society. The food of a country
+that has been long occupied, if it be increasing, increases
+slowly and regularly and cannot be made to answer any sudden
+demands, but variations in the distribution of the money of a
+society are not infrequently occurring, and are undoubtedly among
+the causes that occasion the continual variations which we
+observe in the price of provisions.
+
+The poor laws of England tend to depress the general
+condition of the poor in these two ways. Their first obvious
+tendency is to increase population without increasing the food
+for its support. A poor man may marry with little or no prospect
+of being able to support a family in independence. They may be
+said therefore in some measure to create the poor which they
+maintain, and as the provisions of the country must, in
+consequence of the increased population, be distributed to every
+man in smaller proportions, it is evident that the labour of
+those who are not supported by parish assistance will purchase a
+smaller quantity of provisions than before and consequently more
+of them must be driven to ask for support.
+
+Secondly, the quantity of provisions consumed in workhouses
+upon a part of the society that cannot in general be considered
+as the most valuable part diminishes the shares that would
+otherwise belong to more industrious and more worthy members, and
+thus in the same manner forces more to become dependent. If the
+poor in the workhouses were to live better than they now do, this
+new distribution of the money of the society would tend more
+conspicuously to depress the condition of those out of the
+workhouses by occasioning a rise in the price of provisions.
+
+Fortunately for England, a spirit of independence still
+remains among the peasantry. The poor laws are strongly
+calculated to eradicate this spirit. They have succeeded in part,
+but had they succeeded as completely as might have been expected
+their pernicious tendency would not have been so long concealed.
+
+Hard as it may appear in individual instances, dependent
+poverty ought to be held disgraceful. Such a stimulus seems to be
+absolutely necessary to promote the happiness of the great mass
+of mankind, and every general attempt to weaken this stimulus,
+however benevolent its apparent intention, will always defeat its
+own purpose. If men are induced to marry from a prospect of
+parish provision, with little or no chance of maintaining their
+families in independence, they are not only unjustly tempted to
+bring unhappiness and dependence upon themselves and children,
+but they are tempted, without knowing it, to injure all in the
+same class with themselves. A labourer who marries without being
+able to support a family may in some respects be considered as an
+enemy to all his fellow-labourers.
+
+I feel no doubt whatever that the parish laws of England have
+contributed to raise the price of provisions and to lower the
+real price of labour. They have therefore contributed to
+impoverish that class of people whose only possession is their
+labour. It is also difficult to suppose that they have not
+powerfully contributed to generate that carelessness and want of
+frugality observable among the poor, so contrary to the
+disposition frequently to be remarked among petty tradesmen and
+small farmers. The labouring poor, to use a vulgar expression,
+seem always to live from hand to mouth. Their present wants
+employ their whole attention, and they seldom think of the
+future. Even when they have an opportunity of saving they seldom
+exercise it, but all that is beyond their present necessities
+goes, generally speaking, to the ale-house. The poor laws of
+England may therefore be said to diminish both the power and the
+will to save among the common people, and thus to weaken one of
+the strongest incentives to sobriety and industry, and
+consequently to happiness.
+
+It is a general complaint among master manufacturers that
+high wages ruin all their workmen, but it is difficult to
+conceive that these men would not save a part of their high wages
+for the future support of their families, instead of spending it
+in drunkenness and dissipation, if they did not rely on parish
+assistance for support in case of accidents. And that the poor
+employed in manufactures consider this assistance as a reason why
+they may spend all the wages they earn and enjoy themselves while
+they can appears to be evident from the number of families that,
+upon the failure of any great manufactory, immediately fall upon
+the parish, when perhaps the wages earned in this manufactory
+while it flourished were sufficiently above the price of common
+country labour to have allowed them to save enough for their
+support till they could find some other channel for their
+industry.
+
+A man who might not be deterred from going to the ale-house
+from the consideration that on his death, or sickness, he should
+leave his wife and family upon the parish might yet hesitate in
+thus dissipating his earnings if he were assured that, in either
+of these cases, his family must starve or be left to the support
+of casual bounty. In China, where the real as well as nominal
+price of labour is very low, sons are yet obliged by law to
+support their aged and helpless parents. Whether such a law would
+be advisable in this country I will not pretend to determine. But
+it seems at any rate highly improper, by positive institutions,
+which render dependent poverty so general, to weaken that
+disgrace, which for the best and most humane reasons ought to
+attach to it.
+
+The mass of happiness among the common people cannot but be
+diminished when one of the strongest checks to idleness and
+dissipation is thus removed, and when men are thus allured to
+marry with little or no prospect of being able to maintain a
+family in independence. Every obstacle in the way of marriage
+must undoubtedly be considered as a species of unhappiness. But
+as from the laws of our nature some check to population must
+exist, it is better that it should be checked from a foresight of
+the difficulties attending a family and the fear of dependent
+poverty than that it should be encouraged, only to be repressed
+afterwards by want and sickness.
+
+It should be remembered always that there is an essential
+difference between food and those wrought commodities, the raw
+materials of which are in great plenty. A demand for these last
+will not fail to create them in as great a quantity as they are
+wanted. The demand for food has by no means the same creative
+power. In a country where all the fertile spots have been seized,
+high offers are necessary to encourage the farmer to lay his
+dressing on land from which he cannot expect a profitable return
+for some years. And before the prospect of advantage is
+sufficiently great to encourage this sort of agricultural
+enterprise, and while the new produce is rising, great distresses
+may be suffered from the want of it. The demand for an increased
+quantity of subsistence is, with few exceptions, constant
+everywhere, yet we see how slowly it is answered in all those
+countries that have been long occupied.
+
+The poor laws of England were undoubtedly instituted for the
+most benevolent purpose, but there is great reason to think that
+they have not succeeded in their intention. They certainly
+mitigate some cases of very severe distress which might otherwise
+occur, yet the state of the poor who are supported by parishes,
+considered in all its circumstances, is very far from being free
+from misery. But one of the principal objections to them is that
+for this assistance which some of the poor receive, in itself
+almost a doubtful blessing, the whole class of the common people
+of England is subjected to a set of grating, inconvenient, and
+tyrannical laws, totally inconsistent with the genuine spirit of
+the constitution. The whole business of settlements, even in its
+present amended state, is utterly contradictory to all ideas of
+freedom. The parish persecution of men whose families are likely
+to become chargeable, and of poor women who are near lying-in, is
+a most disgraceful and disgusting tyranny. And the obstructions
+continuity occasioned in the market of labour by these laws have
+a constant tendency to add to the difficulties of those who are
+struggling to support themselves without assistance.
+
+These evils attendant on the poor laws are in some degree
+irremediable. If assistance be to be distributed to a certain
+class of people, a power must be given somewhere of
+discriminating the proper objects and of managing the concerns of
+the institutions that are necessary, but any great interference
+with the affairs of other people is a species of tyranny, and in
+the common course of things the exercise of this power may be
+expected to become grating to those who are driven to ask for
+support. The tyranny of Justices, Church-wardens, and Overseers,
+is a common complaint among the poor, but the fault does not lie
+so much in these persons, who probably, before they were in
+power, were not worse than other people, but in the nature of all
+such institutions.
+
+The evil is perhaps gone too far to be remedied, but I feel
+little doubt in my own mind that if the poor laws had never
+existed, though there might have been a few more instances of
+very severe distress, yet that the aggregate mass of happiness
+among the common people would have been much greater than it is
+at present.
+
+Mr Pitt's Poor Bill has the appearance of being framed with
+benevolent intentions, and the clamour raised against it was in
+many respects ill directed, and unreasonable. But it must be
+confessed that it possesses in a high degree the great and
+radical defect of all systems of the kind, that of tending to
+increase population without increasing the means for its support,
+and thus to depress the condition of those that are not supported
+by parishes, and, consequently, to create more poor.
+
+To remove the wants of the lower classes of society is indeed
+an arduous task. The truth is that the pressure of distress on
+this part of a community is an evil so deeply seated that no
+human ingenuity can reach it. Were I to propose a palliative, and
+palliatives are all that the nature of the case will admit, it
+should be, in the first place, the total abolition of all the
+present parish-laws. This would at any rate give liberty and
+freedom of action to the peasantry of England, which they can
+hardly be said to possess at present. They would then be able to
+settle without interruption, wherever there was a prospect of a
+greater plenty of work and a higher price for labour. The market
+of labour would then be free, and those obstacles removed which,
+as things are now, often for a considerable time prevent the
+price from rising according to the demand.
+
+Secondly, premiums might be given for turning up fresh land,
+and it possible encouragements held out to agriculture above
+manufactures, and to tillage above grazing. Every endeavour
+should be used to weaken and destroy all those institutions
+relating to corporations, apprenticeships, etc., which cause the
+labours of agriculture to be worse paid than the labours of trade
+and manufactures. For a country can never produce its proper
+quantity of food while these distinctions remain in favour of
+artisans. Such encouragements to agriculture would tend to
+furnish the market with an increasing quantity of healthy work,
+and at the same time, by augmenting the produce of the country,
+would raise the comparative price of labour and ameliorate the
+condition of the labourer. Being now in better circumstances, and
+seeing no prospect of parish assistance, he would be more able,
+as well as more inclined, to enter into associations for
+providing against the sickness of himself or family.
+
+Lastly, for cases of extreme distress, county workhouses
+might be established, supported by rates upon the whole kingdom,
+and free for persons of all counties, and indeed of all nations.
+The fare should be hard, and those that were able obliged to
+work. It would be desirable that they should not be considered as
+comfortable asylums in all difficulties, but merely as places
+where severe distress might find some alleviation. A part of
+these houses might be separated, or others built for a most
+beneficial purpose, which has not been infrequently taken notice
+of, that of providing a place where any person, whether native or
+foreigner, might do a day's work at all times and receive the
+market price for it. Many cases would undoubtedly be left for the
+exertion of individual benevolence.
+
+A plan of this kind, the preliminary of which should be an
+abolition of all the present parish laws, seems to be the best
+calculated to increase the mass of happiness among the common
+people of England. To prevent the recurrence of misery, is, alas!
+beyond the power of man. In the vain endeavour to attain what
+in the nature of things is impossible, we now sacrifice not only
+possible but certain benefits. We tell the common people that if
+they will submit to a code of tyrannical regulations, they shall
+never be in want. They do submit to these regulations. They
+perform their part of the contract, but we do not, nay cannot,
+perform ours, and thus the poor sacrifice the valuable blessing
+of liberty and receive nothing that can be called an equivalent
+in return.
+
+Notwithstanding, then, the institution of the poor laws in
+England, I think it will be allowed that considering the state of
+the lower classes altogether, both in the towns and in the
+country, the distresses which they suffer from the want of proper
+and sufficient food, from hard labour and unwholesome
+habitations, must operate as a constant check to incipient
+population.
+
+To these two great checks to population, in all long occupied
+countries, which I have called the preventive and the positive
+checks, may be added vicious customs with respect to women, great
+cities, unwholesome manufactures, luxury, pestilence, and war.
+
+All these checks may be fairly resolved into misery and vice.
+And that these are the true causes of the slow increase of
+population in all the states of modern Europe, will appear
+sufficiently evident from the comparatively rapid increase that
+has invariably taken place whenever these causes have been in any
+considerable degree removed.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 6
+
+New colonies--Reasons for their rapid increase--North American
+Colonies--Extraordinary instance of increase in the back
+settlements--Rapidity with which even old states recover the
+ravages of war, pestilence, famine, or the convulsions of nature.
+
+
+It has been universally remarked that all new colonies settled in
+healthy countries, where there was plenty of room and food, have
+constantly increased with astonishing rapidity in their
+population. Some of the colonies from ancient Greece, in no very
+long period, more than equalled their parent states in numbers
+and strength. And not to dwell on remote instances, the European
+settlements in the new world bear ample testimony to the truth of
+a remark, which, indeed, has never, that I know of, been doubted.
+A plenty of rich land, to be had for little or nothing, is so
+powerful a cause of population as to overcome all other
+obstacles. No settlements could well have been worse managed than
+those of Spain in Mexico, Peru, and Quito. The tyranny,
+superstition, and vices of the mother-country were introduced in
+ample quantities among her children. Exorbitant taxes were
+exacted by the Crown. The most arbitrary restrictions were
+imposed on their trade. And the governors were not behind hand in
+rapacity and extortion for themselves as well as their master.
+Yet, under all these difficulties, the colonies made a quick
+progress in population. The city of Lima, founded since the
+conquest, is represented by Ulloa as containing fifty thousand
+inhabitants near fifty years ago. Quito, which had been but a
+hamlet of indians, is represented by the same author as in his
+time equally populous. Mexico is said to contain a hundred
+thousand inhabitants, which, notwithstanding the exaggerations of
+the Spanish writers, is supposed to be five times greater than
+what it contained in the time of Montezuma.
+
+In the Portuguese colony of Brazil, governed with almost
+equal tyranny, there were supposed to be, thirty years since, six
+hundred thousand inhabitants of European extraction.
+
+The Dutch and French colonies, though under the government of
+exclusive companies of merchants, which, as Dr Adam Smith says
+very justly, is the worst of all possible governments, still
+persisted in thriving under every disadvantage.
+
+But the English North American colonies, now the powerful
+people of the United States of America, made by far the most
+rapid progress. To the plenty of good land which they possessed
+in common with the Spanish and Portuguese settlements, they added
+a greater degree of liberty and equality. Though not without some
+restrictions on their foreign commerce, they were allowed a
+perfect liberty of managing their own internal affairs. The
+political institutions that prevailed were favourable to the
+alienation and division of property. Lands that were not
+cultivated by the proprietor within a limited time were declared
+grantable to any other person. In Pennsylvania there was no right
+of primogeniture, and in the provinces of New England the eldest
+had only a double share. There were no tithes in any of the
+States, and scarcely any taxes. And on account of the extreme
+cheapness of good land a capital could not be more advantageously
+employed than in agriculture, which at the same time that it
+supplies the greatest quantity of healthy work affords much the
+most valuable produce to the society.
+
+The consequence of these favourable circumstances united was
+a rapidity of increase probably without parallel in history.
+Throughout all the northern colonies, the population was found to
+double itself in twenty-five years. The original number of
+persons who had settled in the four provinces of new England in
+1643 was 21,200.(I take these figures from Dr Price's two volumes
+of Observations; not having Dr Styles' pamphlet, from which he
+quotes, by me.) Afterwards, it is supposed that more left them
+than went to them. In the year 1760, they were increased to half
+a million. They had therefore all along doubled their own number
+in twenty-five years. In New Jersey the period of doubling
+appeared to be twenty-two years; and in Rhode island still less.
+In the back settlements, where the inhabitants applied themselves
+solely to agriculture, and luxury was not known, they were found
+to double their own number in fifteen years, a most extraordinary
+instance of increase. Along the sea coast, which would naturally
+be first inhabited, the period of doubling was about thirty-five
+years; and in some of the maritime towns, the population was
+absolutely at a stand.
+
+(In instances of this kind the powers of the earth appear to
+be fully equal to answer it the demands for food that can be made
+upon it by man. But we should be led into an error if we were
+thence to suppose that population and food ever really increase
+in the same ratio. The one is still a geometrical and the other
+an arithmetical ratio, that is, one increases by multiplication,
+and the other by addition. Where there are few people, and a
+great quantity of fertile land, the power of the earth to afford
+a yearly increase of food may be compared to a great reservoir of
+water, supplied by a moderate stream. The faster population
+increases, the more help will be got to draw off the water, and
+consequently an increasing quantity will be taken every year. But
+the sooner, undoubtedly, will the reservoir be exhausted, and the
+streams only remain. When acre has been added to acre, till all
+the fertile land is occupied, the yearly increase of food will
+depend upon the amelioration of the land already in possession;
+and even this moderate stream will be gradually diminishing. But
+population, could it be supplied with food, would go on with
+unexhausted vigour, and the increase of one period would furnish
+the power of a greater increase the next, and this without any
+limit.)
+
+These facts seem to shew that population increases exactly in
+the proportion that the two great checks to it, misery and vice,
+are removed, and that there is not a truer criterion of the
+happiness and innocence of a people than the rapidity of their
+increase. The unwholesomeness of towns, to which some persons are
+necessarily driven from the nature of their trades, must be
+considered as a species of misery, and every the slightest check
+to marriage, from a prospect of the difficulty of maintaining a
+family, may be fairly classed under the same head. In short it is
+difficult to conceive any check to population which does not come
+under the description of some species of misery or vice.
+
+The population of the thirteen American States before the war
+was reckoned at about three millions. Nobody imagines that Great
+Britain is less populous at present for the emigration of the
+small parent stock that produced these numbers. On the contrary,
+a certain degree of emigration is known to be favourable to the
+population of the mother country. It has been particularly
+remarked that the two Spanish provinces from which the greatest
+number of people emigrated to America, became in consequence more
+populous. Whatever was the original number of British emigrants
+that increased so fast in the North American Colonies, let us
+ask, why does not an equal number produce an equal increase in
+the same time in Great Britain? The great and obvious cause to be
+assigned is the want of room and food, or, in other words,
+misery, and that this is a much more powerful cause even than
+vice appears sufficiently evident from the rapidity with which
+even old states recover the desolations of war, pestilence, or
+the accidents of nature. They are then for a short time placed a
+little in the situation of new states, and the effect is always
+answerable to what might be expected. If the industry of the
+inhabitants be not destroyed by fear or tyranny, subsistence will
+soon increase beyond the wants of the reduced numbers, and the
+invariable consequence will be that population which before,
+perhaps, was nearly stationary, will begin immediately to
+increase.
+
+The fertile province of Flanders, which has been so often the
+seat of the most destructive wars, after a respite of a few
+years, has appeared always as fruitful and as populous as ever.
+Even the Palatinate lifted up its head again after the execrable
+ravages of Louis the Fourteenth. The effects of the dreadful
+plague in London in 1666 were not perceptible fifteen or twenty
+years afterwards. The traces of the most destructive famines in
+China and Indostan are by all accounts very soon obliterated.
+It may even be doubted whether Turkey and Egypt are upon an
+average much less populous for the plagues that periodically lay
+them waste. If the number of people which they contain be less
+now than formerly, it is, probably, rather to be attributed to
+the tyranny and oppression of the government under which they
+groan, and the consequent discouragements to agriculture, than to
+the loss which they sustain by the plague. The most tremendous
+convulsions of nature, such as volcanic eruptions and
+earthquakes, if they do not happen so frequently as to drive away
+the inhabitants, or to destroy their spirit of industry, have but
+a trifling effect on the average population of any state. Naples,
+and the country under Vesuvius, are still very populous,
+notwithstanding the repeated eruptions of that mountain. And
+Lisbon and Lima are now, probably, nearly in the same state with
+regard to population as they were before the last earthquakes.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 7
+
+A probable cause of epidemics--Extracts from Mr Suessmilch's
+tables--Periodical returns of sickly seasons to be expected in
+certain cases--Proportion of births to burials for short periods
+in any country an inadequate criterion of the real average
+increase of population--Best criterion of a permanent increase
+of population--Great frugality of living one of the causes of
+the famines of China and Indostan--Evil tendency of one of the
+clauses in Mr Pitt's Poor Bill--Only one proper way of
+encouraging population--Causes of the Happiness of nations--
+Famine, the last and most dreadful mode by which nature represses
+a redundant population--The three propositions considered as
+established.
+
+
+By great attention to cleanliness, the plague seems at length to
+be completely expelled from London. But it is not improbable that
+among the secondary causes that produce even sickly seasons and
+epidemics ought to be ranked a crowded population and unwholesome
+and insufficient food. I have been led to this remark, by looking
+over some of the tables of Mr Suessmilch, which Dr Price has
+extracted in one of his notes to the postscript on the
+controversy respecting the population of England and Wales. They
+are considered as very correct, and if such tables were general,
+they would throw great light on the different ways by which
+population is repressed and prevented from increasing beyond the
+means of subsistence in any country. I will extract a part of the
+tables, with Dr Price's remarks.
+
+IN THE KINGDOM OF PRUSSIA, AND DUKEDOM OF LITHUANIA
+
+                                            Proportion   Proportion
+                 Births  Burials Marriages of Births to of Births to
+                                            Marriages     Burials
+10 Yrs to 1702   21,963  14,718   5,928      37 to 10    150 to 100
+5 Yrs to 1716    21,602  11,984   4,968      37 to 10    180 to 100
+5 Yrs to 1756    28,392  19,154   5,599      50 to 10    148 to 100
+
+
+"N.B. In 1709 and 1710, a pestilence carried off 247,733 of the
+inhabitants of this country, and in 1736 and 1737, epidemics
+prevailed, which again checked its increase."
+
+It may be remarked, that the greatest proportion of births to
+burials, was in the five years after the great pestilence.
+
+DUCHY OF POMERANIA
+
+                                            Proportion   Proportion
+Annual Average   Births  Burials Marriages of Births to of Births to
+                                            Marriages     Burials
+6 yrs to 1702   6,540     4,647   1,810      36 to 10    140 to 100
+6 yrs to 1708   7,455     4,208   1,875      39 to 10    177 to 100
+6 yrs to 1726   8,432     5,627   2,131      39 to 10    150 to 100
+6 yrs to 1756  12,767     9,281   2,957      43 to 10    137 to 100
+
+
+"In this instance the inhabitants appear to have been almost
+doubled in fifty-six years, no very bad epidemics having once
+interrupted the increase, but the three years immediately follow
+ing the last period (to 1759) were so sickly that the births were
+sunk to 10,229 and the burials raised to 15,068."
+
+Is it not probable that in this case the number of inhabitants
+had increased faster than the food and the accommodations
+necessary to preserve them in health? The mass of the people
+would, upon this supposition, be obliged to live harder, and
+a greater number would be crowded together in one house, and
+it is not surely improbable that these were among the natural
+causes that produced the three sickly years. These causes
+may produce such an effect, though the country, absolutely
+considered, may not be extremely crowded and populous. In a
+country even thinly inhabited, if an increase of population take
+place, before more food is raised, and more houses are built, the
+inhabitants must be distressed in some degree for room and
+subsistence. Were the marriages in England, for the next eight or
+ten years, to be more prolifick than usual, or even were a
+greater number of marriages than usual to take place, supposing
+the number of houses to remain the same, instead of five or six
+to a cottage, there must be seven or eight, and this, added to
+the necessity of harder living, would probably have a very
+unfavourable effect on the health of the common people.
+
+NEUMARK OF BRANDENBURGH
+
+                                            Proportion   Proportion
+Annual Average   Births  Burials Marriages of Births to of Births to
+                                            Marriages    Burials
+5 yrs to 1701    5,433    3,483  1,436      37 to 10    155 to 100
+5 yrs to 1726    7,012    4,254  1,713      40 to 10    164 to 100
+5 yrs to 1756    7,978    5,567  1,891      42 to 10    143 to 100
+
+
+"Epidemics prevailed for six years, from 1736, to 1741, which
+checked the increase."
+
+DUKEDOM OF MAGDEBURGH
+
+                                            Proportion   Proportion
+Annual Average   Births  Burials Marriages of Births to of Births to
+                                            Marriages    Burials
+5 yrs to 1702    6,431   4,103   1,681      38 to 10    156 to 100
+5 yrs to 1717    7,590   5,335   2,076      36 to 10    142 to 100
+5 yrs to 1756    8,850   8,069   2,193      40 to 10    109 to 100
+
+
+"The years 1738, 1740, 1750, and 1751, were particularly
+sickly."
+
+For further information on this subject, I refer the reader
+to Mr Suessmilch's tables. The extracts that I have made are
+sufficient to shew the periodical, though irregular, returns of
+sickly seasons, and it seems highly probable that a scantiness of
+room and food was one of the principal causes that occasioned
+them.
+
+It appears from the tables that these countries were
+increasing rather fast for old states, notwithstanding the
+occasional seasons that prevailed. Cultivation must have been
+improving, and marriages, consequently, encouraged. For the
+checks to population appear to have been rather of the positive,
+than of the preventive kind. When from a prospect of increasing
+plenty in any country, the weight that represses population is in
+some degree removed, it is highly probable that the motion will
+be continued beyond the operation of the cause that first
+impelled it. Or, to be more particular, when the increasing
+produce of a country, and the increasing demand for labour, so
+far ameliorate the condition of the labourer as greatly to
+encourage marriage, it is probable that the custom of early
+marriages will continue till the population of the country has
+gone beyond the increased produce, and sickly seasons appear to
+be the natural and necessary consequence. I should expect,
+therefore, that those countries where subsistence was increasing
+sufficiency at times to encourage population but not to answer
+all its demands, would be more subject to periodical epidemics
+than those where the population could more completely accommodate
+itself to the average produce.
+
+An observation the converse of this will probably also be
+found true. In those countries that are subject to periodical
+sicknesses, the increase of population, or the excess of births
+above the burials, will be greater in the intervals of these
+periods than is usual, caeteris paribus, in the countries not so
+much subject to such disorders. If Turkey and Egypt have been
+nearly stationary in their average population for the last
+century, in the intervals of their periodical plagues, the births
+must have exceeded the burials in a greater proportion than in
+such countries as France and England.
+
+The average proportion of births to burials in any country
+for a period of five to ten years, will hence appear to be a very
+inadequate criterion by which to judge of its real progress in
+population. This proportion certainly shews the rate of increase
+during those five or ten years; but we can by no means thence
+infer what had been the increase for the twenty years before, or
+what would be the increase for the twenty years after. Dr Price
+observes that Sweden, Norway, Russia, and the kingdom of Naples,
+are increasing fast; but the extracts from registers that he has
+given are not for periods of sufficient extent to establish the
+fact. It is highly probable, however, that Sweden, Norway, and
+Russia, are really increasing their population, though not at the
+rate that the proportion of births to burials for the short
+periods that Dr Price takes would seem to shew. (See Dr Price's
+Observations, Vol. ii, postscript to the controversy on the
+population of England and Wales.) For five years, ending in 1777,
+the proportion of births to burials in the kingdom of Naples was
+144 to 100, but there is reason to suppose that this proportion
+would indicate an increase much greater than would be really
+found to have taken place in that kingdom during a period of a
+hundred years.
+
+Dr Short compared the registers of many villages and market
+towns in England for two periods; the first, from Queen Elizabeth
+to the middle of the last century, and the second, from different
+years at the end of the last century to the middle of the
+present. And from a comparison of these extracts, it appears that
+in the former period the births exceeded the burials in the
+proportion of 124 to 100, but in the latter, only in the
+proportion of 111 to 100. Dr Price thinks that the registers in
+the former period are not to be depended upon, but, probably, in
+this instance they do not give incorrect proportions. At least
+there are many reasons for expecting to find a greater excess of
+births above the burials in the former period than in the latter.
+In the natural progress of the population of any country, more
+good land will, caeteris paribus, be taken into cultivation in
+the earlier stages of it than in the later. (I say 'caeteris
+paribus', because the increase of the produce of any country will
+always very greatly depend on the spirit of industry that
+prevails, and the way in which it is directed. The knowledge and
+habits of the people, and other temporary causes, particularly
+the degree of civil liberty and equality existing at the time,
+must always have great influence in exciting and directing this
+spirit.) And a greater proportional yearly increase of produce
+will almost invariably be followed by a greater proportional
+increase of population. But, besides this great cause, which
+would naturally give the excess of births above burials greater
+at the end of Queen Elizabeth's reign than in the middle of the
+present century, I cannot help thinking that the occasional
+ravages of the plague in the former period must have had some
+tendency to increase this proportion. If an average of ten years
+had been taken in the intervals of the returns of this dreadful
+disorder, or if the years of plague had been rejected as
+accidental, the registers would certainly give the proportion of
+births to burials too high for the real average increase of the
+population. For some few years after the great plague in 1666, it
+is probable that there was a more than usual excess of births
+above burials, particularly if Dr Price's opinion be founded,
+that England was more populous at the revolution (which happened
+only twenty-two years afterwards) than it is at present.
+
+Mr King, in 1693, stated the proportion of the births to the
+burials throughout the Kingdom, exclusive of London, as 115 to
+100. Dr Short makes it, in the middle of the present century, 111
+to 100, including London. The proportion in France for five
+years, ending in 1774, was 117 to 100. If these statements are
+near the truth; and if there are no very great variations at
+particular periods in the proportions, it would appear that the
+population of France and England has accommodated itself very
+nearly to the average produce of each country. The
+discouragements to marriage, the consequent vicious habits, war,
+luxury, the silent though certain depopulation of large towns,
+and the close habitations, and insufficient food of many of the
+poor, prevent population from increasing beyond the means of
+subsistence; and, if I may use an expression which certainly at
+first appears strange, supercede the necessity of great and
+ravaging epidemics to repress what is redundant. Were a wasting
+plague to sweep off two millions in England, and six millions in
+France, there can be no doubt whatever that, after the
+inhabitants had recovered from the dreadful shock, the proportion
+of births to burials would be much above what it is in either
+country at present.
+
+In New Jersey, the proportion of births to deaths on an
+average of seven years, ending in 1743, was as 300 to 100. In
+France and England, taking the highest proportion, it is as 117
+to 100. Great and astonishing as this difference is, we ought not
+to be so wonder-struck at it as to attribute it to the miraculous
+interposition of heaven. The causes of it are not remote, latent
+and mysterious; but near us, round about us, and open to the
+investigation of every inquiring mind. It accords with the most
+liberal spirit of philosophy to suppose that not a stone can
+fall, or a plant rise, without the immediate agency of divine
+power. But we know from experience that these operations of what
+we call nature have been conducted almost invariably according to
+fixed laws. And since the world began, the causes of population
+and depopulation have probably been as constant as any of the
+laws of nature with which we are acquainted.
+
+The passion between the sexes has appeared in every age to be
+so nearly the same that it may always be considered, in algebraic
+language, as a given quantity. The great law of necessity which
+prevents population from increasing in any country beyond the
+food which it can either produce or acquire, is a law so open to
+our view, so obvious and evident to our understandings, and so
+completely confirmed by the experience of every age, that we
+cannot for a moment doubt it. The different modes which nature
+takes to prevent or repress a redundant population do not appear,
+indeed, to us so certain and regular, but though we cannot always
+predict the mode we may with certainty predict the fact. If the
+proportion of births to deaths for a few years indicate an
+increase of numbers much beyond the proportional increased or
+acquired produce of the country, we may be perfectly certain that
+unless an emigration takes place, the deaths will shortly exceed
+the births; and that the increase that had taken place for a few
+years cannot be the real average increase of the population of
+the country. Were there no other depopulating causes, every
+country would, without doubt, be subject to periodical
+pestilences or famine.
+
+The only true criterion of a real and permanent increase in
+the population of any country is the increase of the means of
+subsistence. But even, this criterion is subject to some slight
+variations which are, however, completely open to our view and
+observations. In some countries population appears to have been
+forced, that is, the people have been habituated by degrees to
+live almost upon the smallest possible quantity of food. There
+must have been periods in such counties when population increased
+permanently, without an increase in the means of subsistence.
+China seems to answer to this description. If the accounts we
+have of it are to be trusted, the lower classes of people are in
+the habit of living almost upon the smallest possible quantity of
+food and are glad to get any putrid offals that European
+labourers would rather starve than eat. The law in China which
+permits parents to expose their children has tended principally
+thus to force the population. A nation in this state must
+necessarily be subject to famines. Where a country is so populous
+in proportion to the means of subsistence that the average
+produce of it is but barely sufficient to support the lives of
+the inhabitants, any deficiency from the badness of seasons must
+be fatal. It is probable that the very frugal manner in which the
+Gentoos are in the habit of living contributes in some degree to
+the famines of Indostan.
+
+In America, where the reward of labour is at present so
+liberal, the lower classes might retrench very considerably in a
+year of scarcity without materially distressing themselves. A
+famine therefore seems to be almost impossible. It may be
+expected that in the progress of the population of America, the
+labourers will in time be much less liberally rewarded. The
+numbers will in this case permanently increase without a
+proportional increase in the means of subsistence.
+
+In the different states of Europe there must be some
+variations in the proportion between the number of inhabitants
+and the quantity of food consumed, arising from the different
+habits of living that prevail in each state. The labourers of the
+South of England are so accustomed to eat fine wheaten bread that
+they will suffer themselves to be half starved before they will
+submit to live like the Scotch peasants. They might perhaps in
+time, by the constant operation of the hard law of necessity, be
+reduced to live even like the Lower Chinese, and the country
+would then, with the same quantity of food, support a greater
+population. But to effect this must always be a most difficult,
+and, every friend to humanity will hope, an abortive attempt.
+Nothing is so common as to hear of encouragements that ought to
+be given to population. If the tendency of mankind to increase be
+so great as I have represented it to be, it may appear strange
+that this increase does not come when it is thus repeatedly
+called for. The true reason is that the demand for a greater
+population is made without preparing the funds necessary to
+support it. Increase the demand for agricultural labour by
+promoting cultivation, and with it consequently increase the
+produce of the country, and ameliorate the condition of the
+labourer, and no apprehensions whatever need be entertained of
+the proportional increase of population. An attempt to effect
+this purpose in any other way is vicious, cruel, and tyrannical,
+and in any state of tolerable freedom cannot therefore succeed.
+It may appear to be the interest of the rulers, and the rich of a
+state, to force population, and thereby lower the price of
+labour, and consequently the expense of fleets and armies, and
+the cost of manufactures for foreign sale; but every attempt of
+the kind should be carefully watched and strenuously resisted by
+the friends of the poor, particularly when it comes under the
+deceitful garb of benevolence, and is likely, on that account, to
+be cheerfully and cordially received by the common people.
+
+I entirely acquit Mr Pitt of any sinister intention in that
+clause of his Poor Bill which allows a shilling a week to every
+labourer for each child he has above three. I confess, that
+before the bill was brought into Parliament, and for some time
+after, I thought that such a regulation would be highly
+beneficial, but further reflection on the subject has convinced
+me that if its object be to better the condition of the poor, it
+is calculated to defeat the very purpose which it has in view. It
+has no tendency that I can discover to increase the produce of
+the country, and if it tend to increase the population, without
+increasing the produce, the necessary and inevitable consequence
+appears to be that the same produce must be divided among a
+greater number, and consequently that a day's labour will
+purchase a smaller quantity of provisions, and the poor therefore
+in general must be more distressed.
+
+I have mentioned some cases where population may permanently
+increase without a proportional increase in the means of
+subsistence. But it is evident that the variation in different
+states, between the food and the numbers supported by it, is
+restricted to a limit beyond which it cannot pass. In every
+country, the population of which is not absolutely decreasing,
+the food must be necessarily sufficient to support, and to
+continue, the race of labourers.
+
+Other circumstances being the same, it may be affirmed that
+countries are populous according to the quantity of human food
+which they produce, and happy according to the liberality with
+which that food is divided, or the quantity which a day's labour
+will purchase. Corn countries are more populous than pasture
+countries, and rice countries more populous than corn countries.
+The lands in England are not suited to rice, but they would all
+bear potatoes; and Dr Adam Smith observes that if potatoes were
+to become the favourite vegetable food of the common people, and
+if the same quantity of land was employed in their culture as is
+now employed in the culture of corn, the country would be able to
+support a much greater population, and would consequently in a
+very short time have it.
+
+The happiness of a country does not depend, absolutely, upon
+its poverty or its riches, upon its youth or its age, upon its
+being thinly or fully inhabited, but upon the rapidity with which
+it is increasing, upon the degree in which the yearly increase of
+food approaches to the yearly increase of an unrestricted
+population. This approximation is always the nearest in new
+colonies, where the knowledge and industry of an old state
+operate on the fertile unappropriated land of a new one. In other
+cases, the youth or the age of a state is not in this respect of
+very great importance. It is probable that the food of Great
+Britain is divided in as great plenty to the inhabitants, at the
+present period, as it was two thousand, three thousand, or four
+thousand years ago. And there is reason to believe that the poor
+and thinly inhabited tracts of the Scotch Highlands are as much
+distressed by an overcharged population as the rich and populous
+province of Flanders.
+
+Were a country never to be overrun by a people more advanced
+in arts, but left to its own natural progress in civilization;
+from the time that its produce might be considered as an unit, to
+the time that it might be considered as a million, during the
+lapse of many hundred years, there would not be a single period
+when the mass of the people could be said to be free from
+distress, either directly or indirectly, for want of food. In
+every state in Europe, since we have first had accounts of it,
+millions and millions of human existences have been repressed
+from this simple cause; though perhaps in some of these states an
+absolute famine has never been known.
+
+Famine seems to be the last, the most dreadful resource of
+nature. The power of population is so superior to the power in
+the earth to produce subsistence for man, that premature death
+must in some shape or other visit the human race. The vices of
+mankind are active and able ministers of depopulation. They are
+the precursors in the great army of destruction; and often finish
+the dreadful work themselves. But should they fail in this war of
+extermination, sickly seasons, epidemics, pestilence, and plague,
+advance in terrific array, and sweep off their thousands and ten
+thousands. Should success be still incomplete, gigantic
+inevitable famine stalks in the rear, and with one mighty blow
+levels the population with the food of the world.
+
+Must it not then be acknowledged by an attentive examiner of
+the histories of mankind, that in every age and in every state in
+which man has existed, or does now exist.
+
+That the increase of population is necessarily limited by the
+means of subsistence.
+
+That population does invariably increase when the means of
+subsistence increase. And that the superior power of
+population it repressed, and the actual population kept equal to
+the means of subsistence, by misery and vice?
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 8
+
+Mr Wallace--Error of supposing that the difficulty arising from
+population is at a great distance--Mr Condorcet's sketch of the
+progress of the human mind--Period when the oscillation,
+mentioned by Mr Condorcet, ought to be applied to the human race.
+
+
+To a person who draws the preceding obvious inferences, from a
+view of the past and present state of mankind, it cannot but be a
+matter of astonishment that all the writers on the perfectibility
+of man and of society who have noticed the argument of an
+overcharged population, treat it always very slightly and
+invariably represent the difficulties arising from it as at a
+great and almost immeasurable distance. Even Mr Wallace, who
+thought the argument itself of so much weight as to destroy his
+whole system of equality, did not seem to be aware that any
+difficulty would occur from this cause till the whole earth had
+been cultivated like a garden and was incapable of any further
+increase of produce. Were this really the case, and were a
+beautiful system of equality in other respects practicable, I
+cannot think that our ardour in the pursuit of such a scheme
+ought to be damped by the contemplation of so remote a
+difficulty. An event at such a distance might fairly be left to
+providence, but the truth is that if the view of the argument
+given in this Essay be just the difficulty, so far from being
+remote, would be imminent and immediate. At every period during
+the progress of cultivation, from the present moment to the time
+when the whole earth was become like a garden, the distress for
+want of food would be constantly pressing on all mankind, if they
+were equal. Though the produce of the earth might be increasing
+every year, population would be increasing much faster, and the
+redundancy must necessarily be repressed by the periodical or
+constant action of misery or vice.
+
+Mr Condorcet's Esquisse d'un Tableau Historique des Progres
+de l'Esprit Humain, was written, it is said, under the pressure
+of that cruel proscription which terminated in his death. If he
+had no hopes of its being seen during his life and of its
+interesting France in his favour, it is a singular instance of
+the attachment of a man to principles, which every day's
+experience was so fatally for himself contradicting. To see the
+human mind in one of the most enlightened nations of the world,
+and after a lapse of some thousand years, debased by such a
+fermentation of disgusting passions, of fear, cruelty, malice,
+revenge, ambition, madness, and folly as would have disgraced the
+most savage nation in the most barbarous age must have been such
+a tremendous shock to his ideas of the necessary and inevitable
+progress of the human mind that nothing but the firmest
+conviction of the truth of his principles, in spite of all
+appearances, could have withstood.
+
+This posthumous publication is only a sketch of a much larger
+work, which he proposed should be executed. It necessarily,
+therefore, wants that detail and application which can alone
+prove the truth of any theory. A few observations will be
+sufficient to shew how completely the theory is contradicted when
+it is applied to the real, and not to an imaginary, state of
+things.
+
+In the last division of the work, which treats of the future
+progress of man towards perfection, he says, that comparing, in
+the different civilized nations of Europe, the actual population
+with the extent of territory, and observing their cultivation,
+their industry, their divisions of labour, and their means of
+subsistence, we shall see that it would be impossible to preserve
+the same means of subsistence, and, consequently, the same
+population, without a number of individuals who have no other
+means of supplying their wants than their industry. Having
+allowed the necessity of such a class of men, and adverting
+afterwards to the precarious revenue of those families that would
+depend so entirely on the life and health of their chief, he
+says, very justly: 'There exists then, a necessary cause of
+inequality, of dependence, and even of misery, which menaces,
+without ceasing, the most numerous and active class of our
+societies.' (To save time and long quotations, I shall here give
+the substance of some of Mr Condorcet's sentiments, and hope I
+shall not misrepresent them. But I refer the reader to the work
+itself, which will amuse, if it does not convince him.) The
+difficulty is just and well stated, and I am afraid that the mode
+by which he proposes it should be removed will be found
+inefficacious. By the application of calculations to the
+probabilities of life and the interest of money, he proposes that
+a fund should be established which should assure to the old an
+assistance, produced, in part, by their own former savings, and,
+in part, by the savings of individuals who in making the same
+sacrifice die before they reap the benefit of it. The same, or a
+similar fund, should give assistance to women and children who
+lose their husbands, or fathers, and afford a capital to those
+who were of an age to found a new family, sufficient for the
+proper development of their industry. These establishments, he
+observes, might be made in the name and under the protection of
+the society. Going still further, he says that, by the just
+application of calculations, means might be found of more
+completely preserving a state of equality, by preventing credit
+from being the exclusive privilege of great fortunes, and yet
+giving it a basis equally solid, and by rendering the progress of
+industry, and the activity of commerce, less dependent on great
+capitalists.
+
+Such establishments and calculations may appear very
+promising upon paper, but when applied to real life they will be
+found to be absolutely nugatory. Mr Condorcet allows that a class
+of people which maintains itself entirely by industry is
+necessary to every state. Why does he allow this? No other reason
+can well be assigned than that he conceives that the labour
+necessary to procure subsistence for an extended population will
+not be performed without the goad of necessity. If by
+establishments of this kind of spur to industry be removed, if
+the idle and the negligent are placed upon the same footing with
+regard to their credit, and the future support of their wives and
+families, as the active and industrious, can we expect to see men
+exert that animated activity in bettering their condition which
+now forms the master spring of public prosperity? If an
+inquisition were to be established to examine the claims of each
+individual and to determine whether he had or had not exerted
+himself to the utmost, and to grant or refuse assistance
+accordingly, this would be little else than a repetition upon a
+larger scale of the English poor laws and would be completely
+destructive of the true principles of liberty and equality.
+
+But independent of this great objection to these
+establishments, and supposing for a moment that they would give
+no check to productive industry, by far the greatest difficulty
+remains yet behind.
+
+Were every man sure of a comfortable provision for his
+family, almost every man would have one, and were the rising
+generation free from the 'killing frost' of misery, population
+must rapidly increase. Of this Mr Condorcet seems to be fully
+aware himself, and after having described further improvements,
+he says:
+
+But in this process of industry and happiness, each generation
+will be called to more extended enjoyments, and in consequence,
+by the physical constitution of the human frame, to an increase
+in the number of individuals. Must not there arrive a period
+then, when these laws, equally necessary, shall counteract each
+other? When the increase of the number of men surpassing their
+means of subsistence, the necessary result must be either a
+continual diminution of happiness and population, a movement
+truly retrograde, or, at least, a kind of oscillation between
+good and evil? In societies arrived at this term, will not this
+oscillation be a constantly subsisting cause of periodical
+misery? Will it not mark the limit when all further amelioration
+will become impossible, and point out that term to the
+perfectibility of the human race which it may reach in the course
+of ages, but can never pass?
+
+He then adds,
+
+There is no person who does not see how very distant such a
+period is from us, but shall we ever arrive at it? It is equally
+impossible to pronounce for or against the future realization of
+an event which cannot take place but at an era when the human
+race will have attained improvements, of which we can at present
+scarcely form a conception.
+
+Mr Condorcet's picture of what may be expected to happen when
+the number of men shall surpass the means of their subsistence is
+justly drawn. The oscillation which he describes will certainly
+take place and will without doubt be a constantly subsisting
+cause of periodical misery. The only point in which I differ from
+Mr Condorcet with regard to this picture is the period when it
+may be applied to the human race. Mr Condorcet thinks that it
+cannot possibly be applicable but at an era extremely distant. If
+the proportion between the natural increase of population and
+food which I have given be in any degree near the truth, it will
+appear, on the contrary, that the period when the number of men
+surpass their means of subsistence has long since arrived, and
+that this necessity oscillation, this constantly subsisting cause
+of periodical misery, has existed ever since we have had any
+histories of mankind, does exist at present, and will for ever
+continue to exist, unless some decided change take place in the
+physical constitution of our nature.
+
+Mr Condorcet, however, goes on to say that should the period,
+which he conceives to be so distant, ever arrive, the human race,
+and the advocates for the perfectibility of man, need not be
+alarmed at it. He then proceeds to remove the difficulty in a
+manner which I profess not to understand. Having observed, that
+the ridiculous prejudices of superstition would by that time have
+ceased to throw over morals a corrupt and degrading austerity, he
+alludes, either to a promiscuous concubinage, which would prevent
+breeding, or to something else as unnatural. To remove the
+difficulty in this way will, surely, in the opinion of most men,
+be to destroy that virtue and purity of manners, which the
+advocates of equality, and of the perfectibility of man, profess
+to be the end and object of their views.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 9
+
+Mr Condorcet's conjecture concerning the organic perfectibility
+of man, and the indefinite prolongation of human life--Fallacy
+of the argument, which infers an unlimited progress from a
+partial improvement, the limit of which cannot be ascertained,
+illustrated in the breeding of animals, and the cultivation of
+plants.
+
+
+The last question which Mr Condorcet proposes for examination is
+the organic perfectibility of man. He observes that if the proofs
+which have been already given and which, in their development
+will receive greater force in the work itself, are sufficient to
+establish the indefinite perfectibility of man upon the
+supposition of the same natural faculties and the same
+organization which he has at present, what will be the certainty,
+what the extent of our hope, if this organization, these natural
+faculties themselves, are susceptible of amelioration?
+
+From the improvement of medicine, from the use of more
+wholesome food and habitations, from a manner of living which
+will improve the strength of the body by exercise without
+impairing it by excess, from the destruction of the two great
+causes of the degradation of man, misery, and too great riches,
+from the gradual removal of transmissible and contagious
+disorders by the improvement of physical knowledge, rendered more
+efficacious by the progress of reason and of social order, he
+infers that though man will not absolutely become immortal, yet
+that the duration between his birth and natural death will
+increase without ceasing, will have no assignable term, and may
+properly be expressed by the word 'indefinite'. He then defines
+this word to mean either a constant approach to an unlimited
+extent, without ever reaching it, or an increase. In the
+immensity of ages to an extent greater than any assignable
+quantity.
+
+But surely the application of this term in either of these
+senses to the duration of human life is in the highest degree
+unphilosophical and totally unwarranted by any appearances in the
+laws of nature. Variations from different causes are essentially
+distinct from a regular and unretrograde increase. The average
+duration of human life will to a certain degree vary from healthy
+or unhealthy climates, from wholesome or unwholesome food, from
+virtuous or vicious manners, and other causes, but it may be
+fairly doubted whether there is really the smallest perceptible
+advance in the natural duration of human life since first we have
+had any authentic history of man. The prejudices of all ages have
+indeed been directly contrary to this supposition, and though I
+would not lay much stress upon these prejudices, they will in
+some measure tend to prove that there has been no marked advance
+in an opposite direction.
+
+It may perhaps be said that the world is yet so young, so
+completely in its infancy, that it ought not to be expected that
+any difference should appear so soon.
+
+If this be the case, there is at once an end of all human
+science. The whole train of reasonings from effects to causes
+will be destroyed. We may shut our eyes to the book of nature, as
+it will no longer be of any use to read it. The wildest and most
+improbable conjectures may be advanced with as much certainty as
+the most just and sublime theories, founded on careful and
+reiterated experiments. We may return again to the old mode of
+philosophising and make facts bend to systems, instead of
+establishing systems upon facts. The grand and consistent theory
+of Newton will be placed upon the same footing as the wild and
+eccentric hypotheses of Descartes. In short, if the laws of
+nature are thus fickle and inconstant, if it can be affirmed and
+be believed that they will change, when for ages and ages they
+have appeared immutable, the human mind will no longer have any
+incitements to inquiry, but must remain fixed in inactive torpor,
+or amuse itself only in bewildering dreams and extravagant
+fancies.
+
+The constancy of the laws of nature and of effects and causes
+is the foundation of all human knowledge, though far be it from
+me to say that the same power which framed and executes the laws
+of nature may not change them all 'in a moment, in the twinkling
+of an eye.'  Such a change may undoubtedly happen. All that I
+mean to say is that it is impossible to infer it from reasoning.
+If without any previous observable symptoms or indications of a
+change, we can infer that a change will take place, we may as
+well make any assertion whatever and think it as unreasonable to
+be contradicted in affirming that the moon will come in contact
+with the earth tomorrow, as in saying that the sun will rise at
+its usual time.
+
+With regard to the duration of human life, there does not
+appear to have existed from the earliest ages of the world to the
+present moment the smallest permanent symptom or indication of
+increasing prolongation. The observable effects of climate,
+habit, diet, and other causes, on length of life have furnished
+the pretext for asserting its indefinite extension; and the sandy
+foundation on which the argument rests is that because the limit
+of human life is undefined; because you cannot mark its precise
+term, and say so far exactly shall it go and no further; that
+therefore its extent may increase for ever, and be properly
+termed indefinite or unlimited. But the fallacy and absurdity of
+this argument will sufficiently appear from a slight examination
+of what Mr Condorcet calls the organic perfectibility, or
+degeneration, of the race of plants and animals, which he says
+may be regarded as one of the general laws of nature.
+
+I am told that it is a maxim among the improvers of cattle
+that you may breed to any degree of nicety you please, and they
+found this maxim upon another, which is that some of the
+offspring will possess the desirable qualities of the parents in
+a greater degree. In the famous Leicestershire breed of sheep,
+the object is to procure them with small heads and small legs.
+Proceeding upon these breeding maxims, it is evident that we
+might go on till the heads and legs were evanescent quantities,
+but this is so palpable an absurdity that we may be quite sure
+that the premises are not just and that there really is a limit,
+though we cannot see it or say exactly where it is. In this case,
+the point of the greatest degree of improvement, or the smallest
+size of the head and legs, may be said to be undefined, but this
+is very different from unlimited, or from indefinite, in Mr
+Condorcet's acceptation of the term. Though I may not be able in
+the present instance to mark the limit at which further
+improvement will stop, I can very easily mention a point at which
+it will not arrive. I should not scruple to assert that were the
+breeding to continue for ever, the head and legs of these sheep
+would never be so small as the head and legs of a rat.
+
+It cannot be true, therefore, that among animals, some of the
+offspring will possess the desirable qualities of the parents in
+a greater degree, or that animals are indefinitely perfectible.
+
+The progress of a wild plant to a beautiful garden flower is
+perhaps more marked and striking than anything that takes place
+among animals, yet even here it would be the height of absurdity
+to assert that the progress was unlimited or indefinite.
+
+One of the most obvious features of the improvement is the
+increase of size. The flower has grown gradually larger by
+cultivation. If the progress were really unlimited it might be
+increased ad infinitum, but this is so gross an absurdity that we
+may be quite sure that among plants as well as among animals
+there is a limit to improvement, though we do not exactly know
+where it is. It is probable that the gardeners who contend for
+flower prizes have often applied stronger dressing without
+success. At the same time it would be highly presumptuous in any
+man to say that he had seen the finest carnation or anemone that
+could ever be made to grow. He might however assert without the
+smallest chance of being contradicted by a future fact, that no
+carnation or anemone could ever by cultivation be increased to
+the size of a large cabbage; and yet there are assignable
+quantities much greater than a cabbage. No man can say that he
+has seen the largest ear of wheat, or the largest oak that could
+ever grow; but he might easily, and with perfect certainty, name
+a point of magnitude at which they would not arrive. In all these
+cases therefore, a careful distinction should be made, between an
+unlimited progress, and a progress where the limit is merely
+undefined.
+
+It will be said, perhaps, that the reason why plants and
+animals cannot increase indefinitely in size is, that they would
+fall by their own weight. I answer, how do we know this but from
+experience?--from experience of the degree of strength with
+which these bodies are formed. I know that a carnation, long
+before it reached the size of a cabbage, would not be supported
+by its stalk, but I only know this from my experience of the
+weakness and want of tenacity in the materials of a carnation
+stalk. There are many substances in nature of the same size that
+would support as large a head as a cabbage.
+
+The reasons of the mortality of plants are at present
+perfectly unknown to us. No man can say why such a plant is
+annual, another biennial, and another endures for ages. The whole
+affair in all these cases, in plants, animals, and in the human
+race, is an affair of experience, and I only conclude that man is
+mortal because the invariable experience of all ages has proved
+the mortality of those materials of which his visible body is
+made:
+
+What can we reason, but from what we know?
+
+Sound philosophy will not authorize me to alter this opinion
+of the mortality of man on earth, till it can be clearly proved
+that the human race has made, and is making, a decided progress
+towards an illimitable extent of life. And the chief reason why I
+adduced the two particular instances from animals and plants was
+to expose and illustrate, if I could, the fallacy of that
+argument which infers an unlimited progress, merely because some
+partial improvement has taken place, and that the limit of this
+improvement cannot be precisely ascertained.
+
+The capacity of improvement in plants and animals, to a
+certain degree, no person can possibly doubt. A clear and decided
+progress has already been made, and yet, I think, it appears that
+it would be highly absurd to say that this progress has no
+limits. In human life, though there are great variations from
+different causes, it may be doubted whether, since the world
+began, any organic improvement whatever in the human frame can be
+clearly ascertained. The foundations, therefore, on which the
+arguments for the organic perfectibility of man rest, are
+unusually weak, and can only be considered as mere conjectures.
+It does not, however, by any means seem impossible that by an
+attention to breed, a certain degree of improvement, similar to
+that among animals, might take place among men. Whether intellect
+could be communicated may be a matter of doubt: but size,
+strength, beauty, complexion, and perhaps even longevity are in a
+degree transmissible. The error does not seem to lie in supposing
+a small degree of improvement possible, but in not discriminating
+between a small improvement, the limit of which is undefined, and
+an improvement really unlimited. As the human race, however,
+could not be improved in this way, without condemning all the bad
+specimens to celibacy, it is not probable that an attention to
+breed should ever become general; indeed, I know of no
+well-directed attempts of this kind, except in the ancient family
+of the Bickerstaffs, who are said to have been very successful in
+whitening the skins and increasing the height of their race by
+prudent marriages, particularly by that very judicious cross with
+Maud, the milk-maid, by which some capital defects in the
+constitutions of the family were corrected.
+
+It will not be necessary, I think, in order more completely
+to shew the improbability of any approach in man towards
+immortality on earth, to urge the very great additional weight
+that an increase in the duration of life would give to the
+argument of population.
+
+Many, I doubt not, will think that the attempting gravely to
+controvert so absurd a paradox as the immortality of man on
+earth, or indeed, even the perfectibility of man and society, is
+a waste of time and words, and that such unfounded conjectures
+are best answered by neglect. I profess, however, to be of a
+different opinion. When paradoxes of this kind are advanced by
+ingenious and able men, neglect has no tendency to convince them
+of their mistakes. Priding themselves on what they conceive to be
+a mark of the reach and size of their own understandings, of the
+extent and comprehensiveness of their views, they will look upon
+this neglect merely as an indication of poverty, and narrowness,
+in the mental exertions of their contemporaries, and only think
+that the world is not yet prepared to receive their sublime
+truths.
+
+On the contrary, a candid investigation of these subjects,
+accompanied with a perfect readiness to adopt any theory
+warranted by sound philosophy, may have a tendency to convince
+them that in forming improbable and unfounded hypotheses, so far
+from enlarging the bounds of human science, they are contracting
+it, so far from promoting the improvement of the human mind, they
+are obstructing it; they are throwing us back again almost into
+the infancy of knowledge and weakening the foundations of that
+mode of philosophising, under the auspices of which science has
+of late made such rapid advances. The present rage for wide and
+unrestrained speculation seems to be a kind of mental
+intoxication, arising, perhaps, from the great and unexpected
+discoveries which have been made of late years, in various
+branches of science. To men elate and giddy with such successes,
+every thing appeared to be within the grasp of human powers; and,
+under this illusion, they confounded subjects where no real
+progress could be proved with those where the progress had been
+marked, certain, and acknowledged. Could they be persuaded to
+sober themselves with a little severe and chastised thinking,
+they would see, that the cause of truth, and of sound philosophy,
+cannot but suffer by substituting wild flights and unsupported
+assertions for patient investigation, and well authenticated
+proofs.
+
+Mr Condorcet's book may be considered not only as a sketch of
+the opinions of a celebrated individual, but of many of the
+literary men in France at the beginning of the Revolution. As
+such, though merely a sketch, it seems worthy of attention.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 10
+
+Mr Godwin's system of equality--Error of attributing all the
+vices of mankind to human institutions--Mr Godwin's first answer
+to the difficulty arising from population totally insufficient--
+Mr Godwin's beautiful system of equality supposed to be realized
+--Its utter destruction simply from the principle of population in
+so short a time as thirty years.
+
+
+In reading Mr Godwin's ingenious and able work on political
+justice, it is impossible not to be struck with the spirit and
+energy of his style, the force and precision of some of his
+reasonings, the ardent tone of his thoughts, and particularly
+with that impressive earnestness of manner which gives an air of
+truth to the whole. At the same time, it must be confessed that
+he has not proceeded in his inquiries with the caution that sound
+philosophy seems to require. His conclusions are often
+unwarranted by his premises. He fails sometimes in removing the
+objections which he himself brings forward. He relies too much on
+general and abstract propositions which will not admit of
+application. And his conjectures certainly far outstrip the
+modesty of nature.
+
+The system of equality which Mr Godwin proposes is, without
+doubt, by far the most beautiful and engaging of any that has yet
+appeared. An amelioration of society to be produced merely by
+reason and conviction wears much more the promise of permanence
+than any change effected and maintained by force. The unlimited
+exercise of private judgement is a doctrine inexpressibly grand
+and captivating and has a vast superiority over those systems
+where every individual is in a manner the slave of the public.
+The substitution of benevolence as the master-spring and moving
+principle of society, instead of self-love, is a consummation
+devoutly to be wished. In short, it is impossible to contemplate
+the whole of this fair structure without emotions of delight and
+admiration, accompanied with ardent longing for the period of its
+accomplishment. But, alas! that moment can never arrive. The
+whole is little better than a dream, a beautiful phantom of the
+imagination. These 'gorgeous palaces' of happiness and
+immortality, these 'solemn temples' of truth and virtue will
+dissolve, 'like the baseless fabric of a vision', when we awaken
+to real life and contemplate the true and genuine situation of
+man on earth. Mr Godwin, at the conclusion of the third chapter
+of his eighth book, speaking of population, says:
+
+There is a principle in human society, by which population is
+perpetually kept down to the level of the means of subsistence.
+Thus among the wandering tribes of America and Asia, we never
+find through the lapse of ages that population has so increased
+as to render necessary the cultivation of the earth.
+
+This principle, which Mr Godwin thus mentions as some
+mysterious and occult cause and which he does not attempt to
+investigate, will be found to be the grinding law of necessity,
+misery, and the fear of misery.
+
+The great error under which Mr Godwin labours throughout his
+whole work is the attributing almost all the vices and misery
+that are seen in civil society to human institutions. Political
+regulations and the established administration of property are
+with him the fruitful sources of all evil, the hotbeds of all the
+crimes that degrade mankind. Were this really a true state of the
+case, it would not seem a hopeless task to remove evil completely
+from the world, and reason seems to be the proper and adequate
+instrument for effecting so great a purpose. But the truth is,
+that though human institutions appear to be the obvious and
+obtrusive causes of much mischief to mankind, yet in reality they
+are light and superficial, they are mere feathers that float on
+the surface, in comparison with those deeper seated causes of
+impurity that corrupt the springs and render turbid the whole
+stream of human life.
+
+Mr Godwin, in his chapter on the benefits attendant on a
+system of equality, says:
+
+The spirit of oppression, the spirit of servility, and the
+spirit of fraud, these are the immediate growth of the
+established administration of property. They are alike hostile to
+intellectual improvement. The other vices of envy, malice, and
+revenge are their inseparable companions. In a state of society
+where men lived in the midst of plenty and where all shared alike
+the bounties of nature, these sentiments would inevitably expire.
+The narrow principle of selfishness would vanish. No man being
+obliged to guard his little store or provide with anxiety and
+pain for his restless wants, each would lose his individual
+existence in the thought of the general good. No man would be an
+enemy to his neighbour, for they would have no subject of
+contention, and, of consequence, philanthropy would resume the
+empire which reason assigns her. Mind would be delivered from her
+perpetual anxiety about corporal support, and free to expatiate
+in the field of thought, which is congenial to her. Each would
+assist the inquiries of all.
+
+This would, indeed, be a happy state. But that it is merely
+an imaginary picture, with scarcely a feature near the truth, the
+reader, I am afraid, is already too well convinced.
+
+Man cannot live in the midst of plenty. All cannot share
+alike the bounties of nature. Were there no established
+administration of property, every man would be obliged to guard
+with force his little store. Selfishness would be triumphant. The
+subjects of contention would be perpetual. Every individual mind
+would be under a constant anxiety about corporal support, and not
+a single intellect would be left free to expatiate in the field
+of thought.
+
+How little Mr Godwin has turned the attention of his
+penetrating mind to the real state of man on earth will
+sufficiently appear from the manner in which he endeavours to
+remove the difficulty of an overcharged population. He says:
+
+The obvious answer to this objection, is, that to reason thus
+is to foresee difficulties at a great distance. Three fourths of
+the habitable globe is now uncultivated. The parts already
+cultivated are capable of immeasurable improvement. Myriads of
+centuries of still increasing population may pass away, and the
+earth be still found sufficient for the subsistence of its
+inhabitants.
+
+I have already pointed out the error of supposing that no
+distress and difficulty would arise from an overcharged
+population before the earth absolutely refused to produce any
+more. But let us imagine for a moment Mr Godwin's beautiful
+system of equality realized in its utmost purity, and see how
+soon this difficulty might be expected to press under so perfect
+a form of society. A theory that will not admit of application
+cannot possibly be just.
+
+Let us suppose all the causes of misery and vice in this
+island removed. War and contention cease. Unwholesome trades and
+manufactories do not exist. Crowds no longer collect together in
+great and pestilent cities for purposes of court intrigue, of
+commerce, and vicious gratifications. Simple, healthy, and
+rational amusements take place of drinking, gaming, and
+debauchery. There are no towns sufficiently large to have any
+prejudicial effects on the human constitution. The greater part
+of the happy inhabitants of this terrestrial paradise live in
+hamlets and farmhouses scattered over the face of the country.
+Every house is clean, airy, sufficiently roomy, and in a healthy
+situation. All men are equal. The labours of luxury are at end.
+And the necessary labours of agriculture are shared amicably
+among all. The number of persons, and the produce of the island,
+we suppose to be the same as at present. The spirit of
+benevolence, guided by impartial justice, will divide this
+produce among all the members of the society according to their
+wants. Though it would be impossible that they should all have
+animal food every day, yet vegetable food, with meat
+occasionally, would satisfy the desires of a frugal people and
+would be sufficient to preserve them in health, strength, and
+spirits.
+
+Mr Godwin considers marriage as a fraud and a monopoly. Let
+us suppose the commerce of the sexes established upon principles
+of the most perfect freedom. Mr Godwin does not think himself
+that this freedom would lead to a promiscuous intercourse, and in
+this I perfectly agree with him. The love of variety is a
+vicious, corrupt, and unnatural taste and could not prevail in
+any great degree in a simple and virtuous state of society. Each
+man would probably select himself a partner, to whom he would
+adhere as long as that adherence continued to be the choice of
+both parties. It would be of little consequence, according to Mr
+Godwin, how many children a woman had or to whom they belonged.
+Provisions and assistance would spontaneously flow from the
+quarter in which they abounded, to the quarter that was
+deficient. (See Bk VIII, ch. 8; in the third edition, Vol II, p.
+512) And every man would be ready to furnish instruction to the
+rising generation according to his capacity.
+
+I cannot conceive a form of society so favourable upon the
+whole to population. The irremediableness of marriage, as it is
+at present constituted, undoubtedly deters many from entering
+into that state. An unshackled intercourse on the contrary would
+be a most powerful incitement to early attachments, and as we are
+supposing no anxiety about the future support of children to
+exist, I do not conceive that there would be one woman in a
+hundred, of twenty-three, without a family.
+
+With these extraordinary encouragements to population, and
+every cause of depopulation, as we have supposed, removed, the
+numbers would necessarily increase faster than in any society
+that has ever yet been known. I have mentioned, on the authority
+of a pamphlet published by a Dr Styles and referred to by Dr
+Price, that the inhabitants of the back settlements of America
+doubled their numbers in fifteen years. England is certainly a
+more healthy country than the back settlements of America, and as
+we have supposed every house in the island to be airy and
+wholesome, and the encouragements to have a family greater even
+than with the back settlers, no probable reason can be assigned
+why the population should not double itself in less, if possible,
+than fifteen years. But to be quite sure that we do not go beyond
+the truth, we will only suppose the period of doubling to be
+twenty-five years, a ratio of increase which is well known to
+have taken place throughout all the Northern States of America.
+
+There can be little doubt that the equalization of property
+which we have supposed, added to the circumstance of the labour
+of the whole community being directed chiefly to agriculture,
+would tend greatly to augment the produce of the country. But to
+answer the demands of a population increasing so rapidly, Mr
+Godwin's calculation of half an hour a day for each man would
+certainly not be sufficient. It is probable that the half of
+every man's time must be employed for this purpose. Yet with
+such, or much greater exertions, a person who is acquainted with
+the nature of the soil in this country, and who reflects on the
+fertility of the lands already in cultivation, and the barrenness
+of those that are not cultivated, will be very much disposed to
+doubt whether the whole average produce could possibly be doubled
+in twenty-five years from the present period. The only chance of
+success would be the ploughing up all the grazing countries and
+putting an end almost entirely to the use of animal food. Yet a
+part of this scheme might defeat itself. The soil of England will
+not produce much without dressing, and cattle seem to be
+necessary to make that species of manure which best suits the
+land. In China it is said that the soil in some of the provinces
+is so fertile as to produce two crops of rice in the year without
+dressing. None of the lands in England will answer to this
+description.
+
+Difficult, however, as it might be to double the average
+produce of the island in twenty-five years, let us suppose it
+effected. At the expiration of the first period therefore, the
+food, though almost entirely vegetable, would be sufficient to
+support in health the doubled population of fourteen millions.
+
+During the next period of doubling, where will the food be
+found to satisfy the importunate demands of the increasing
+numbers? Where is the fresh land to turn up? Where is the
+dressing necessary to improve that which is already in
+cultivation? There is no person with the smallest knowledge of
+land but would say that it was impossible that the average
+produce of the country could be increased during the second
+twenty-five years by a quantity equal to what it at present
+yields. Yet we will suppose this increase, however improbable, to
+take place. The exuberant strength of the argument allows of
+almost any concession. Even with this concession, however, there
+would be seven millions at the expiration of the second term
+unprovided for. A quantity of food equal to the frugal support of
+twenty-one millions, would be to be divided among twenty-eight
+millions.
+
+Alas! what becomes of the picture where men lived in the
+midst of plenty, where no man was obliged to provide with anxiety
+and pain for his restless wants, where the narrow principle of
+selfishness did not exist, where Mind was delivered from her
+perpetual anxiety about corporal support and free to expatiate in
+the field of thought which is congenial to her. This beautiful
+fabric of imagination vanishes at the severe touch of truth. The
+spirit of benevolence, cherished and invigorated by plenty, is
+repressed by the chilling breath of want. The hateful passions
+that had vanished reappear. The mighty law of self-preservation
+expels all the softer and more exalted emotions of the soul. The
+temptations to evil are too strong for human nature to resist.
+The corn is plucked before it is ripe, or secreted in unfair
+proportions, and the whole black train of vices that belong to
+falsehood are immediately generated. Provisions no longer flow in
+for the support of the mother with a large family. The children
+are sickly from insufficient food. The rosy flush of health gives
+place to the pallid cheek and hollow eye of misery. Benevolence,
+yet lingering in a few bosoms, makes some faint expiring
+struggles, till at length self-love resumes his wonted empire and
+lords it triumphant over the world.
+
+No human institutions here existed, to the perverseness of
+which Mr Godwin ascribes the original sin of the worst men. (Bk
+VIII, ch. 3; in the third edition, Vol. II, p. 462) No opposition
+had been produced by them between public and private good. No
+monopoly had been created of those advantages which reason
+directs to be left in common. No man had been goaded to the
+breach of order by unjust laws. Benevolence had established her
+reign in all hearts: and yet in so short a period as within fifty
+years, violence, oppression, falsehood, misery, every hateful
+vice, and every form of distress, which degrade and sadden the
+present state of society, seem to have been generated by the most
+imperious circumstances, by laws inherent in the nature of man,
+and absolutely independent of it human regulations.
+
+If we are not yet too well convinced of the reality of this
+melancholy picture, let us but look for a moment into the next
+period of twenty-five years; and we shall see twenty-eight
+millions of human beings without the means of support; and before
+the conclusion of the first century, the population would be one
+hundred and twelve millions, and the food only sufficient for
+thirty-five millions, leaving seventy-seven millions unprovided
+for. In these ages want would be indeed triumphant, and rapine
+and murder must reign at large: and yet all this time we are
+supposing the produce of the earth absolutely unlimited, and the
+yearly increase greater than the boldest speculator can imagine.
+
+This is undoubtedly a very different view of the difficulty
+arising from population from that which Mr Godwin gives, when he
+says, 'Myriads of centuries of still increasing population may
+pass away, and the earth be still found sufficient for the
+subsistence of its inhabitants.'
+
+I am sufficiently aware that the redundant twenty-eight
+millions, or seventy-seven millions, that I have mentioned, could
+never have existed. It is a perfectly just observation of Mr
+Godwin, that, 'There is a principle in human society, by which
+population is perpetually kept down to the level of the means of
+subsistence.' The sole question is, what is this principle? is it
+some obscure and occult cause? Is it some mysterious interference
+of heaven which, at a certain period, strikes the men with
+impotence, and the women with barrenness? Or is it a cause, open
+to our researches, within our view, a cause, which has constantly
+been observed to operate, though with varied force, in every
+state in which man has been placed? Is it not a degree of misery,
+the necessary and inevitable result of the laws of nature, which
+human institutions, so far from aggravating, have tended
+considerably to mitigate, though they never can remove?
+
+It may be curious to observe, in the case that we have been
+supposing, how some of the laws which at present govern civilized
+society, would be successively dictated by the most imperious
+necessity. As man, according to Mr Godwin, is the creature of the
+impressions to which he is subject, the goadings of want could
+not continue long, before some violations of public or private
+stock would necessarily take place. As these violations increased
+in number and extent, the more active and comprehensive
+intellects of the society would soon perceive, that while
+population was fast increasing, the yearly produce of the country
+would shortly begin to diminish. The urgency of the case would
+suggest the necessity of some mediate measures to be taken for
+the general safety. Some kind of convention would then be called,
+and the dangerous situation of the country stated in the
+strongest terms. It would be observed, that while they lived in
+the midst of plenty, it was of little consequence who laboured
+the least, or who possessed the least, as every man was perfectly
+willing and ready to supply the wants of his neighbour. But that
+the question was no longer whether one man should give to another
+that which he did not use himself, but whether he should give to
+his neighbour the food which was absolutely necessary to his own
+existence. It would be represented, that the number of those that
+were in want very greatly exceeded the number and means of those
+who should supply them; that these pressing wants, which from the
+state of the produce of the country could not all be gratified,
+had occasioned some flagrant violations of justice; that these
+violations had already checked the increase of food, and would,
+if they were not by some means or other prevented, throw the
+whole community in confusion; that imperious necessity seemed to
+dictate that a yearly increase of produce should, if possible, be
+obtained at all events; that in order to effect this first,
+great, and indispensable purpose, it would be advisable to make a
+more complete division of land, and to secure every man's stock
+against violation by the most powerful sanctions, even by death
+itself.
+
+It might be urged perhaps by some objectors that, as the
+fertility of the land increased, and various accidents occurred,
+the share of some men might be much more than sufficient for
+their support, and that when the reign of self-love was once
+established, they would not distribute their surplus produce
+without some compensation in return. It would be observed, in
+answer, that this was an inconvenience greatly to be lamented;
+but that it was an evil which bore no comparison to the black
+train of distresses that would inevitably be occasioned by the
+insecurity of property; that the quantity of food which one man
+could consume was necessarily limited by the narrow capacity of
+the human stomach; that it was not certainly probable that he
+should throw away the rest; but that even if he exchanged his
+surplus food for the labour of others, and made them in some
+degree dependent on him, this would still be better than that
+these others should absolutely starve.
+
+It seems highly probable, therefore, that an administration
+of property, not very different from that which prevails in
+civilized states at present, would be established, as the best,
+though inadequate, remedy for the evils which were pressing on
+the society.
+
+The next subject that would come under discussion, intimately
+connected with the preceding, is the commerce between the sexes.
+It would be urged by those who had turned their attention to the
+true cause of the difficulties under which the community
+laboured, that while every man felt secure that all his children
+would be well provided for by general benevolence, the powers of
+the earth would be absolutely inadequate to produce food for the
+population which would inevitably ensue; that even if the whole
+attention and labour of the society were directed to this sole
+point, and if, by the most perfect security of property, and
+every other encouragement that could be thought of, the greatest
+possible increase of produce were yearly obtained; yet still,
+that the increase of food would by no means keep pace with the
+much more rapid increase of population; that some check to
+population therefore was imperiously called for; that the most
+natural and obvious check seemed to be to make every man provide
+for his own children; that this would operate in some respect as
+a measure and guide in the increase of population, as it might be
+expected that no man would bring beings into the world, for whom
+he could not find the means of support; that where this
+notwithstanding was the case, it seemed necessary, for the
+example of others, that the disgrace and inconvenience attending
+such a conduct should fall upon the individual, who had thus
+inconsiderately plunged himself and innocent children in misery
+and want.
+
+The institution of marriage, or at least, of some express or
+implied obligation on every man to support his own children,
+seems to be the natural result of these reasonings in a community
+under the difficulties that we have supposed.
+
+The view of these difficulties presents us with a very
+natural origin of the superior disgrace which attends a breach of
+chastity in the woman than in the man. It could not be expected
+that women should have resources sufficient to support their own
+children. When therefore a woman was connected with a man, who
+had entered into no compact to maintain her children, and, aware
+of the inconveniences that he might bring upon himself, had
+deserted her, these children must necessarily fall for support
+upon the society, or starve. And to prevent the frequent
+recurrence of such an inconvenience, as it would be highly unjust
+to punish so natural a fault by personal restraint or infliction,
+the men might agree to punish it with disgrace. The offence is
+besides more obvious and conspicuous in the woman, and less
+liable to any mistake. The father of a child may not always be
+known, but the same uncertainty cannot easily exist with regard
+to the mother. Where the evidence of the offence was most
+complete, and the inconvenience to the society at the same time
+the greatest, there it was agreed that the large share of blame
+should fall. The obligation on every man to maintain his
+children, the society would enforce, if there were occasion; and
+the greater degree of inconvenience or labour, to which a family
+would necessarily subject him, added to some portion of disgrace
+which every human being must incur who leads another into
+unhappiness, might be considered as a sufficient punishment for
+the man.
+
+That a woman should at present be almost driven from society
+for an offence which men commit nearly with impunity, seems to be
+undoubtedly a breach of natural justice. But the origin of the
+custom, as the most obvious and effectual method of preventing
+the frequent recurrence of a serious inconvenience to a
+community, appears to be natural, though not perhaps perfectly
+justifiable. This origin, however, is now lost in the new train
+of ideas which the custom has since generated. What at first
+might be dictated by state necessity is now supported by female
+delicacy, and operates with the greatest force on that part of
+society where, if the original intention of the custom were
+preserved, there is the least real occasion for it.
+
+When these two fundamental laws of society, the security of
+property, and the institution of marriage, were once established,
+inequality of conditions must necessarily follow. Those who were
+born after the division of property would come into a world
+already possessed. If their parents, from having too large a
+family, could not give them sufficient for their support, what
+are they to do in a world where everything is appropriated? We
+have seen the fatal effects that would result to a society, if
+every man had a valid claim to an equal share of the produce of
+the earth. The members of a family which was grown too large for
+the original division of land appropriated to it could not then
+demand a part of the surplus produce of others, as a debt of
+justice. It has appeared, that from the inevitable laws of our
+nature some human beings must suffer from want. These are the
+unhappy persons who, in the great lottery of life, have drawn a
+blank. The number of these claimants would soon exceed the
+ability of the surplus produce to supply. Moral merit is a very
+difficult distinguishing criterion, except in extreme cases. The
+owners of surplus produce would in general seek some more obvious
+mark of distinction. And it seems both natural and just that,
+except upon particular occasions, their choice should fall upon
+those who were able, and professed themselves willing, to exert
+their strength in procuring a further surplus produce; and thus
+at once benefiting the community, and enabling these proprietors
+to afford assistance to greater numbers. All who were in want of
+food would be urged by imperious necessity to offer their labour
+in exchange for this article so absolutely essential to
+existence. The fund appropriated to the maintenance of labour
+would be the aggregate quantity of food possessed by the owners
+of land beyond their own consumption. When the demands upon this
+fund were great and numerous, it would naturally be divided in
+very small shares. Labour would be ill paid. Men would offer to
+work for a bare subsistence, and the rearing of families would be
+checked by sickness and misery. On the contrary, when this fund
+was increasing fast, when it was great in proportion to the
+number of claimants, it would be divided in much larger shares.
+No man would exchange his labour without receiving an ample
+quantity of food in return. Labourers would live in ease and
+comfort, and would consequently be able to rear a numerous and
+vigorous offspring.
+
+On the state of this fund, the happiness, or the degree of
+misery, prevailing among the lower classes of people in every
+known state at present chiefly depends. And on this happiness, or
+degree of misery, depends the increase, stationariness, or
+decrease of population.
+
+And thus it appears, that a society constituted according to
+the most beautiful form that imagination can conceive, with
+benevolence for its moving principle, instead of self-love, and
+with every evil disposition in all its members corrected by
+reason and not force, would, from the inevitable laws of nature,
+and not from any original depravity of man, in a very short
+period degenerate into a society constructed upon a plan not
+essentially different from that which prevails in every known
+state at present; I mean, a society divided into a class of
+proprietors, and a class of labourers, and with self-love the
+main-spring of the great machine.
+
+In the supposition I have made, I have undoubtedly taken the
+increase of population smaller, and the increase of produce
+greater, than they really would be. No reason can be assigned
+why, under the circumstances I have supposed, population should
+not increase faster than in any known instance. If then we were
+to take the period of doubling at fifteen years, instead of
+twenty-five years, and reflect upon the labour necessary to
+double the produce in so short a time, even if we allow it
+possible, we may venture to pronounce with certainty that if Mr
+Godwin's system of society was established in its utmost
+perfection, instead of myriads of centuries, not thirty years
+could elapse before its utter destruction from the simple
+principle of population.
+
+I have taken no notice of emigration for obvious reasons. If
+such societies were instituted in other parts of Europe, these
+countries would be under the same difficulties with regard to
+population, and could admit no fresh members into their bosoms.
+If this beautiful society were confined to this island, it must
+have degenerated strangely from its original purity, and
+administer but a very small portion of the happiness it proposed;
+in short, its essential principle must be completely destroyed,
+before any of its members would voluntarily consent to leave it,
+and live under such governments as at present exist in Europe, or
+submit to the extreme hardships of first settlers in new regions.
+We well know, from repeated experience, how much misery and
+hardship men will undergo in their own country, before they can
+determine to desert it; and how often the most tempting proposals
+of embarking for new settlements have been rejected by people who
+appeared to be almost starving.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 11
+
+Mr Godwin's conjecture concerning the future extinction of the
+passion between the sexes--Little apparent grounds for such a
+conjecture--Passion of love not inconsistent either with reason
+or virtue.
+
+
+We have supported Mr Godwin's system of society once completely
+established. But it is supposing an impossibility. The same
+causes in nature which would destroy it so rapidly, were it once
+established, would prevent the possibility of its establishment.
+And upon what grounds we can presume a change in these natural
+causes, I am utterly at a loss to conjecture. No move towards the
+extinction of the passion between the sexes has taken place in
+the five or six thousand years that the world has existed. Men in
+the decline of life have in all ages declaimed against a passion
+which they have ceased to feel, but with as little reason as
+success. Those who from coldness of constitutional temperament
+have never felt what love is, will surely be allowed to be very
+incompetent judges with regard to the power of this passion to
+contribute to the sum of pleasurable sensations in life. Those
+who have spent their youth in criminal excesses and have prepared
+for themselves, as the comforts of their age, corporeal debility
+and mental remorse may well inveigh against such pleasures as
+vain and futile, and unproductive of lasting satisfaction. But
+the pleasures of pure love will bear the contemplation of the
+most improved reason, and the most exalted virtue. Perhaps there
+is scarcely a man who has once experienced the genuine delight of
+virtuous love, however great his intellectual pleasure may have
+been, that does not look back to the period as the sunny spot in
+his whole life, where his imagination loves to bask, which he
+recollects and contemplates with the fondest regrets, and which
+he would most wish to live over again. The superiority of
+intellectual to sensual pleasures consists rather in their
+filling up more time, in their having a larger range, and in
+their being less liable to satiety, than in their being more real
+and essential.
+
+Intemperance in every enjoyment defeats its own purpose. A
+walk in the finest day through the most beautiful country, if
+pursued too far, ends in pain and fatigue. The most wholesome and
+invigorating food, eaten with an unrestrained appetite, produces
+weakness instead of strength. Even intellectual pleasures, though
+certainly less liable than others to satiety, pursued with too
+little intermission, debilitate the body, and impair the vigour
+of the mind. To argue against the reality of these pleasures from
+their abuse seems to be hardly just. Morality, according to Mr
+Godwin, is a calculation of consequences, or, as Archdeacon Paley
+very justly expresses it, the will of God, as collected from
+general expediency. According to either of these definitions, a
+sensual pleasure not attended with the probability of unhappy
+consequences does not offend against the laws of morality, and if
+it be pursued with such a degree of temperance as to leave the
+most ample room for intellectual attainments, it must undoubtedly
+add to the sum of pleasurable sensations in life. Virtuous love,
+exalted by friendship, seems to be that sort of mixture of
+sensual and intellectual enjoyment particularly suited to the
+nature of man, and most powerfully calculated to awaken the
+sympathies of the soul, and produce the most exquisite
+gratifications.
+
+Mr Godwin says, in order to shew the evident inferiority of
+the pleasures of sense, 'Strip the commerce of the sexes of all
+its attendant circumstances, and it would be generally despised'
+(Bk. I, ch. 5; in the third edition, Vol. I, pp. 71-72). He might
+as well say to a man who admired trees: strip them of their
+spreading branches and lovely foliage, and what beauty can you
+see in a bare pole? But it was the tree with the branches and
+foliage, and not without them, that excited admiration. One
+feature of an object may be as distinct, and excite as different
+emotions, from the aggregate as any two things the most remote,
+as a beautiful woman, and a map of Madagascar. It is 'the
+symmetry of person, the vivacity, the voluptuous softness of
+temper, the affectionate kindness of feelings, the imagination
+and the wit' of a woman that excite the passion of love, and not
+the mere distinction of her being female. Urged by the passion of
+love, men have been driven into acts highly prejudicial to the
+general interests of society, but probably they would have found
+no difficulty in resisting the temptation, had it appeared in the
+form of a woman with no other attractions whatever but her sex.
+To strip sensual pleasures of all their adjuncts, in order to
+prove their inferiority, is to deprive a magnet of some of its
+most essential causes of attraction, and then to say that it is
+weak and inefficient.
+
+In the pursuit of every enjoyment, whether sensual or
+intellectual, reason, that faculty which enables us to calculate
+consequences, is the proper corrective and guide. It is probable
+therefore that improved reason will always tend to prevent the
+abuse of sensual pleasures, though it by no means follows that it
+will extinguish them.
+
+I have endeavoured to expose the fallacy of that argument
+which infers an unlimited progress from a partial improvement,
+the limits of which cannot be exactly ascertained. It has
+appeared, I think, that there are many instances in which a
+decided progress has been observed, where yet it would be a gross
+absurdity to suppose that progress indefinite. But towards the
+extinction of the passion between the sexes, no observable
+progress whatever has hitherto been made. To suppose such an
+extinction, therefore, is merely to offer an unfounded
+conjecture, unsupported by any philosophical probabilities.
+
+It is a truth, which history I am afraid makes too clear,
+that some men of the highest mental powers have been addicted not
+only to a moderate, but even to an immoderate indulgence in the
+pleasures of sensual love. But allowing, as I should be inclined
+to do, notwithstanding numerous instances to the contrary, that
+great intellectual exertions tend to diminish the empire of this
+passion over man, it is evident that the mass of mankind must be
+improved more highly than the brightest ornaments of the species
+at present before any difference can take place sufficient
+sensibly to affect population. I would by no means suppose that
+the mass of mankind has reached its term of improvement, but the
+principal argument of this essay tends to place in a strong point
+of view the improbability that the lower classes of people in any
+country should ever be sufficiently free from want and labour to
+obtain any high degree of intellectual improvement.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 12
+
+Mr Godwin's conjecture concerning the indefinite prolongation of
+human life--Improper inference drawn from the effects of mental
+stimulants on the human frame, illustrated in various instances--
+Conjectures not founded on any indications in the past not to be
+considered as philosophical conjectures--Mr Godwin's and Mr
+Condorcet's conjecture respecting the approach of man towards
+immortality on earth, a curious instance of the inconsistency of
+scepticism.
+
+
+Mr Godwin's conjecture respecting the future approach of man
+towards immortality on earth seems to be rather oddly placed in a
+chapter which professes to remove the objection to his system of
+equality from the principle of population. Unless he supposes the
+passion between the sexes to decrease faster than the duration of
+life increases, the earth would be more encumbered than ever. But
+leaving this difficulty to Mr Godwin, let us examine a few of the
+appearances from which the probable immortality of man is
+inferred.
+
+To prove the power of the mind over the body, Mr Godwin
+observes, "How often do we find a piece of good news dissipating a
+distemper? How common is the remark that those accidents which
+are to the indolent a source of disease are forgotten and
+extirpated in the busy and active? I walk twenty miles in an
+indolent and half determined temper and am extremely fatigued. I
+walk twenty miles full of ardour, and with a motive that
+engrosses my soul, and I come in as fresh and as alert as when I
+began my journey. Emotion excited by some unexpected word, by a
+letter that is delivered to us, occasions the most extraordinary
+revolutions in our frame, accelerates the circulation, causes the
+heart to palpitate, the tongue to refuse its office, and has been
+known to occasion death by extreme anguish or extreme joy. There
+is nothing indeed of which the physician is more aware than of
+the power of the mind in assisting or reading convalescence."
+
+The instances here mentioned are chiefly instances of the
+effects of mental stimulants on the bodily frame. No person has
+ever for a moment doubted the near, though mysterious, connection
+of mind and body. But it is arguing totally without knowledge of
+the nature of stimulants to suppose, either that they can be
+applied continually with equal strength, or if they could be so
+applied, for a time, that they would not exhaust and wear out the
+subject. In some of the cases here noticed, the strength of the
+stimulus depends upon its novelty and unexpectedness. Such a
+stimulus cannot, from its nature, be repeated often with the same
+effect, as it would by repetition lose that property which gives
+it its strength.
+
+In the other cases, the argument is from a small and partial
+effect, to a great and general effect, which will in numberless
+instances be found to be a very fallacious mode of reasoning. The
+busy and active man may in some degree counteract, or what is
+perhaps nearer the truth, may disregard those slight disorders of
+frame which fix the attention of a man who has nothing else to
+think of; but this does not tend to prove that activity of mind
+will enable a man to disregard a high fever, the smallpox, or the
+plague.
+
+The man who walks twenty miles with a motive that engrosses
+his soul does not attend to his slight fatigue of body when he
+comes in; but double his motive, and set him to walk another
+twenty miles, quadruple it, and let him start a third time, and
+so on; and the length of his walk will ultimately depend upon
+muscle and not mind. Powell, for a motive of ten guineas, would
+have walked further probably than Mr Godwin, for a motive of half
+a million. A motive of uncommon power acting upon a frame of
+moderate strength would, perhaps, make the man kill himself by
+his exertions, but it would not make him walk a hundred miles in
+twenty-four hours. This statement of the case shews the fallacy
+of supposing that the person was really not at all tired in his
+first walk of twenty miles, because he did not appear to be so,
+or, perhaps, scarcely felt any fatigue himself. The mind cannot
+fix its attention strongly on more than one object at once. The
+twenty thousand pounds so engrossed his thoughts that he did not
+attend to any slight soreness of foot, or stiffness of limb. But
+had he been really as fresh and as alert, as when he first set
+off, he would be able to go the second twenty miles with as much
+ease as the first, and so on, the third, &c. Which leads to a
+palpable absurdity. When a horse of spirit is nearly half tired,
+by the stimulus of the spur, added to the proper management of
+the bit, he may be put so much upon his mettle, that he would
+appear to a standerby, as fresh and as high spirited as if he had
+not gone a mile. Nay, probably, the horse himself, while in the
+heat and passion occasioned by this stimulus, would not feel any
+fatigue; but it would be strangely contrary to all reason and
+experience, to argue from such an appearance that, if the
+stimulus were continued, the horse would never be tired. The cry
+of a pack of hounds will make some horses, after a journey of
+forty miles on the road, appear as fresh, and as lively, as when
+they first set out. Were they then to be hunted, no perceptible
+abatement would at first be felt by their riders in their
+strength and spirits, but towards the end of a hard day, the
+previous fatigue would have its full weight and effect, and make
+them tire sooner. When I have taken a long walk with my gun, and
+met with no success, I have frequently returned home feeling a
+considerable degree of uncomfortableness from fatigue. Another
+day, perhaps, going over nearly the same extent of ground with a
+good deal of sport, I have come home fresh, and alert. The
+difference in the sensation of fatigue upon coming in, on the
+different days, may have been very striking, but on the following
+mornings I have found no such difference. I have not perceived
+that I was less stiff in my limbs, or less footsore, on the
+morning after the day of the sport, than on the other morning.
+
+In all these cases, stimulants upon the mind seem to act
+rather by taking off the attention from the bodily fatigue, than
+by really and truly counteracting it. If the energy of my mind
+had really counteracted the fatigue of my body, why should I feel
+tired the next morning? if the stimulus of the hounds had as
+completely overcome the fatigue of the journey in reality, as it
+did in appearance, why should the horse be tired sooner than if
+he had not gone the forty miles? I happen to have a very bad fit
+of the toothache at the time I am writing this. In the eagerness
+of composition, I every now and then, for a moment or two, forget
+it. Yet I cannot help thinking that the process, which causes the
+pain, is still going forwards, and that the nerves which carry
+the information of it to the brain are even during these moments
+demanding attention and room for their appropriate vibrations.
+The multiplicity of vibrations of another kind may perhaps
+prevent their admission, or overcome them for a time when
+admitted, till a shoot of extraordinary energy puts all other
+vibration to the rout, destroys the vividness of my argumentative
+conceptions, and rides triumphant in the brain. In this case, as
+in the others, the mind seems to have little or no power in
+counteracting or curing the disorder, but merely possesses a
+power, if strongly excited, of fixing its attention on other
+subjects.
+
+I do not, however, mean to say that a sound and vigorous mind
+has no tendency whatever to keep the body in a similar state. So
+close and intimate is the union of mind and body that it would be
+highly extraordinary if they did not mutually assist each other's
+functions. But, perhaps, upon a comparison, the body has more
+effect upon the mind than the mind upon the body. The first
+object of the mind is to act as purveyor to the wants of the
+body. When these wants are completely satisfied, an active mind
+is indeed apt to wander further, to range over the fields of
+science, or sport in the regions of. Imagination, to fancy that
+it has 'shuffled off this mortal coil', and is seeking its
+kindred element. But all these efforts are like the vain
+exertions of the hare in the fable. The slowly moving tortoise,
+the body, never fails to overtake the mind, however widely and
+extensively it may have ranged, and the brightest and most
+energetic intellects, unwillingly as they may attend to the first
+or second summons, must ultimately yield the empire of the brain
+to the calls of hunger, or sink with the exhausted body in sleep.
+
+It seems as if one might say with certainty that if a
+medicine could be found to immortalize the body there would be no
+fear of its [not] being accompanied by the immortality of the
+mind. But the immortality of the mind by no means seems to infer
+the immortality of the body. On the contrary, the greatest
+conceivable energy of mind would probably exhaust and destroy the
+strength of the body. A temperate vigour of mind appears to be
+favourable to health, but very great intellectual exertions tend
+rather, as has been often observed, to wear out the scabbard.
+Most of the instances which Mr Godwin has brought to prove the
+power of the mind over the body, and the consequent probability
+of the immortality of man, are of this latter description, and
+could such stimulants be continually applied, instead of tending
+to immortalize, they would tend very rapidly to destroy the human
+frame.
+
+The probable increase of the voluntary power of man over his
+animal frame comes next under Mr Godwin's consideration, and he
+concludes by saying, that the voluntary power of some men, in
+this respect, is found to extend to various articles in which
+other men are impotent. But this is reasoning against an almost
+universal rule from a few exceptions; and these exceptions seem
+to be rather tricks, than powers that may be exerted to any good
+purpose. I have never heard of any man who could regulate his
+pulse in a fever, and doubt much, if any of the persons here
+alluded to have made the smallest perceptible progress in the
+regular correction of the disorders of their frames and the
+consequent prolongation of their lives.
+
+Mr Godwin says, 'Nothing can be more unphilosophical than to
+conclude, that, because a certain species of power is beyond the
+train of our present observation, that it is beyond the limits of
+the human mind.' I own my ideas of philosophy are in this respect
+widely different from Mr Godwin's. The only distinction that I
+see, between a philosophical conjecture, and the assertions of
+the Prophet Mr Brothers, is, that one is founded upon indications
+arising from the train of our present observations, and the other
+has no foundation at all. I expect that great discoveries are yet
+to take place in all the branches of human science, particularly
+in physics; but the moment we leave past experience as the
+foundation of our conjectures concerning the future, and, still
+more, if our conjectures absolutely contradict past experience,
+we are thrown upon a wide field of uncertainty, and any one
+supposition is then just as good as another. If a person were to
+tell me that men would ultimately have eyes and hands behind them
+as well as before them, I should admit the usefulness of the
+addition, but should give as a reason for my disbelief of it,
+that I saw no indications whatever in the past from which I could
+infer the smallest probability of such a change. If this be not
+allowed a valid objection, all conjectures are alike, and all
+equally philosophical. I own it appears to me that in the train
+of our present observations, there are no more genuine
+indications that man will become immortal upon earth than that he
+will have four eyes and four hands, or that trees will grow
+horizontally instead of perpendicularly.
+
+It will be said, perhaps, that many discoveries have already
+taken place in the world that were totally unforeseen and
+unexpected. This I grant to be true; but if a person had
+predicted these discoveries without being guided by any analogies
+or indications from past facts, he would deserve the name of seer
+or prophet, but not of philosopher. The wonder that some of our
+modern discoveries would excite in the savage inhabitants of
+Europe in the times of Theseus and Achilles, proves but little.
+Persons almost entirely unacquainted with the powers of a machine
+cannot be expected to guess at its effects. I am far from saying,
+that we are at present by any means fully acquainted with the
+powers of the human mind; but we certainly know more of this
+instrument than was known four thousand years ago; and therefore,
+though not to be called competent judges, we are certainly much
+better able than savages to say what is, or is not, within its
+grasp. A watch would strike a savage with as much surprise as a
+perpetual motion; yet one is to us a most familiar piece of
+mechanism, and the other has constantly eluded the efforts of the
+most acute intellects. In many instances we are now able to
+perceive the causes, which prevent an unlimited improvement in
+those inventions, which seemed to promise fairly for it at first.
+The original improvers of telescopes would probably think, that
+as long as the size of the specula and the length of the tubes
+could be increased, the powers and advantages of the instrument
+would increase; but experience has since taught us, that the
+smallness of the field, the deficiency of light, and the
+circumstance of the atmosphere being magnified, prevent the
+beneficial results that were to be expected from telescopes of
+extraordinary size and power. In many parts of knowledge, man has
+been almost constantly making some progress; in other parts, his
+efforts have been invariably baffled. The savage would not
+probably be able to guess at the causes of this mighty
+difference. Our further experience has given us some little
+insight into these causes, and has therefore enabled us better to
+judge, if not of what we are to expect in future, at least of
+what we are not to expect, which, though negative, is a very
+useful piece of information.
+
+As the necessity of sleep seems rather to depend upon the
+body than the mind, it does not appear how the improvement of the
+mind can tend very greatly to supersede this 'conspicuous
+infirmity'. A man who by great excitements on his mind is able
+to pass two or three nights without sleep, proportionably
+exhausts the vigour of his body, and this diminution of health
+and strength will soon disturb the operations of his
+understanding, so that by these great efforts he appears to have
+made no real progress whatever in superseding the necessity of
+this species of rest.
+
+There is certainly a sufficiently marked difference in the
+various characters of which we have some knowledge, relative to
+the energies of their minds, their benevolent pursuits, etc., to
+enable us to judge whether the operations of intellect have any
+decided effect in prolonging the duration of human life. It is
+certain that no decided effect of this kind has yet been
+observed. Though no attention of any kind has ever produced such
+an effect as could be construed into the smallest semblance of an
+approach towards immortality, yet of the two, a certain attention
+to the body seems to have more effect in this respect than an
+attention to the mind. The man who takes his temperate meals and
+his bodily exercise, with scrupulous regularity, will generally
+be found more healthy than the man who, very deeply engaged in
+intellectual pursuits, often forgets for a time these bodily
+cravings. The citizen who has retired, and whose ideas, perhaps,
+scarcely soar above or extend beyond his little garden, puddling
+all the morning about his borders of box, will, perhaps, live as
+long as the philosopher whose range of intellect is the most
+extensive, and whose views are the clearest of any of his
+contemporaries. It has been positively observed by those who have
+attended to the bills of mortality that women live longer upon an
+average than men, and, though I would not by any means say that
+their intellectual faculties are inferior, yet, I think, it must
+be allowed that, from their different education, there are not so
+many women as men, who are excited to vigorous mental exertion.
+
+As in these and similar instances, or to take a larger range,
+as in the great diversity of characters that have existed during
+some thousand years, no decided difference has been observed in
+the duration of human life from the operation of intellect, the
+mortality of man on earth seems to be as completely established,
+and exactly upon the same grounds, as any one, the most constant,
+of the laws of nature. An immediate act of power in the Creator
+of the Universe might, indeed, change one or all of these laws,
+either suddenly or gradually, but without some indications of
+such a change, and such indications do not exist, it. Is just as
+unphilosophical to suppose that the life of man may be prolonged
+beyond any assignable limits, as to suppose that the attraction
+of the earth will gradually be changed into repulsion and that
+stones will ultimately rise instead of fall or that the earth
+will fly off at a certain period to some more genial and warmer
+sun.
+
+The conclusion of this chapter presents us, undoubtedly, with
+a very beautiful and desirable picture, but like some of the
+landscapes drawn from fancy and not imagined with truth, it fails
+of that interest in the heart which nature and probability can
+alone give.
+
+I cannot quit this subject without taking notice of these
+conjectures of Mr Godwin and Mr Condorcet concerning the
+indefinite prolongation of human life, as a very curious instance
+of the longing of the soul after immortality. Both these
+gentlemen have rejected the light of revelation which absolutely
+promises eternal life in another state. They have also rejected
+the light of natural religion, which to the ablest intellects in
+all ages has indicated the future existence of the soul. Yet so
+congenial is the idea of immortality to the mind of man that they
+cannot consent entirely to throw it out of their systems. After
+all their fastidious scepticisms concerning the only probable
+mode of immortality, they introduce a species of immortality of
+their own, not only completely contradictory to every law of
+philosophical probability, but in itself in the highest degree
+narrow, partial, and unjust. They suppose that all the great,
+virtuous, and exalted minds that have ever existed or that may
+exist for some thousands, perhaps millions of years, will be sunk
+in annihilation, and that only a few beings, not greater in
+number than can exist at once upon the earth, will be ultimately
+crowned with immortality. Had such a tenet been advanced as a
+tenet of revelation I am very sure that all the enemies of
+religion, and probably Mr Godwin and Mr Condorcet among the rest,
+would have exhausted the whole force of their ridicule upon it,
+as the most puerile, the most absurd, the poorest, the most
+pitiful, the most iniquitously unjust, and, consequently, the
+most unworthy of the Deity that the superstitious folly of man
+could invent.
+
+What a strange and curious proof do these conjectures exhibit
+of the inconsistency of scepticism! For it should be observed,
+that there is a very striking and essential difference between
+believing an assertion which absolutely contradicts the most
+uniform experience, and an assertion which contradicts nothing,
+but is merely beyond the power of our present observation and
+knowledge. So diversified are the natural objects around us, so
+many instances of mighty power daily offer themselves to our
+view, that we may fairly presume, that there are many forms and
+operations of nature which we have not yet observed, or which,
+perhaps, we are not capable of observing with our present
+confined inlets of knowledge. The resurrection of a spiritual
+body from a natural body does not appear in itself a more
+wonderful instance of power than the germination of a blade of
+wheat from the grain, or of an oak from an acorn. Could we
+conceive an intelligent being, so placed as to be conversant only
+with inanimate or full grown objects, and never to have witnessed
+the process of vegetation and growth; and were another being to
+shew him two little pieces of matter, a grain of wheat, and an
+acorn, to desire him to examine them, to analyse them if he
+pleased, and endeavour to find out their properties and essences;
+and then to tell him, that however trifling these little bits of
+matter might appear to him, that they possessed such curious
+powers of selection, combination, arrangement, and almost of
+creation, that upon being put into the ground, they would choose,
+amongst all the dirt and moisture that surrounded them, those
+parts which best suited their purpose, that they would collect
+and arrange these parts with wonderful taste, judgement, and
+execution, and would rise up into beautiful forms, scarcely in
+any respect analogous to the little bits of matter which were
+first placed in the earth. I feel very little doubt that the
+imaginary being which I have supposed would hesitate more, would
+require better authority, and stronger proofs, before he believed
+these strange assertions, than if he had been told, that a being
+of mighty power, who had been the cause of all that he saw around
+him, and of that existence of which he himself was conscious,
+would, by a great act of power upon the death and corruption of
+human creatures, raise up the essence of thought in an
+incorporeal, or at least invisible form, to give it a happier
+existence in another state.
+
+The only difference, with regard to our own apprehensions,
+that is not in favour of the latter assertion is that the first
+miracle we have repeatedly seen, and the last miracle we have not
+seen. I admit the full weight of this prodigious difference, but
+surely no man can hesitate a moment in saying that, putting
+Revelation out of the question, the resurrection of a spiritual
+body from a natural body, which may be merely one among the many
+operations of nature which we cannot see, is an event
+indefinitely more probable than the immortality of man on earth,
+which is not only an event of which no symptoms or indications
+have yet appeared, but is a positive contradiction to one of the
+most constant of the laws of nature that has ever come within the
+observation of man.
+
+When we extend our view beyond this life, it is evident that
+we can have no other guides than authority, or conjecture, and
+perhaps, indeed, an obscure and undefined feeling. What I say
+here, therefore, does not appear to me in any respect to
+contradict what I said before, when I observed that it was
+unphilosophical to expect any specifick event that was not
+indicated by some kind of analogy in the past. In ranging beyond
+the bourne from which no traveller returns, we must necessarily
+quit this rule; but with regard to events that may be expected to
+happen on earth, we can seldom quit it consistently with true
+philosophy. Analogy has, however, as I conceive, great latitude.
+For instance, man has discovered many of the laws of nature:
+analogy seems to indicate that he will discover many more; but no
+analogy seems to indicate that he will discover a sixth sense, or
+a new species of power in the human mind, entirely beyond the
+train of our present observations.
+
+The powers of selection, combination, and transmutation,
+which every seed shews, are truly miraculous. Who can imagine
+that these wonderful faculties are contained in these little bits
+of matter? To me it appears much more philosophical to suppose
+that the mighty God of nature is present in full energy in all
+these operations. To this all powerful Being, it would be equally
+easy to raise an oak without an acorn as with one. The
+preparatory process of putting seeds into the ground is merely
+ordained for the use of man, as one among the various other
+excitements necessary to awaken matter into mind. It is an idea
+that will be found consistent, equally with the natural phenomena
+around us, with the various events of human life, and with the
+successive revelations of God to man, to suppose that the world
+is a mighty process for the creation and formation of mind. Many
+vessels will necessarily come out of this great furnace in wrong
+shapes. These will be broken and thrown aside as useless; while
+those vessels whose forms are full of truth, grace, and
+loveliness, will be wafted into happier situations, nearer the
+presence of the mighty maker.
+
+I ought perhaps again to make an apology to my readers for
+dwelling so long upon a conjecture which many, I know, will think
+too absurd and improbable to require the least discussion. But if
+it be as improbable and as contrary to the genuine spirit of
+philosophy as I own I think it is, why should it not be shewn to
+be so in a candid examination? A conjecture, however improbable
+on the first view of it, advanced by able and ingenious men,
+seems at least to deserve investigation. For my own part I feel
+no disinclination whatever to give that degree of credit to the
+opinion of the probable immortality of man on earth, which the
+appearances that can be brought in support of it deserve. Before
+we decide upon the utter improbability of such an event, it is
+but fair impartially to examine these appearances; and from such
+an examination I think we may conclude, that we have rather less
+reason for supposing that the life of man may be indefinitely
+prolonged, than that trees may be made to grow indefinitely high,
+or potatoes indefinitely large. Though Mr Godwin advances the
+idea of the indefinite prolongation of human life merely as a
+conjecture, yet as he has produced some appearances, which in his
+conception favour the supposition, he must certainly intend that
+these appearances should be examined and this is all that I have
+meant to do.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 13
+
+Error of Mr Godwin is considering man too much in the light of a
+being merely rational--In the compound being, man, the passions
+will always act as disturbing forces in the decisions of the
+understanding--Reasonings of Mr Godwin on the subject of
+coercion--Some truths of a nature not to be communicated from
+one man to another.
+
+
+In the chapter which I have been examining, Mr Godwin professes
+to consider the objection to his system of equality from the
+principle of population. It has appeared, I think clearly, that
+he is greatly erroneous in his statement of the distance of this
+difficulty, and that instead of myriads of centuries, it is
+really not thirty years, or even thirty days, distant from us.
+The supposition of the approach of man to immortality on earth is
+certainly not of a kind to soften the difficulty. The only
+argument, therefore, in the chapter which has any tendency to
+remove the objection is the conjecture concerning the extinction
+of the passion between the sexes, but as this is a mere
+conjecture, unsupported by the smallest shadow of proof, the
+force of the objection may be fairly said to remain unimpaired,
+and it is undoubtedly of sufficient weight of itself completely
+to overturn Mr Godwin's whole system of equality. I will,
+however, make one or two observations on a few of the prominent
+parts of Mr Godwin's reasonings which will contribute to place in
+a still clearer point of view the little hope that we can
+reasonably entertain of those vast improvements in the nature of
+man and of society which he holds up to our admiring gaze in his
+Political Justice.
+
+Mr Godwin considers man too much in the light of a being
+merely intellectual. This error, at least such I conceive it to
+be, pervades his whole work and mixes itself with all his
+reasonings. The voluntary actions of men may originate in their
+opinions, but these opinions will be very differently modified in
+creatures compounded of a rational faculty and corporal
+propensities from what they would be in beings wholly
+intellectual. Mr Godwin, in proving that sound reasoning and
+truth are capable of being adequately communicated, examines the
+proposition first practically, and then adds, 'Such is the
+appearance which this proposition assumes, when examined in a
+loose and practical view. In strict consideration it will not
+admit of debate. Man is a rational being, etc.' (Bk. I, ch. 5; in
+the third edition Vol. I, p. 88). So far from calling this a
+strict consideration of the subject, I own I should call it the
+loosest, and most erroneous, way possible, of considering it. It
+is the calculating the velocity of a falling body in vacuo, and
+persisting in it, that it would be the same through whatever
+resisting mediums it might fall. This was not Newton's mode of
+philosophizing. Very few general propositions are just in
+application to a particular subject. The moon is not kept in her
+orbit round the earth, nor the earth in her orbit round the sun,
+by a force that varies merely in the inverse ratio of the squares
+of the distances. To make the general theory just in application
+to the revolutions of these bodies, it was necessary to calculate
+accurately the disturbing force of the sun upon the moon, and of
+the moon upon the earth; and till these disturbing forces were
+properly estimated, actual observations on the motions of these
+bodies would have proved that the theory was not accurately true.
+
+I am willing to allow that every voluntary act is preceded by
+a decision of the mind, but it is strangely opposite to what I
+should conceive to be the just theory upon the subject, and a
+palpable contradiction to all experience, to say that the
+corporal propensities of man do not act very powerfully, as
+disturbing forces, in these decisions. The question, therefore,
+does not merely depend upon whether a man may be made to
+understand a distinct proposition or be convinced by an
+unanswerable argument. A truth may be brought home to his
+conviction as a rational being, though he may determine to act
+contrary to it, as a compound being. The cravings of hunger, the
+love of liquor, the desire of possessing a beautiful woman, will
+urge men to actions, of the fatal consequences of which, to the
+general interests of society, they are perfectly well convinced,
+even at the very time they commit them. Remove their bodily
+cravings, and they would not hesitate a moment in determining
+against such actions. Ask them their opinion of the same conduct
+in another person, and they would immediately reprobate it. But
+in their own case, and under all the circumstances of their
+situation with these bodily cravings, the decision of the
+compound being is different from the conviction of the rational
+being.
+
+If this be the just view of the subject, and both theory and
+experience unite to prove that it is, almost all Mr Godwin's
+reasonings on the subject of coercion in his seventh chapter,
+will appear to be founded on error. He spends some time in
+placing in a ridiculous point of view the attempt to convince a
+man's understanding and to clear up a doubtful proposition in his
+mind, by blows. Undoubtedly it is both ridiculous and barbarous,
+and so is cock-fighting, but one has little more to do with the
+real object of human punishments than the other. One frequent
+(indeed much too frequent) mode of punishment is death. Mr Godwin
+will hardly think this intended for conviction, at least it does
+not appear how the individual or the society could reap much
+future benefit from an understanding enlightened in this manner.
+
+The principal objects which human punishments have in view
+are undoubtedly restraint and example; restraint, or removal, of
+an individual member whose vicious habits are likely to be
+prejudicial to the society'; and example, which by expressing the
+sense of the community with regard to a particular crime, and by
+associating more nearly and visibly crime and punishment, holds
+out a moral motive to dissuade others from the commission of it.
+
+Restraint, Mr Godwin thinks, may be permitted as a temporary
+expedient, though he reprobates solitary imprisonment, which has
+certainly been the most successful, and, indeed, almost the only
+attempt towards the moral amelioration of offenders. He talks of
+the selfish passions that are fostered by solitude and of the
+virtues generated in society. But surely these virtues are not
+generated in the society of a prison. Were the offender confined
+to the society of able and virtuous men he would probably be more
+improved than in solitude. But is this practicable? Mr Godwin's
+ingenuity is more frequently employed in finding out evils than
+in suggesting practical remedies.
+
+Punishment, for example, is totally reprobated. By
+endeavouring to make examples too impressive and terrible,
+nations have, indeed, been led into the most barbarous cruelties,
+but the abuse of any practice is not a good argument against its
+use. The indefatigable pains taken in this country to find out a
+murder, and the certainty of its punishment, has powerfully
+contributed to generate that sentiment which is frequent in the
+mouths of the common people, that a murder will sooner or later
+come to light; and the habitual horror in which murder is in
+consequence held will make a man, in the agony of passion, throw
+down his knife for fear he should be tempted to use it in the
+gratification of his revenge. In Italy, where murderers, by
+flying to a sanctuary, are allowed more frequently to escape, the
+crime has never been held in the same detestation and has
+consequently been more frequent. No man, who is at all aware of
+the operation of moral motives, can doubt for a moment, that if
+every murder in Italy had been invariably punished, the use of
+the stiletto in transports of passion would have been
+comparatively but little known.
+
+That human laws either do, or can, proportion the punishment
+accurately to the offence, no person will have the folly to
+assert. From the inscrutability of motives the thing is
+absolutely impossible, but this imperfection, though it may be
+called a species of injustice, is no valid argument against human
+laws. It is the lot of man, that he will frequently have to
+choose between two evils; and it is a sufficient reason for the
+adoption of any institution, that it is the best mode that
+suggests itself of preventing greater evils. A continual
+endeavour should undoubtedly prevail to make these institutions
+as perfect as the nature of them will admit. But nothing is so
+easy as to find fault with human institutions; nothing so
+difficult as to suggest adequate practical improvements. It is to
+be lamented, that more men of talents employ their time in the
+former occupation than in the latter.
+
+The frequency of crime among men, who, as the common saying
+is, know better, sufficiently proves, that some truths may be
+brought home to the conviction of the mind without always
+producing the proper effect upon the conduct. There are other
+truths of a nature that perhaps never can be adequately
+communicated from one man to another. The superiority of the
+pleasures of intellect to those of sense, Mr Godwin considers as
+a fundamental truth. Taking all circumstances into consideration,
+I should be disposed to agree with him; but how am I to
+communicate this truth to a person who has scarcely ever felt
+intellectual pleasure? I may as well attempt to explain the
+nature and beauty of colours to a blind man. If I am ever so
+laborious, patient, and clear, and have the most repeated
+opportunities of expostulation, any real progress toward the
+accomplishment of my purpose seems absolutely hopeless. There is
+no common measure between us. I cannot proceed step by step.. It
+is a truth of a nature absolutely incapable of demonstration. All
+that I can say is, that the wisest and best men in all ages had
+agreed in giving the preference, very greatly, to the pleasures
+of intellect; and that my own experience completely confirmed the
+truth of their decisions; that I had found sensual pleasures
+vain, transient, and continually attended with tedium and
+disgust; but that intellectual pleasures appeared to me ever
+fresh and young, filled up all my hours satisfactorily, gave a
+new zest to life, and diffused a lasting serenity over my mind.
+If he believe me, it can only be from respect and veneration for
+my authority. It is credulity, and not conviction. I have not
+said any thing, nor can any thing be said, of a nature to produce
+real conviction. The affair is not an affair of reasoning, but of
+experience. He would probably observe in reply, what you say may
+be very true with regard to yourself and many other good men, but
+for my own part I feel very differently upon the subject. I have
+very frequently taken up a book and almost as frequently gone to
+sleep over it; but when I pass an evening with a gay party, or a
+pretty woman, I feel alive, and in spirits, and truly enjoy my
+existence.
+
+Under such circumstances, reasoning and arguments are not
+instruments from which success can be expected. At some future
+time perhaps, real satiety of sensual pleasures, or some
+accidental impressions that awakened the energies of his mind,
+might effect that, in a month, which the most patient and able
+expostulations might be incapable of effecting in forty years.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 14
+
+Mr Godwin's five propositions respecting political truth, on
+which his whole work hinges, not established--Reasons we have
+for supposing, from the distress occasioned by the principle of
+population, that the vices and moral weakness of man can never be
+wholly eradicated--Perfectibility, in the sense in which Mr
+Godwin uses the term, not applicable to man--Nature of the real
+perfectibility of man illustrated.
+
+
+If the reasonings of the preceding chapter are just, the
+corollaries respecting political truth, which Mr Godwin draws
+from the proposition, that the voluntary actions of men originate
+in their opinions, will not appear to be clearly established.
+These corollaries are, "Sound reasoning and truth, when
+adequately communicated, must always be victorious over error:
+Sound reasoning and truth are capable of being so communicated:
+Truth is omnipotent: The vices and moral weakness of man are not
+invincible: Man is perfectible, or in other words, susceptible of
+perpetual improvement."
+
+The first three propositions may be considered a complete
+syllogism. If by adequately communicated, be meant such a
+conviction as to produce an adequate effect upon the conduct, the
+major may be allowed and the minor denied. The consequent, or the
+omnipotence of truth, of course falls to the ground. If by
+'adequately communicated' be meant merely the conviction of the
+rational faculty, the major must be denied, the minor will be
+only true in cases capable of demonstration, and the consequent
+equally falls. The fourth proposition Mr Godwin calls the
+preceding proposition, with a slight variation in the statement.
+If so, it must accompany the preceding proposition in its fall.
+But it may be worth while to inquire, with reference to the
+principal argument of this essay, into the particular reasons
+which we have for supposing that the vices and moral weakness of
+man can never be wholly overcome in this world.
+
+Man, according to Mr Godwin, is a creature formed what he is
+by the successive impressions which he has received, from the
+first moment that the germ from which he sprung was animated.
+Could he be placed in a situation, where he was subject to no
+evil impressions whatever, though it might be doubted whether in
+such a situation virtue could exist, vice would certainly be
+banished. The great bent of Mr Godwin's work on Political
+Justice, if I understand it rightly, is to shew that the greater
+part of the vices and weaknesses of men proceed from the
+injustice of their political and social institutions, and that if
+these were removed and the understandings of men more
+enlightened, there would be little or no temptation in the world
+to evil. As it has been clearly proved, however, (at least as I
+think) that this is entirely a false conception, and that,
+independent of any political or social institutions whatever, the
+greater part of mankind, from the fixed and unalterable laws of
+nature, must ever be subject to the evil temptations arising from
+want, besides other passions, it follows from Mr Godwin's
+definition of man that such impressions, and combinations of
+impressions, cannot be afloat in the world without generating a
+variety of bad men. According to Mr Godwin's own conception of
+the formation of character, it is surely as improbable that under
+such circumstances all men will be virtuous as that sixes will
+come up a hundred times following upon the dice. The great
+variety of combinations upon the dice in a repeated succession of
+throws appears to me not inaptly to represent the great variety
+of character that must necessarily exist in the world, supposing
+every individual to be formed what he is by that combination of
+impressions which he has received since his first existence. And
+this comparison will, in some measure, shew the absurdity of
+supposing, that exceptions will ever become general rules; that
+extraordinary and unusual combinations will be frequent; or that
+the individual instances of great virtue which had appeared in
+all ages of the world will ever prevail universally.
+
+I am aware that Mr Godwin might say that the comparison is in
+one respect inaccurate, that in the case of the dice, the
+preceding causes, or rather the chances respecting the preceding
+causes, were always the same, and that, therefore, I could have
+no good reason for supposing that a greater number of sixes would
+come up in the next hundred times of throwing than in the
+preceding same number of throws. But, that man had in some sort a
+power of influencing those causes that formed character, and that
+every good and virtuous man that was produced, by the influence
+which he must necessarily have, rather increased the probability
+that another such virtuous character would be generated, whereas
+the coming up of sixes upon the dice once, would certainly not
+increase the probability of their coming up a second time. I
+admit this objection to the accuracy of the comparison, but it is
+only partially valid. Repeated experience has assured us, that
+the influence of the most virtuous character will rarely prevail
+against very strong temptations to evil. It will undoubtedly
+affect some, but it will fail with a much greater number. Had Mr
+Godwin succeeded in his attempt to prove that these temptations
+to evil could by the exertions of man be removed, I would give up
+the comparison; or at least allow, that a man might be so far
+enlightened with regard to the mode of shaking his elbow, that he
+would be able to throw sixes every time. But as long as a great
+number of those impressions which form character, like the nice
+motions of the arm, remain absolutely independent of the will of
+man, though it would be the height of folly and presumption to
+attempt to calculate the relative proportions of virtue and vice
+at the future periods of the world, it may be safely asserted
+that the vices and moral weakness of mankind, taken in the mass,
+are invincible.
+
+The fifth proposition is the general deduction from the four
+former and will consequently fall, as the foundations which
+support it have given way. In the sense in which Mr Godwin
+understands the term 'perfectible', the perfectibility of man
+cannot be asserted, unless the preceding propositions could have
+been clearly established. There is, however, one sense, which the
+term will bear, in which it is, perhaps, just. It may be said
+with truth that man is always susceptible of improvement, or that
+there never has been, or will be, a period of his history, in
+which he can be said to have reached his possible acme of
+perfection. Yet it does not by any means follow from this, that
+our efforts to improve man will always succeed, or even that he
+will ever make, in the greatest number of ages, any extraordinary
+strides towards perfection. The only inference that can be drawn
+is that the precise limit of his improvement cannot possibly be
+known. And I cannot help again reminding the reader of a
+distinction which, it appears to me, ought particularly to be
+attended to in the present question: I mean, the essential
+difference there is between an unlimited improvement and an
+improvement the limit of which cannot be ascertained. The former
+is an improvement not applicable to man under the present laws of
+his nature. The latter, undoubtedly, is applicable.
+
+The real perfectibility of man may be illustrated, as I have
+mentioned before, by the perfectibility of a plant. The object of
+the enterprising florist is, as I conceive, to unite size,
+symmetry, and beauty of colour. It would surely be presumptuous
+in the most successful improver to affirm, that he possessed a
+carnation in which these qualities existed in the greatest
+possible state of perfection. However beautiful his flower may
+be, other care, other soil, or other suns, might produce one
+still more beautiful.
+
+Yet, although he may be aware of the absurdity of supposing
+that he has reached perfection, and though he may know by what
+means he attained that degree of beauty in the flower which he at
+present possesses, yet he cannot be sure that by pursuing similar
+means, rather increased in strength, he will obtain a more
+beautiful blossom. By endeavouring to improve one quality, he may
+impair the beauty of another. The richer mould which he would
+employ to increase the size of his plant would probably burst the
+calyx, and destroy at once its symmetry. In a similar manner, the
+forcing manure used to bring about the French Revolution, and to
+give a greater freedom and energy to the human mind, has burst
+the calyx of humanity, the restraining bond of all society; and,
+however large the separate petals have grown, however strongly,
+or even beautifully, a few of them have been marked, the whole is
+at present a loose, deformed, disjointed mass, without union,
+symmetry, or harmony of colouring.
+
+Were it of consequence to improve pinks and carnations,
+though we could have no hope of raising them as large as
+cabbages, we might undoubtedly expect, by successive efforts, to
+obtain more beautiful specimens than we at present possess. No
+person can deny the importance of improving the happiness of the
+human species. Every the least advance in this respect is highly
+valuable. But an experiment with the human race is not like an
+experiment upon inanimate objects. The bursting of a flower may
+be a trifle. Another will soon succeed it. But the bursting of
+the bonds of society is such a separation of parts as cannot take
+place without giving the most acute pain to thousands: and a long
+time may elapse, and much misery may be endured, before the wound
+grows up again.
+
+As the five propositions which I have been examining may be
+considered as the corner stones of Mr Godwin's fanciful
+structure, and, indeed, as expressing the aim and bent of his
+whole work, however excellent much of his detached reasoning may
+be, he must be considered as having failed in the great object of
+his undertaking. Besides the difficulties arising from the
+compound nature of man, which he has by no means sufficiently
+smoothed, the principal argument against the perfectibility of
+man and society remains whole and unimpaired from any thing that
+he has advanced. And as far as I can trust my own judgement, this
+argument appears to be conclusive, not only against the
+perfectibility of man, in the enlarged sense in which Mr Godwin
+understands the term, but against any very marked and striking
+change for the better, in the form and structure of general
+society; by which I mean any great and decided amelioration of
+the condition of the lower classes of mankind, the most numerous,
+and, consequently, in a general view of the subject, the most
+important part of the human race. Were I to live a thousand
+years, and the laws of nature to remain the same, I should little
+fear, or rather little hope, a contradiction from experience in
+asserting that no possible sacrifices or exertions of the rich,
+in a country which had been long inhabited, could for any time
+place the lower classes of the community in a situation equal,
+with regard to circumstances, to the situation of the common
+people about thirty years ago in the northern States of America.
+
+The lower classes of people in Europe may at some future
+period be much better instructed than they are at present; they
+may be taught to employ the little spare time they have in many
+better ways than at the ale-house; they may live under better and
+more equal laws than they have ever hitherto done, perhaps, in
+any country; and I even conceive it possible, though not probable
+that they may have more leisure; but it is not in the nature of
+things that they can be awarded such a quantity of money or
+subsistence as will allow them all to marry early, in the full
+confidence that they shall be able to provide with ease for a
+numerous family.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 15
+
+Models too perfect may sometimes rather impede than promote
+improvement--Mr Godwin's essay on 'Avarice and Profusion'--
+Impossibility of dividing the necessary labour of a society
+amicably among all--Invectives against labour may produce present
+evil, with little or no chance of producing future good--An
+accession to the mass of agricultural labour must always be an
+advantage to the labourer.
+
+
+Mr Godwin in the preface to his Enquirer, drops a few expressions
+which seem to hint at some change in his opinions since he wrote
+the Political Justice; and as this is a work now of some years
+standing, I should certainly think that I had been arguing
+against opinions which the author had himself seen reason to
+alter, but that in some of the essays of the Enquirer, Mr
+Godwin's peculiar mode of thinking appears in as striking a light
+as ever.
+
+It has been frequently observed that though we cannot hope to
+reach perfection in any thing, yet that it must always be
+advantageous to us to place before our eyes the most perfect
+models. This observation has a plausible appearance, but is very
+far from being generally true. I even doubt its truth in one of
+the most obvious exemplifications that would occur. I doubt
+whether a very young painter would receive so much benefit, from
+an attempt to copy a highly finished and perfect picture, as from
+copying one where the outlines were more strongly marked and the
+manner of laying on the colours was more easily discoverable. But
+in cases where the perfection of the model is a perfection of a
+different and superior nature from that towards which we should
+naturally advance, we shall not always fail in making any
+progress towards it, but we shall in all probability impede the
+progress which we might have expected to make had we not fixed
+our eyes upon so perfect a model. A highly intellectual
+being, exempt from the infirm calls of hunger or sleep, is
+undoubtedly a much more perfect existence than man, but were man
+to attempt to copy such a model, he would not only fail in making
+any advances towards it; but by unwisely straining to imitate
+what was inimitable, he would probably destroy the little
+intellect which he was endeavouring to improve.
+
+The form and structure of society which Mr Godwin describes
+is as essentially distinct from any forms of society which have
+hitherto prevailed in the world as a being that can live without
+food or sleep is from a man. By improving society in its present
+form, we are making no more advances towards such a state of
+things as he pictures than we should make approaches towards a
+line, with regard to which we were walking parallel. The
+question, therefore, is whether, by looking to such a form of
+society as our polar star, we are likely to advance or retard the
+improvement of the human species? Mr Godwin appears to me to have
+decided this question against himself in his essay on 'Avarice
+and Profusion' in the Enquirer.
+
+Dr Adam Smith has very justly observed that nations as well
+as individuals grow rich by parsimony and poor by profusion, and
+that, therefore, every frugal man was a friend and every
+spendthrift an enemy to his country. The reason he gives is that
+what is saved from revenue is always added to stock, and is
+therefore taken from the maintenance of labour that is generally
+unproductive and employed in the maintenance of labour that
+realizes itself in valuable commodities. No observation can be
+more evidently just. The subject of Mr Godwin's essay is a little
+similar in its first appearance, but in essence is as distinct as
+possible. He considers the mischief of profusion as an
+acknowledged truth, and therefore makes his comparison between
+the avaricious man, and the man who spends his income. But the
+avaricious man of Mr Godwin is totally a distinct character, at
+least with regard to his effect upon the prosperity of the state,
+from the frugal man of Dr Adam Smith. The frugal man in order to
+make more money saves from his income and adds to his capital,
+and this capital he either employs himself in the maintenance of
+productive labour, or he lends it to some other person who will
+probably employ it in this way. He benefits the state because he
+adds to its general capital, and because wealth employed as
+capital not only sets in motion more labour than when spent as
+income, but the labour is besides of a more valuable kind. But
+the avaricious man of Mr Godwin locks up his wealth in a chest
+and sets in motion no labour of any kind, either productive or
+unproductive. This is so essential a difference that Mr Godwin's
+decision in his essay appears at once as evidently false as Dr
+Adam Smith's position is evidently true. It could not, indeed,
+but occur to Mr Godwin that some present inconvenience might
+arise to the poor from thus locking up the funds destined for the
+maintenance of labour. The only way, therefore, he had of
+weakening this objection was to compare the two characters
+chiefly with regard to their tendency to accelerate the approach
+of that happy state of cultivated equality, on which he says we
+ought always to fix our eyes as our polar star.
+
+I think it has been proved in the former parts of this essay
+that such a state of society is absolutely impracticable. What
+consequences then are we to expect from looking to such a point
+as our guide and polar star in the great sea of political
+discovery? Reason would teach us to expect no other than winds
+perpetually adverse, constant but fruitless toil, frequent
+shipwreck, and certain misery. We shall not only fail in making
+the smallest real approach towards such a perfect form of
+society; but by wasting our strength of mind and body, in a
+direction in which it is impossible to proceed, and by the
+frequent distress which we must necessarily occasion by our
+repeated failures, we shall evidently impede that degree of
+improvement in society, which is really attainable.
+
+It has appeared that a society constituted according to Mr
+Godwin's system must, from the inevitable laws of our nature,
+degenerate into a class of proprietors and a class of labourers,
+and that the substitution of benevolence for self-love as the
+moving principle of society, instead of producing the happy
+effects that might be expected from so fair a name, would cause
+the same pressure of want to be felt by the whole of society,
+which is now felt only by a part. It is to the established
+administration of property and to the apparently narrow principle
+of self-love that we are indebted for all the noblest exertions
+of human genius, all the finer and more delicate emotions of the
+soul, for everything, indeed, that distinguishes the civilized
+from the savage state; and no sufficient change has as yet taken
+place in the nature of civilized man to enable us to say that he
+either is, or ever will be, in a state when he may safely throw
+down the ladder by which he has risen to this eminence.
+
+If in every society that has advanced beyond the savage
+state, a class of proprietors and a class of labourers must
+necessarily exist, it is evident that, as labour is the only
+property of the class of labourers, every thing that tends to
+diminish the value of this property must tend to diminish the
+possession of this part of society. The only way that a poor man
+has of supporting himself in independence is by the exertion of
+his bodily strength. This is the only commodity he has to give in
+exchange for the necessaries of life. It would hardly appear then
+that you benefit him by narrowing the market for this commodity,
+by decreasing the demand for labour, and lessening the value of
+the only property that he possesses.
+
+It should be observed that the principal argument of this
+Essay only goes to prove the necessity of a class of proprietors,
+and a class of labourers, but by no means infers that the present
+great inequality of property is either necessary or useful to
+society. On the contrary, it must certainly be considered as an
+evil, and every institution that promotes it is essentially bad
+and impolitic. But whether a government could with advantage to
+society actively interfere to repress inequality of fortunes may
+be a matter of doubt. Perhaps the generous system of perfect
+liberty adopted by Dr Adam Smith and the French economists would
+be ill exchanged for any system of restraint.
+
+Mr Godwin would perhaps say that the whole system of barter
+and exchange is a vile and iniquitous traffic. If you would
+essentially relieve the poor man, you should take a part of his
+labour upon yourself, or give him your money, without exacting so
+severe a return for it. In answer to the first method proposed,
+it may be observed, that even if the rich could be persuaded to
+assist the poor in this way, the value of the assistance would be
+comparatively trifling. The rich, though they think themselves of
+great importance, bear but a small proportion in point of numbers
+to the poor, and would, therefore, relieve them but of a small
+part of their burdens by taking a share. Were all those that are
+employed in the labours of luxuries added to the number of those
+employed in producing necessaries, and could these necessary
+labours be amicably divided among all, each man's share might
+indeed be comparatively light; but desirable as such an amicable
+division would undoubtedly be, I cannot conceive any practical
+principle according to which it could take place. It has been
+shewn, that the spirit of benevolence, guided by the strict
+impartial justice that Mr Godwin describes, would, if vigorously
+acted upon, depress in want and misery the whole human race. Let
+us examine what would be the consequence, if the proprietor were
+to retain a decent share for himself, but to give the rest away
+to the poor, without exacting a task from them in return. Not to
+mention the idleness and the vice that such a proceeding, if
+general, would probably create in the present state of society,
+and the great risk there would be, of diminishing the produce of
+land, as well as the labours of luxury, another objection yet
+remains.
+
+Mr Godwin seems to have but little respect for practical
+principles; but I own it appears to me, that he is a much greater
+benefactor to mankind, who points out how an inferior good may be
+attained, than he who merely expatiates on the deformity of the
+present state of society, and the beauty of a different state,
+without pointing out a practical method, that might be
+immediately applied, of accelerating our advances from the one,
+to the other.
+
+It has appeared that from the principle of population more
+will always be in want than can be adequately supplied. The
+surplus of the rich man might be sufficient for three, but four
+will be desirous to obtain it. He cannot make this selection of
+three out of the four without conferring a great favour on those
+that are the objects of his choice. These persons must consider
+themselves as under a great obligation to him and as dependent
+upon him for their support. The rich man would feel his power and
+the poor man his dependence, and the evil effects of these two
+impressions on the human heart are well known. Though I perfectly
+agree with Mr Godwin therefore in the evil of hard labour, yet I
+still think it a less evil, and less calculated to debase the
+human mind, than dependence, and every history of man that we
+have ever read places in a strong point of view the danger to
+which that mind is exposed which is entrusted with constant
+power.
+
+In the present state of things, and particularly when labour
+is in request, the man who does a day's work for me confers full
+as great an obligation upon me as I do upon him. I possess what
+he wants, he possesses what I want. We make an amicable exchange.
+The poor man walks erect in conscious independence; and the mind
+of his employer is not vitiated by a sense of power.
+
+Three or four hundred years ago there was undoubtedly much
+less labour in England, in proportion to the population, than at
+present, but there was much more dependence, and we probably
+should not now enjoy our present degree of civil liberty if the
+poor, by the introduction of manufactures, had not been enabled
+to give something in exchange for the provisions of the great
+Lords, instead of being dependent upon their bounty. Even the
+greatest enemies of trade and manufactures, and I do not reckon
+myself a very determined friend to them, must allow that when
+they were introduced into England, liberty came in their train.
+
+Nothing that has been said tends in the most remote degree to
+undervalue the principle of benevolence. It is one of the noblest
+and most godlike qualities of the human heart, generated,
+perhaps, slowly and gradually from self-love, and afterwards
+intended to act as a general law, whose kind office it should be,
+to soften the partial deformities, to correct the asperities, and
+to smooth the wrinkles of its parent: and this seems to be the
+analog of all nature. Perhaps there is no one general law of
+nature that will not appear, to us at least, to produce partial
+evil; and we frequently observe at the same time, some bountiful
+provision which, acting as another general law, corrects the
+inequalities of the first.
+
+The proper office of benevolence is to soften the partial
+evils arising from self-love, but it can never be substituted in
+its place. If no man were to allow himself to act till he had
+completely determined that the action he was about to perform was
+more conducive than any other to the general good, the most
+enlightened minds would hesitate in perplexity and amazement; and
+the unenlightened would be continually committing the grossest
+mistakes.
+
+As Mr Godwin, therefore, has not laid down any practical
+principle according to which the necessary labours of agriculture
+might be amicably shared among the whole class of labourers, by
+general invectives against employing the poor he appears to
+pursue an unattainable good through much present evil. For if
+every man who employs the poor ought to be considered as their
+enemy, and as adding to the weight of their oppressions, and if
+the miser is for this reason to be preferred to the man who
+spends his income, it follows that any number of men who now
+spend their incomes might, to the advantage of society, be
+converted into misers. Suppose then that a hundred thousand
+persons who now employ ten men each were to lock up their wealth
+from general use, it is evident, that a million of working men of
+different kinds would be completely thrown out of all employment.
+The extensive misery that such an event would produce in the
+present state of society Mr Godwin himself could hardly refuse to
+acknowledge, and I question whether he might not find some
+difficulty in proving that a conduct of this kind tended more
+than the conduct of those who spend their incomes to 'place human
+beings in the condition in which they ought to be placed.' But Mr
+Godwin says that the miser really locks up nothing, that the
+point has not been rightly understood, and that the true
+development and definition of the nature of wealth have not been
+applied to illustrate it. Having defined therefore wealth, very
+justly, to be the commodities raised and fostered by human
+labour, he observes that the miser locks up neither corn, nor
+oxen, nor clothes, nor houses. Undoubtedly he does not really
+lock up these articles, but he locks up the power of producing
+them, which is virtually the same. These things are certainly
+used and consumed by his contemporaries, as truly, and to as
+great an extent, as if he were a beggar; but not to as great an
+extent as if he had employed his wealth in turning up more land,
+in breeding more oxen, in employing more tailors, and in building
+more houses. But supposing, for a moment, that the conduct of the
+miser did not tend to check any really useful produce, how are
+all those who are thrown out of employment to obtain patents
+which they may shew in order to be awarded a proper share of the
+food and raiment produced by the society? This is the
+unconquerable difficulty.
+
+I am perfectly willing to concede to Mr Godwin that there is
+much more labour in the world than is really necessary, and that,
+if the lower classes of society could agree among themselves
+never to work more than six or seven hours in the day, the
+commodities essential to human happiness might still be produced
+in as great abundance as at present. But it is almost impossible
+to conceive that such an agreement could be adhered to. From the
+principle of population, some would necessarily be more in want
+than others. Those that had large families would naturally be
+desirous of exchanging two hours more of their labour for an
+ampler quantity of subsistence. How are they to be prevented from
+making this exchange? it would be a violation of the first and
+most sacred property that a man possesses to attempt, by positive
+institutions, to interfere with his command over his own labour.
+
+Till Mr Godwin, therefore, can point out some practical plan
+according to which the necessary labour in a society might be
+equitably divided, his invectives against labour, if they were
+attended to, would certainly produce much present evil without
+approximating us to that state of cultivated equality to which he
+looks forward as his polar star, and which, he seems to think,
+should at present be our guide in determining the nature and
+tendency of human actions. A mariner guided by such a polar star
+is in danger of shipwreck.
+
+Perhaps there is no possible way in which wealth could in
+general be employed so beneficially to a state, and particularly
+to the lower orders of it, as by improving and rendering
+productive that land which to a farmer would not answer the
+expense of cultivation. Had Mr Godwin exerted his energetic
+eloquence in painting the superior worth and usefulness of the
+character who employed the poor in this way, to him who employed
+them in narrow luxuries, every enlightened man must have
+applauded his efforts. The increasing demand for agricultural
+labour must always tend to better the condition of the poor; and
+if the accession of work be of this kind, so far is it from being
+true that the poor would be obliged to work ten hours for the
+same price that they before worked eight, that the very reverse
+would be the fact; and a labourer might then support his wife and
+family as well by the labour of six hours as he could before by
+the labour of eight.
+
+The labour created by luxuries, though useful in distributing
+the produce of the country, without vitiating the proprietor by
+power, or debasing the labourer by dependence, has not, indeed,
+the same beneficial effects on the state of the poor. A great
+accession of work from manufacturers, though it may raise the
+price of labour even more than an increasing demand for
+agricultural labour, yet, as in this case the quantity of food in
+the country may not be proportionably increasing, the advantage
+to the poor will be but temporary, as the price of provisions
+must necessarily rise in proportion to the price of labour.
+Relative to this subject, I cannot avoid venturing a few remarks
+on a part of Dr Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, speaking at the
+same time with that diffidence which I ought certainly to feel in
+differing from a person so justly celebrated in the political
+world.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 16
+
+Probable error of Dr Adam Smith in representing every increase of
+the revenue or stock of a society as an increase in the funds for
+the maintenance of labour--Instances where an increase of wealth
+can have no tendency to better the condition of the labouring
+poor--England has increased in riches without a proportional
+increase in the funds for the maintenance of labour--The state
+of the poor in China would not be improved by an increase of
+wealth from manufactures.
+
+
+The professed object of Dr Adam Smith's inquiry is the nature and
+causes of the wealth of nations. There is another inquiry,
+however, perhaps still more interesting, which he occasionally
+mixes with it; I mean an inquiry into the causes which affect the
+happiness of nations or the happiness and comfort of the lower
+orders of society, which is the most numerous class in every
+nation. I am sufficiency aware of the near connection of these
+two subjects, and that the causes which tend to increase the
+wealth of a state tend also, generally speaking, to increase the
+happiness of the lower classes of the people. But perhaps Dr Adam
+Smith has considered these two inquiries as still more nearly
+connected than they really are; at least, he has not stopped to
+take notice of those instances where the wealth of a society may
+increase (according to his definition of 'wealth') without having
+any tendency to increase the comforts of the labouring part of
+it. I do not mean to enter into a philosophical discussion of
+what constitutes the proper happiness of man, but shall merely
+consider two universally acknowledged ingredients, health, and
+the command of the necessaries and conveniences of life.
+
+Little or no doubt can exist that the comforts of the
+labouring poor depend upon the increase of the funds destined for
+the maintenance of labour, and will be very exactly in proportion
+to the rapidity of this increase. The demand for labour which
+such increase would occasion, by creating a competition in the
+market, must necessarily raise the value of labour, and, till the
+additional number of hands required were reared, the increased
+funds would be distributed to the same number of persons as
+before the increase, and therefore every labourer would live
+comparatively at his ease. But perhaps Dr Adam Smith errs in
+representing every increase of the revenue or stock of a society
+as an increase of these funds. Such surplus stock or revenue
+will, indeed, always be considered by the individual possessing
+it as an additional fund from which he may maintain more labour:
+but it will not be a real and effectual fund for the maintenance
+of an additional number of labourers, unless the whole, or at
+least a great part of this increase of the stock or revenue of
+the society, be convertible into a proportional quantity of
+provisions; and it will not be so convertible where the increase
+has arisen merely from the produce of labour, and not from the
+produce of land. A distinction will in this case occur, between
+the number of hands which the stock of the society could employ,
+and the number which its territory can maintain.
+
+To explain myself by an instance. Dr Adam Smith defines the
+wealth of a nation to consist. In the annual produce of its land
+and labour. This definition evidently includes manufactured
+produce, as well as the produce of the land. Now supposing a
+nation for a course of years was to add what it saved from its
+yearly revenue to its manufacturing capital solely, and not to
+its capital employed upon land, it is evident that it might grow
+richer according to the above definition, without a power of
+supporting a greater number of labourers, and, therefore, without
+an increase in the real funds for the maintenance of labour.
+There would, notwithstanding, be a demand for labour from the
+power which each manufacturer would possess, or at least think he
+possessed, of extending his old stock in trade or of setting up
+fresh works. This demand would of course raise the price of
+labour, but if the yearly stock of provisions in the country was
+not increasing, this rise would soon turn out to be merely
+nominal, as the price of provisions must necessarily rise with
+it. The demand for manufacturing labourers might, indeed, entice
+many from agriculture and thus tend to diminish the annual
+produce of the land, but we will suppose any effect of this kind
+to be compensated by improvements in the instruments of
+agriculture, and the quantity of provisions therefore to remain
+the same. Improvements in manufacturing machinery would of course
+take place, and this circumstance, added to the greater number of
+hands employed in manufactures, would cause the annual produce of
+the labour of the country to be upon the whole greatly increased.
+The wealth therefore of the country would be increasing annually,
+according to the definition, and might not, perhaps, be
+increasing very slowly.
+
+The question is whether wealth, increasing in this way, has
+any tendency to better the condition of the labouring poor. It is
+a self-evident proposition that any general rise in the price of
+labour, the stock of provisions remaining the same, can only be a
+nominal rise, as it must very shortly be followed by a
+proportional rise in the price of provisions. The increase in the
+price of labour, therefore, which we have supposed, would have
+little or no effect in giving the labouring poor a greater
+command over the necessaries and conveniences of life. In this
+respect they would be nearly in the same state as before. In one
+other respect they would be in a worse state. A greater
+proportion of them would be employed in manufactures, and fewer,
+consequently, in agriculture. And this exchange of professions
+will be allowed, I think, by all, to be very unfavourable in
+respect of health, one essential ingredient of happiness, besides
+the greater uncertainty of manufacturing labour, arising from the
+capricious taste of man, the accidents of war, and other causes.
+
+It may be said, perhaps, that such an instance as I have
+supposed could not occur, because the rise in the price of
+provisions would immediately turn some additional capital into
+the channel of agriculture. But this is an event which may take
+place very slowly, as it should be remarked that a rise in the
+price of labour had preceded the rise of provisions, and would,
+therefore, impede the good effects upon agriculture, which the
+increased value of the produce of the land might otherwise have
+occasioned.
+
+It might also be said, that the additional capital of the
+nation would enable it to import provisions sufficient for the
+maintenance of those whom its stock could employ. A small country
+with a large navy, and great inland accommodations for carriage,
+such as Holland, may, indeed, import and distribute an effectual
+quantity of provisions; but the price of provisions must be very
+high to make such an importation and distribution answer in large
+countries less advantageously circumstanced in this respect.
+
+An instance, accurately such as I have supposed, may not,
+perhaps, ever have occurred, but I have little doubt that
+instances nearly approximating to it may be found without any
+very laborious search. Indeed I am strongly inclined to think
+that England herself, since the Revolution, affords a very
+striking elucidation of the argument in question.
+
+The commerce of this country, internal as well as external,
+has certainly been rapidly advancing during the last century. The
+exchangeable value in the market of Europe of the annual produce
+of its land and labour has, without doubt, increased very
+considerably. But, upon examination, it will be found that the
+increase has been chiefly in the produce of labour and not in the
+produce of land, and therefore, though the wealth of the nation
+has been advancing with a quick pace, the effectual funds for the
+maintenance of labour have been increasing very slowly, and the
+result is such as might be expected. The increasing wealth of the
+nation has had little or no tendency to better the condition of
+the labouring poor. They have not, I believe, a greater command
+of the necessaries and conveniences of life, and a much greater
+proportion of them than at the period of the Revolution is
+employed in manufactures and crowded together in close and
+unwholesome rooms.
+
+Could we believe the statement of Dr Price that the
+population of England has decreased since the Revolution, it
+would even appear that the effectual funds for the maintenance of
+labour had been declining during the progress of wealth in other
+respects. For I conceive that it may be laid down as a general
+rule that if the effectual funds for the maintenance of labour
+are increasing, that is, if the territory can maintain as well as
+the stock employ a greater number of labourers, this additional
+number will quickly spring up, even in spite of such wars as Dr
+Price enumerates. And, consequently, if the population of any
+country has been stationary, or declining, we may safely infer,
+that, however it may have advanced in manufacturing wealth, its
+effectual funds for the maintenance of labour cannot have
+increased.
+
+It is difficult, however, to conceive that the population of
+England has been declining since the Revolution, though every
+testimony concurs to prove that its increase, if it has
+increased, has been very slow. In the controversy which the
+question has occasioned, Dr Price undoubtedly appears to be much
+more completely master of his subject, and to possess more
+accurate information, than his opponents. Judging simply from
+this controversy, I think one should say that Dr Price's point is
+nearer being proved than Mr Howlett's. Truth, probably, lies
+between the two statements, but this supposition makes the
+increase of population since the Revolution to have been very
+slow in comparison with the increase of wealth.
+
+That the produce of the land has been decreasing, or even
+that it has been absolutely stationary during the last century,
+few will be disposed to believe. The enclosure of commons and
+waste lands certainly tends to increase the food of the country,
+but it has been asserted with confidence that the enclosure of
+common fields has frequently had a contrary effect, and that
+large tracts of land which formerly produced great quantities of
+corn, by being converted into pasture both employ fewer hands and
+feed fewer mouths than before their enclosure. It is, indeed, an
+acknowledged truth, that pasture land produces a smaller quantity
+of human subsistence than corn land of the same natural
+fertility, and could it be clearly ascertained that from the
+increased demand for butchers' meat of the best quality, and its
+increased price in consequence, a greater quantity of good land
+has annually been employed in grazing, the diminution of human
+subsistence, which this circumstance would occasion, might have
+counterbalanced the advantages derived from the enclosure of
+waste lands, and the general improvements in husbandry.
+
+It scarcely need be remarked that the high price of butchers'
+meat at present, and its low price formerly, were not caused by
+the scarcity in the one case or the plenty in the other, but by
+the different expense sustained at the different periods, in
+preparing cattle for the market. It is, however, possible, that
+there might have been more cattle a hundred years ago in the
+country than at present; but no doubt can be entertained, that
+there is much more meat of a superior quality brought to market
+at present than ever there was. When the price of butchers' meat
+was very low, cattle were reared chiefly upon waste lands; and
+except for some of the principal markets, were probably killed
+with but little other fatting. The veal that is sold so cheap in
+some distant counties at present bears little other resemblance
+than the name, to that which is bought in London. Formerly, the
+price of butchers, meat would not pay for rearing, and scarcely
+for feeding, cattle on land that would answer in tillage; but the
+present price will not only pay for fatting cattle on the very
+best land, but will even allow of the rearing many, on land that
+would bear good crops of corn. The same number of cattle, or even
+the same weight of cattle at the different periods when killed,
+will have consumed (if I may be allowed the expression) very
+different quantities of human substance. A fatted beast may in
+some respects be considered, in the language of the French
+economists, as an unproductive labourer: he has added nothing
+to the value of the raw produce that he has consumed. The present
+system of grating, undoubtedly tends more than the former system
+to diminish the quantity of human subsistence in the country, in
+proportion to the general fertility of the land.
+
+I would not by any means be understood to say that the former
+system either could or ought to have continued. The increasing
+price of butchers' meat is a natural and inevitable consequence
+of the general progress of cultivation; but I cannot help
+thinking, that the present great demand for butchers' meat of the
+best quality, and the quantity of good land that is in
+consequence annually employed to produce it, together with the
+great number of horses at present kept for pleasure, are the
+chief causes that have prevented the quantity of human food in
+the country from keeping pace with the generally increased
+fertility of the soil; and a change of custom in these respects
+would, I have little doubt, have a very sensible effect on the
+quantity of subsistence in the country, and consequently on its
+population.
+
+The employment of much of the most fertile land in grating,
+the improvements in agricultural instruments, the increase of
+large farms, and particularly the diminution of the number of
+cottages throughout the kingdom, all concur to prove, that there
+are not probably so many persons employed in agricultural labour
+now as at the period of the Revolution. Whatever increase of
+population, therefore, has taken place, must be employed almost
+wholly in manufactures, and it is well known that the failure of
+some of these manufactures, merely from the caprice of fashion,
+such as the adoption of muslins instead of silks, or of
+shoe-strings and covered buttons, instead of buckles and metal
+buttons, combined with the restraints in the market of labour
+arising from corporation and parish laws, have frequently driven
+thousands on charity for support. The great increase of the poor
+rates is, indeed, of itself a strong evidence that the poor have
+not a greater command of the necessaries and conveniences of
+life, and if to the consideration, that their condition in this
+respect is rather worse than better, be added the circumstance,
+that a much greater proportion of them is employed in large
+manufactories, unfavourable both to health and virtue, it must be
+acknowledged, that the increase of wealth of late years has had
+no tendency to increase the happiness of the labouring poor.
+
+That every increase of the stock or revenue of a nation
+cannot be considered as an increase of the real funds for the
+maintenance of labour and, therefore, cannot have the same good
+effect upon the condition of the poor, will appear in a strong
+light if the argument be applied to China.
+
+Dr Adam Smith observes that China has probably long been as
+rich as the nature of her laws and institutions will admit, but
+that with other laws and institutions, and if foreign commerce
+were had in honour, she might still be much richer. The question
+is, would such an increase of wealth be an increase of the real
+funds for the maintenance of labour, and consequently tend to
+place the lower classes of people in China in a state of greater
+plenty?
+
+It is evident, that if trade and foreign commerce were held
+in great honour in China, from the plenty of labourers, and the
+cheapness of labour, she might work up manufactures for foreign
+sale to an immense amount. It is equally evident that from the
+great bulk of provisions and the amazing extent of her inland
+territory she could not in return import such a quantity as would
+be any sensible addition to the annual stock of subsistence in
+the country. Her immense amount of manufactures, therefore, she
+would exchange, chiefly, for luxuries collected from all parts of
+the world. At present, it appears, that no labour whatever is
+spared in the production of food. The country is rather
+over-people in proportion to what its stock can employ, and
+labour is, therefore, so abundant, that no pains are taken to
+abridge it. The consequence of this is, probably, the greatest
+production of food that the soil can possibly afford, for it will
+be generally observed, that processes for abridging labour,
+though they may enable a farmer to bring a certain quantity of
+grain cheaper to market, tend rather to diminish than increase
+the whole produce; and in agriculture, therefore, may, in some
+respects, be considered rather as private than public advantages.
+
+An immense capital could not be employed in China in
+preparing manufactures for foreign trade without taking off so
+many labourers from agriculture as to alter this state of things,
+and in some degree to diminish the produce of the country. The
+demand for manufacturing labourers would naturally raise the
+price of labour, but as the quantity of subsistence would not be
+increased, the price of provisions would keep pace with it, or
+even more than keep pace with it if the quantity of provisions
+were really decreasing. The country would be evidently advancing
+in wealth, the exchangeable value of the annual produce of its
+land and labour would be annually augmented, yet the real funds
+for the maintenance of labour would be stationary, or even
+declining, and, consequently, the increasing wealth of the nation
+would rather tend to depress than to raise the condition of the
+poor. With regard to the command over the necessaries and
+comforts of life, they would be in the same or rather worse state
+than before; and a great part of them would have exchanged the
+healthy labours of agriculture for the unhealthy occupations of
+manufacturing industry.
+
+The argument, perhaps, appears clearer when applied to China,
+because it is generally allowed that the wealth of China has been
+long stationary. With regard to any other country it might be
+always a matter of dispute at which of the two periods, compared,
+wealth was increasing the fastest, as it is upon the rapidity of
+the increase of wealth at any particular period that Dr Adam
+Smith says the condition of the poor depends. It is evident,
+however, that two nations might increase exactly with the same
+rapidity in the exchangeable value of the annual produce of their
+land and labour, yet if one had applied itself chiefly to
+agriculture, and the other chiefly to commerce, the funds for the
+maintenance of labour, and consequently the effect of the
+increase of wealth in each nation, would be extremely different.
+In that which had applied itself chiefly to agriculture, the poor
+would live in great plenty, and population would rapidly
+increase. In that which had applied itself chiefly to commerce,
+the poor would be comparatively but little benefited and
+consequently population would increase slowly.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 17
+
+Question of the proper definition of the wealth of a state--
+Reason given by the French economists for considering all
+manufacturers as unproductive labourers, not the true reason--
+The labour of artificers and manufacturers sufficiently
+productive to individuals, though not to the state--A remarkable
+passage in Dr Price's two volumes of Observations--Error of Dr
+Price in attributing the happiness and rapid population of
+America, chiefly, to its peculiar state of civilization--No
+advantage can be expected from shutting our eyes to the
+difficulties in the way to the improvement of society.
+
+
+A question seems naturally to arise here whether the exchangeable
+value of the annual produce of the land and labour be the proper
+definition of the wealth of a country, or whether the gross
+produce of the land, according to the French economists, may not
+be a more accurate definition. Certain it is that every increase
+of wealth, according to the definition of the economists, will be
+an increase of the funds for the maintenance of labour, and
+consequently will always tend to ameliorate the condition of the
+labouring poor, though an increase of wealth, according to Dr
+Adam Smith's definition, will by no means invariably have the
+same tendency. And yet it may not follow from this consideration
+that Dr Adam Smith's definition is not just. It seems in many
+respects improper to exclude the clothing and lodging of a whole
+people from any part of their revenue. Much of it may, indeed, be
+of very trivial and unimportant value in comparison with the food
+of the country, yet still it may be fairly considered as a part
+of its revenue; and, therefore, the only point in which I should
+differ from Dr Adam Smith is where he seems to consider every
+increase of the revenue or stock of a society as an increase of
+the funds for the maintenance of labour, and consequently as
+tending always to ameliorate the condition of the poor.
+
+The fine silks and cottons, the laces, and other ornamental
+luxuries of a rich country, may contribute very considerably to
+augment the exchangeable value of its annual produce; yet they
+contribute but in a very small degree to augment the mass of
+happiness in the society, and it appears to me that it is with
+some view to the real utility of the produce that we ought to
+estimate the productiveness or unproductiveness of different
+sorts of labour. The French economists consider all labour
+employed in manufactures as unproductive. Comparing it with the
+labour employed upon land, I should be perfectly disposed to
+agree with them, but not exactly for the reasons which they give.
+They say that labour employed upon land is productive because the
+produce, over and above completely paying the labourer and the
+farmer, affords a clear rent to the landlord, and that the labour
+employed upon a piece of lace is unproductive because it merely
+replaces the provisions that the workman had consumed, and the
+stock of his employer, without affording any clear rent whatever.
+But supposing the value of the wrought lace to be such as that,
+besides paying in the most complete manner the workman and his
+employer, it could afford a clear rent to a third person, it
+appears to me that, in comparison with the labour employed upon
+land, it would be still as unproductive as ever. Though,
+according to the reasoning used by the French economists, the man
+employed in the manufacture of lace would, in this case, seem to
+be a productive labourer. Yet according to their definition of
+the wealth of a state, he ought not to be considered in that
+light. He will have added nothing to the gross produce of the
+land: he has consumed a portion of this gross produce, and has
+left a bit of lace in return; and though he may sell this bit of
+lace for three times the quantity of provisions that he consumed
+whilst he was making it, and thus be a very productive labourer
+with regard to himself, yet he cannot be considered as having
+added by his labour to any essential part of the riches of the
+state. The clear rent, therefore, that a certain produce can
+afford, after paying the expenses of procuring it, does not
+appear to be the sole criterion, by which to judge of the
+productiveness or unproductiveness to a state of any particular
+species of labour.
+
+Suppose that two hundred thousand men, who are now employed
+in producing manufactures that only tend to gratify the vanity of
+a few rich people, were to be employed upon some barren and
+uncultivated lands, and to produce only half the quantity of food
+that they themselves consumed; they would be still more
+productive labourers with regard to the state than they were
+before, though their labour, so far from affording a rent to a
+third person, would but half replace the provisions used in
+obtaining the produce. In their former employment they consumed a
+certain portion of the food of the country and left in return
+some silks and laces. In their latter employment they consumed
+the same quantity of food and left in return provision for a
+hundred thousand men. There can be little doubt which of the two
+legacies would be the most really beneficial to the country, and
+it will, I think, be allowed that the wealth which supported the
+two hundred thousand men while they were producing silks and
+laces would have been more usefully employed in supporting them
+while they were producing the additional quantity of food.
+
+A capital employed upon land may be unproductive to the
+individual that employs it and yet be highly productive to the
+society. A capital employed in trade, on the contrary, may be
+highly productive to the individual, and yet be almost totally
+unproductive to the society: and this is the reason why I should
+call manufacturing labour unproductive, in comparison of that
+which is employed in agriculture, and not for the reason given by
+the French economists. It is, indeed, almost impossible to see
+the great fortunes that are made in trade, and the liberality
+with which so many merchants live, and yet agree in the statement
+of the economists, that manufacturers can only grow rich by
+depriving themselves of the funds destined for their support. In
+many branches of trade the profits are so great as would allow of
+a clear rent to a third person; but as there is no third person
+in the case, and as all the profits centre in the master
+manufacturer, or merchant, he seems to have a fair chance of
+growing rich, without much privation; and we consequently see
+large fortunes acquired in trade by persons who have not been
+remarked for their parsimony.
+
+Daily experience proves that the labour employed in trade and
+manufactures is sufficiently productive to individuals, but it
+certainly is not productive in the same degree to the state.
+Every accession to the food of a country tends to the immediate
+benefit of the whole society; but the fortunes made in trade tend
+but in a remote and uncertain manner to the same end, and in some
+respects have even a contrary tendency. The home trade of
+consumption is by far the most important trade of every nation.
+China is the richest country in the world, without any other.
+Putting then, for a moment, foreign trade out of the question,
+the man who, by an ingenious manufacture, obtains a double
+portion out of the old stock of provisions, will certainly not to
+be so useful to the state as the man who, by his labour, adds a
+single share to the former stock. The consumable commodities of
+silks, laces, trinkets, and expensive furniture, are undoubtedly
+a part of the revenue of the society; but they are the revenue
+only of the rich, and not of the society in general. An increase
+in this part of the revenue of a state, cannot, therefore, be
+considered of the same importance as an increase of food, which
+forms the principal revenue of the great mass of the people.
+
+Foreign commerce adds to the wealth of a state, according to
+Dr Adam Smith's definition, though not according to the
+definition of the economists. Its principal use, and the reason,
+probably, that it has in general been held in such high
+estimation is that it adds greatly to the external power of a
+nation or to its power of commanding the labour of other
+countries; but it will be found, upon a near examination, to
+contribute but little to the increase of the internal funds for
+the maintenance of labour, and consequently but little to the
+happiness of the greatest part of society. In the natural
+progress of a state towards riches, manufactures, and foreign
+commerce would follow, in their order, the high cultivation of
+the soil. In Europe, this natural order of things has been
+inverted, and the soil has been cultivated from the redundancy of
+manufacturing capital, instead of manufactures rising from the
+redundancy of capital employed upon land. The superior
+encouragement that has been given to the industry of the towns,
+and the consequent higher price that is paid for the labour of
+artificers than for the labour of those employed in husbandry,
+are probably the reasons why so much soil in Europe remains
+uncultivated. Had a different policy been pursued throughout
+Europe, it might undoubtedly have been much more populous than at
+present, and yet not be more incumbered by its population.
+
+I cannot quit this curious subject of the difficulty arising
+from population, a subject that appears to me to deserve a minute
+investigation and able discussion much beyond my power to give
+it, without taking notice of an extraordinary passage in Dr
+Price's two volumes of Observations. Having given some tables on
+the probabilities of life, in towns and in the country, he says
+(Vol. II, p. 243):
+
+From this comparison, it appears with how much truth great cities
+have been called the graves of mankind. It must also convince all
+who consider it, that according to the observation, at the end of
+the fourth essay, in the former volume, it is by no means
+strictly proper to consider our diseases as the original
+intention of nature. They are, without doubt, in general our own
+creation. Were there a country where the inhabitants led lives
+entirely natural and virtuous, few of them would die without
+measuring out the whole period of present existence allotted to
+them; pain and distemper would be unknown among them, and death
+would come upon them like a sleep, in consequence of no other
+cause than gradual and unavoidable decay.
+
+I own that I felt myself obliged to draw a very opposite
+conclusion from the facts advanced in Dr Price's two volumes. I
+had for some time been aware that population and food increased
+in different ratios, and a vague opinion had been floating in my
+mind that they could only be kept equal by some species of misery
+or vice, but the perusal of Dr Price's two volumes of
+Observations, after that opinion had been conceived, raised it at
+once to conviction. With so many facts in his view to prove the
+extraordinary rapidity with which population increases when
+unchecked, and with such a body of evidence before him to
+elucidate even the manner by which the general laws of nature
+repress a redundant population, it is perfectly inconceivable to
+me how he could write the passage that I have quoted. He was a
+strenuous advocate for early marriages, as the best preservative
+against vicious manners. He had no fanciful conceptions about the
+extinction of the passion between the sexes, like Mr Godwin, nor
+did he ever think of eluding the difficulty in the ways hinted at
+by Mr Condorcet. He frequently talks of giving the prolifick
+powers of nature room to exert themselves. Yet with these ideas,
+that his understanding could escape from the obvious and
+necessary inference that an unchecked population would increase,
+beyond comparison, faster than the earth, by the best directed
+exertions of man, could produce food for its support, appears to
+me as astonishing as if he had resisted the conclusion of one of
+the plainest propositions of Euclid.
+
+Dr Price, speaking of the different stages of the civilized
+state, says, 'The first, or simple stages of civilization, are
+those which favour most the increase and the happiness of
+mankind.' He then instances the American colonies, as being at
+that time in the first and happiest of the states that he had
+described, and as affording a very striking proof of the effects
+of the different stages of civilization on population. But he
+does not seem to be aware that the happiness of the Americans
+depended much less upon their peculiar degree of civilization
+than upon the peculiarity of their situation, as new colonies,
+upon their having a great plenty of fertile uncultivated land. In
+parts of Norway, Denmark, or Sweden, or in this country, two or
+three hundred years ago, he might have found perhaps nearly the
+same degree of civilization, but by no means the same happiness
+or the same increase of population. He quotes himself a statute
+of Henry the Eighth, complaining of the decay of tillage, and the
+enhanced price of provisions, 'whereby a marvellous number of
+people were rendered incapable of maintaining themselves and
+families.' The superior degree of civil liberty which prevailed
+in America contributed, without doubt, its share to promote the
+industry, happiness, and population of these states, but even
+civil liberty, all powerful as it is, will not create fresh land.
+The Americans may be said, perhaps, to enjoy a greater degree of
+civil liberty, now they are an independent people, than while
+they were in subjection in England, but we may be perfectly sure
+that population will not long continue to increase with the same
+rapidity as it did then.
+
+A person who contemplated the happy state of the lower
+classes of people in America twenty years ago would naturally
+wish to retain them for ever in that state, and might think,
+perhaps, that by preventing the introduction of manufactures and
+luxury he might effect his purpose, but he might as reasonably
+expect to prevent a wife or mistress from growing old by never
+exposing her to the sun or air. The situation of new colonies,
+well governed, is a bloom of youth that no efforts can arrest.
+There are, indeed, many modes of treatment in the political, as
+well as animal, body, that contribute to accelerate or retard the
+approaches of age, but there can be no chance of success, in any
+mode that could be devised, for keeping either of them in
+perpetual youth. By encouraging the industry of the towns more
+than the industry of the country, Europe may be said, perhaps, to
+have brought on a premature old age. A different policy in this
+respect would infuse fresh life and vigour into every state.
+While from the law of primogeniture, and other European customs,
+land bears a monopoly price, a capital can never be employed in
+it with much advantage to the individual; and, therefore, it is
+not probable that the soil should be properly cultivated. And,
+though in every civilized state a class of proprietors and a
+class of labourers must exist, yet one permanent advantage would
+always result from a nearer equalization of property. The greater
+the number of proprietors, the smaller must be the number of
+labourers: a greater part of society would be in the happy state
+of possessing property: and a smaller part in the unhappy state
+of possessing no other property than their labour. But the best
+directed exertions, though they may alleviate, can never remove
+the pressure of want, and it will be difficult for any person who
+contemplates the genuine situation of man on earth, and the
+general laws of nature, to suppose it possible that any, the most
+enlightened, efforts could place mankind in a state where 'few
+would die without measuring out the whole period of present
+existence allotted to them; where pain and distemper would be
+unknown among them; and death would come upon them like a sleep,
+in consequence of no other cause than gradual and unavoidable
+decay.'
+
+It is, undoubtedly, a most disheartening reflection that the
+great obstacle in the way to any extraordinary improvement in
+society is of a nature that we can never hope to overcome. The
+perpetual tendency in the race of man to increase beyond the
+means of subsistence is one of the general laws of animated
+nature which we can have no reason to expect will change. Yet,
+discouraging as the contemplation of this difficulty must be to
+those whose exertions are laudably directed to the improvement of
+the human species, it is evident that no possible good can arise
+from any endeavours to slur it over or keep it in the background.
+On the contrary, the most baleful mischiefs may be expected from
+the unmanly conduct of not daring to face truth because it is
+unpleasing. Independently of what relates to this great obstacle,
+sufficient yet remains to be done for mankind to animate us to
+the most unremitted exertion. But if we proceed without a
+thorough knowledge and accurate comprehension of the nature,
+extent, and magnitude of the difficulties we have to encounter,
+or if we unwisely direct our efforts towards an object in which
+we cannot hope for success, we shall not only exhaust our
+strength in fruitless exertions and remain at as great a distance
+as ever from the summit of our wishes, but we shall be
+perpetually crushed by the recoil of this rock of Sisyphus.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 18
+
+The constant pressure of distress on man, from the principle of
+population, seems to direct our hopes to the future--State of
+trial inconsistent with our ideas of the foreknowledge of God--
+The world, probably, a mighty process for awakening matter into
+mind--Theory of the formation of mind--Excitements from the
+wants of the body--Excitements from the operation of general
+laws--Excitements from the difficulties of life arising from the
+principle of population.
+
+
+The view of human life which results from the contemplation of
+the constant pressure of distress on man from the difficulty of
+subsistence, by shewing the little expectation that he can
+reasonably entertain of perfectibility on earth, seems strongly
+to point his hopes to the future. And the temptations to which he
+must necessarily be exposed, from the operation of those laws of
+nature which we have been examining, would seem to represent the
+world in the light in which it has been frequently considered, as
+a state of trial and school of virtue preparatory to a superior
+state of happiness. But I hope I shall be pardoned if I attempt
+to give a view in some degree different of the situation of man
+on earth, which appears to me to be more consistent with the
+various phenomena of nature which we observe around us and more
+consonant to our ideas of the power, goodness, and foreknowledge
+of the Deity.
+
+It cannot be considered as an unimproving exercise of the
+human mind to endeavour to 'vindicate the ways of God to man' if
+we proceed with a proper distrust of our own understandings and a
+just sense of our insufficiency to comprehend the reason of all
+we see, if we hail every ray of light with gratitude, and, when
+no light appears, think that the darkness is from within and not
+from without, and bow with humble deference to the supreme wisdom
+of him whose 'thoughts are above our thoughts' 'as the heavens
+are high above the earth.'
+
+In all our feeble attempts, however, to 'find out the
+Almighty to perfection', it seems absolutely necessary that we
+should reason from nature up to nature's God and not presume to
+reason from God to nature. The moment we allow ourselves to ask
+why some things are not otherwise, instead of endeavouring to
+account for them as they are, we shall never know where to stop,
+we shall be led into the grossest and most childish absurdities,
+all progress in the knowledge of the ways of Providence must
+necessarily be at an end, and the study will even cease to be an
+improving exercise of the human mind. Infinite power is so vast
+and incomprehensible an idea that the mind of man must
+necessarily be bewildered in the contemplation of it. With the
+crude and puerile conceptions which we sometimes form of this
+attribute of the Deity, we might imagine that God could call into
+being myriads and myriads of existences, all free from pain and
+imperfection, all eminent in goodness and wisdom, all capable of
+the highest enjoyments, and unnumbered as the points throughout
+infinite space. But when from these vain and extravagant dreams
+of fancy, we turn our eyes to the book of nature, where alone we
+can read God as he is, we see a constant succession of sentient
+beings, rising apparently from so many specks of matter, going
+through a long and sometimes painful process in this world, but
+many of them attaining, ere the termination of it, such high
+qualities and powers as seem to indicate their fitness for some
+superior state. Ought we not then to correct our crude and
+puerile ideas of infinite Power from the contemplation of what we
+actually see existing? Can we judge of the Creator but from his
+creation? And, unless we wish to exalt the power of God at the
+expense of his goodness, ought we not to conclude that even to
+the great Creator, almighty as he is, a certain process may be
+necessary, a certain time (or at least what appears to us as
+time) may be requisite, in order to form beings with those
+exalted qualities of mind which will fit them for his high
+purposes?
+
+A state of trial seems to imply a previously formed existence
+that does not agree with the appearance of man in infancy and
+indicates something like suspicion and want of foreknowledge,
+inconsistent with those ideas which we wish to cherish of the
+Supreme Being. I should be inclined, therefore, as I have hinted
+before, to consider the world and this life as the mighty process
+of God, not for the trial, but for the creation and formation of
+mind, a process necessary to awaken inert, chaotic matter into
+spirit, to sublimate the dust of the earth into soul, to elicit
+an ethereal spark from the clod of clay. And in this view of the
+subject, the various impressions and excitements which man
+receives through life may be considered as the forming hand of
+his Creator, acting by general laws, and awakening his sluggish
+existence, by the animating touches of the Divinity, into a
+capacity of superior enjoyment. The original sin of man is the
+torpor and corruption of the chaotic matter in which he may be
+said to be born.
+
+It could answer no good purpose to enter into the question
+whether mind be a distinct substance from matter, or only a finer
+form of it. The question is, perhaps, after all, a question
+merely of words. Mind is as essentially mind, whether formed from
+matter or any other substance. We know from experience that soul
+and body are most intimately united, and every appearance seems
+to indicate that they grow from infancy together. It would be a
+supposition attended with very little probability to believe that
+a complete and full formed spirit existed in every infant, but
+that it was clogged and impeded in its operations during the
+first twenty years of life by the weakness, or hebetude, of the
+organs in which it was enclosed. As we shall all be disposed to
+agree that God is the creator of mind as well as of body, and as
+they both seem to be forming and unfolding themselves at the same
+time, it cannot appear inconsistent either with reason or
+revelation, if it appear to be consistent with phenomena of
+nature, to suppose that God is constantly occupied in forming
+mind out of matter and that the various impressions that man
+receives through life is the process for that purpose. The
+employment is surely worthy of the highest attributes of the
+Deity.
+
+This view of the state of man on earth will not seem to be
+unattended with probability, if, judging from the little
+experience we have of the nature of mind, it shall appear upon
+investigation that the phenomena around us, and the various
+events of human life, seem peculiarly calculated to promote this
+great end, and especially if, upon this supposition, we can
+account, even to our own narrow understandings, for many of those
+roughnesses and inequalities in life which querulous man too
+frequently makes the subject of his complaint against the God of
+nature.
+
+The first great awakeners of the mind seem to be the wants of
+the body. (It was my intention to have entered at some length
+into this subject as a kind of second part to the Essay. A long
+interruption, from particular business, has obliged me to lay
+aside this intention, at least for the present. I shall now,
+therefore, only give a sketch of a few of the leading
+circumstances that appear to me to favour the general supposition
+that I have advanced.) They are the first stimulants that rouse
+the brain of infant man into sentient activity, and such seems to
+be the sluggishness of original matter that unless by a peculiar
+course of excitements other wants, equally powerful, are
+generated, these stimulants seem, even afterwards, to be
+necessary to continue that activity which they first awakened.
+The savage would slumber for ever under his tree unless he were
+roused from his torpor by the cravings of hunger or the pinchings
+of cold, and the exertions that he makes to avoid these evils, by
+procuring food, and building himself a covering, are the
+exercises which form and keep in motion his faculties, which
+otherwise would sink into listless inactivity. From all that
+experience has taught us concerning the structure of the human
+mind, if those stimulants to exertion which arise from the wants
+of the body were removed from the mass of mankind, we have much
+more reason to think that they would be sunk to the level of
+brutes, from a deficiency of excitements, than that they would be
+raised to the rank of philosophers by the possession of leisure.
+In those countries where nature is the most redundant in
+spontaneous produce the inhabitants will not be found the most
+remarkable for acuteness of intellect. Necessity has been with
+great truth called the mother of invention. Some of the noblest
+exertions of the human mind have been set in motion by the
+necessity of satisfying the wants of the body. Want has not
+unfrequently given wings to the imagination of the poet, pointed
+the flowing periods of the historian, and added acuteness to the
+researches of the philosopher, and though there are undoubtedly
+many minds at present so far improved by the various excitements
+of knowledge, or of social sympathy, that they would not relapse
+into listlessness if their bodily stimulants were removed, yet it
+can scarcely be doubted that these stimulants could not be
+withdrawn from the mass of mankind without producing a general
+and fatal torpor, destructive of all the germs of future
+improvement.
+
+Locke, if I recollect, says that the endeavour to avoid pain
+rather than the pursuit of pleasure is the great stimulus to
+action in life: and that in looking to any particular pleasure,
+we shall not be roused into action in order to obtain it, till
+the contemplation of it has continued so long as to amount to a
+sensation of pain or uneasiness under the absence of it. To avoid
+evil and to pursue good seem to be the great duty and business of
+man, and this world appears to be peculiarly calculated to afford
+opportunity of the most unremitted exertion of this kind, and it
+is by this exertion, by these stimulants, that mind is formed. If
+Locke's idea be just, and there is great reason to think that it
+is, evil seems to be necessary to create exertion, and exertion
+seems evidently necessary to create mind.
+
+The necessity of food for the support of life gives rise,
+probably, to a greater quantity of exertion than any other want,
+bodily or mental. The Supreme Being has ordained that the earth
+shall not produce good in great quantities till much preparatory
+labour and ingenuity has been exercised upon its surface. There
+is no conceivable connection to our comprehensions, between the
+seed and the plant or tree that rises from it. The Supreme
+Creator might, undoubtedly, raise up plants of all kinds, for the
+use of his creatures, without the assistance of those little bits
+of matter, which we call seed, or even without the assisting
+labour and attention of man. The processes of ploughing and
+clearing the ground, of collecting and sowing seeds, are not
+surely for the assistance of God in his creation, but are made
+previously necessary to the enjoyment of the blessings of life,
+in order to rouse man into action, and form his mind to reason.
+
+To furnish the most unremitted excitements of this kind, and
+to urge man to further the gracious designs of Providence by the
+full cultivation of the earth, it has been ordained that
+population should increase much faster than food. This general
+law (as it has appeared in the former parts of this Essay)
+undoubtedly produces much partial evil, but a little reflection
+may, perhaps, satisfy us, that it produces a great overbalance of
+good. Strong excitements seem necessary to create exertion, and
+to direct this exertion, and form the reasoning faculty, it seems
+absolutely necessary, that the Supreme Being should act always
+according to general laws. The constancy of the laws of nature,
+or the certainty with which we may expect the same effects from
+the same causes, is the foundation of the faculty of reason. If
+in the ordinary course of things, the finger of God were
+frequently visible, or to speak more correctly, if God were
+frequently to change his purpose (for the finger of God is,
+indeed, visible in every blade of grass that we see), a general
+and fatal torpor of the human faculties would probably ensue;
+even the bodily wants of mankind would cease to stimulate them to
+exertion, could they not reasonably expect that if their efforts
+were well directed they would be crowned with success. The
+constancy of the laws of nature is the foundation of the industry
+and foresight of the husbandman, the indefatigable ingenuity of
+the artificer, the skilful researches of the physician and
+anatomist, and the watchful observation and patient investigation
+of the natural philosopher. To this constancy we owe all the
+greatest and noblest efforts of intellect. To this constancy we
+owe the immortal mind of a Newton.
+
+As the reasons, therefore, for the constancy of the laws of
+nature seem, even to our understandings, obvious and striking; if
+we return to the principle of population and consider man as he
+really is, inert, sluggish, and averse from labour, unless
+compelled by necessity (and it is surely the height of folly to
+talk of man, according to our crude fancies of what he might be),
+we may pronounce with certainty that the world would not have
+been peopled, but for the superiority of the power of population
+to the means of subsistence. Strong and constantly operative as
+this stimulus is on man to urge him to the cultivation of the
+earth, if we still see that cultivation proceeds very slowly, we
+may fairly conclude that a less stimulus would have been
+insufficient. Even under the operation of this constant
+excitement, savages will inhabit countries of the greatest
+natural fertility for a long period before they betake themselves
+to pasturage or agriculture. Had population and food increased in
+the same ratio, it is probable that man might never have emerged
+from the savage state. But supposing the earth once well peopled,
+an Alexander, a Julius Caesar, a Tamberlane, or a bloody
+revolution might irrecoverably thin the human race, and defeat
+the great designs of the Creator. The ravages of a contagious
+disorder would be felt for ages; and an earthquake might unpeople
+a region for ever. The principle, according to which population
+increases, prevents the vices of mankind, or the accidents of
+nature, the partial evils arising from general laws, from
+obstructing the high purpose of the creation. It keeps the
+inhabitants of the earth always fully up to the level of the
+means of subsistence; and is constantly acting upon man as a
+powerful stimulus, urging him to the further cultivation of the
+earth, and to enable it, consequently, to support a more extended
+population. But it is impossible that this law can operate, and
+produce the effects apparently intended by the Supreme Being,
+without occasioning partial evil. Unless the principle of
+population were to be altered according to the circumstances of
+each separate country (which would not only be contrary to our
+universal experience, with regard to the laws of nature, but
+would contradict even our own reason, which sees the absolute
+necessity of general laws for the formation of intellect), it is
+evident that the same principle which, seconded by industry, will
+people a fertile region in a few years must produce distress in
+countries that have been long inhabited.
+
+It seems, however, every way probable that even the
+acknowledged difficulties occasioned by the law of population
+tend rather to promote than impede the general purpose of
+Providence. They excite universal exertion and contribute to that
+infinite variety of situations, and consequently of impressions,
+which seems upon the whole favourable to the growth of mind. It
+is probable, that too great or too little excitement, extreme
+poverty, or too great riches may be alike unfavourable in this
+respect. The middle regions of society seem to be best suited to
+intellectual improvement, but it is contrary to the analogy of
+all nature to expect that the whole of society can be a middle
+region. The temperate zones of the earth seem to be the most
+favourable to the mental and corporal energies of man, but all
+cannot be temperate zones. A world, warmed and enlightened but by
+one sun, must from the laws of matter have some parts chilled by
+perpetual frosts and others scorched by perpetual heats. Every
+piece of matter lying on a surface must have an upper and an
+under side, all the particles cannot be in the middle. The most
+valuable parts of an oak, to a timber merchant, are not either
+the roots or the branches, but these are absolutely necessary to
+the existence of the middle part, or stem, which is the object in
+request. The timber merchant could not possibly expect to make an
+oak grow without roots or branches, but if he could find out a
+mode of cultivation which would cause more of the substance to go
+to stem, and less to root and branch, he would be right to exert
+himself in bringing such a system into general use.
+
+In the same manner, though we cannot possibly expect to
+exclude riches and poverty from society, yet if we could find out
+a mode of government by which the numbers in the extreme regions
+would be lessened and the numbers in the middle regions
+increased, it would be undoubtedly our duty to adopt it. It is
+not, however, improbable that as in the oak, the roots and
+branches could not be diminished very greatly without weakening
+the vigorous circulation of the sap in the stem, so in society
+the extreme parts could not be diminished beyond a certain degree
+without lessening that animated exertion throughout the middle
+parts, which is the very cause that they are the most favourable
+to the growth of intellect. If no man could hope to rise or fear
+to fall, in society, if industry did not bring with it its reward
+and idleness its punishment, the middle parts would not certainly
+be what they now are. In reasoning upon this subject, it is
+evident that we ought to consider chiefly the mass of mankind and
+not individual instances. There are undoubtedly many minds, and
+there ought to be many, according to the chances out of so great
+a mass, that, having been vivified early by a peculiar course of
+excitements, would not need the constant action of narrow motives
+to continue them in activity. But if we were to review the
+various useful discoveries, the valuable writings, and other
+laudable exertions of mankind, I believe we should find that more
+were to be attributed to the narrow motives that operate upon the
+many than to the apparently more enlarged motives that operate
+upon the few.
+
+Leisure is, without doubt, highly valuable to man, but taking
+man as he is, the probability seems to be that in the greater
+number of instances it will produce evil rather than good. It has
+been not infrequently remarked that talents are more common among
+younger brothers than among elder brothers, but it can scarcely
+be imagined that younger brothers are, upon an average, born with
+a greater original susceptibility of parts. The difference, if
+there really is any observable difference, can only arise from
+their different situations. Exertion and activity are in general
+absolutely necessary in one case and are only optional in the
+other.
+
+That the difficulties of life contribute to generate talents,
+every day's experience must convince us. The exertions that men
+find it necessary to make, in order to support themselves or
+families, frequently awaken faculties that might otherwise have
+lain for ever dormant, and it has been commonly remarked that new
+and extraordinary situations generally create minds adequate to
+grapple with the difficulties in which they are involved.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER 19
+
+The sorrows of life necessary to soften and humanize the heart--
+The excitement of social sympathy often produce characters of a
+higher order than the mere possessors of talents--Moral evil
+probably necessary to the production of moral excellence--
+Excitements from intellectual wants continually kept up by the
+infinite variety of nature, and the obscurity that involves
+metaphysical subjects--The difficulties in revelation to be
+accounted for upon this principle--The degree of evidence which
+the scriptures contain, probably, best suited to the improvements
+of the human faculties, and the moral amerlioration of mankind--
+The idea that mind is created by excitements seems to account for
+the existence of natural and moral evil.
+
+
+The sorrows and distresses of life form another class of
+excitements, which seem to be necessary, by a peculiar train of
+impressions, to soften and humanize the heart, to awaken social
+sympathy, to generate all the Christian virtues, and to afford
+scope for the ample exertion of benevolence. The general tendency
+of an uniform course of prosperity is rather to degrade than
+exalt the character. The heart that has never known sorrow itself
+will seldom be feelingly alive to the pains and pleasures, the
+wants and wishes, of its fellow beings. It will seldom be
+overflowing with that warmth of brotherly love, those kind and
+amiable affections, which dignify the human character even more
+than the possession of the highest talents. Talents, indeed,
+though undoubtedly a very prominent and fine feature of mind, can
+by no means be considered as constituting the whole of it. There
+are many minds which have not been exposed to those excitements
+that usually form talents, that have yet been vivified to a high
+degree by the excitements of social sympathy. In every rank of
+life, in the lowest as frequently as in the highest, characters
+are to be found overflowing with the milk of human kindness,
+breathing love towards God and man, and, though without those
+peculiar powers of mind called talents, evidently holding a
+higher rank in the scale of beings than many who possess them.
+Evangelical charity, meekness, piety, and all that class of
+virtues distinguished particularly by the name of Christian
+virtues do not seem necessarily to include abilities; yet a soul
+possessed of these amiable qualities, a soul awakened and
+vivified by these delightful sympathies, seems to hold a nearer
+commerce with the skies than mere acuteness of intellect.
+
+The greatest talents have been frequently misapplied and have
+produced evil proportionate to the extent of their powers. Both
+reason and revelation seem to assure us that such minds will be
+condemned to eternal death, but while on earth, these vicious
+instruments performed their part in the great mass of
+impressions, by the disgust and abhorrence which they excited. It
+seems highly probable that moral evil is absolutely necessary to
+the production of moral excellence. A being with only good placed
+in view may be justly said to be impelled by a blind necessity.
+The pursuit of good in this case can be no indication of virtuous
+propensities. It might be said, perhaps, that infinite Wisdom
+cannot want such an indication as outward action, but would
+foreknow with certainly whether the being would choose good or
+evil. This might be a plausible argument against a state of
+trial, but will not hold against the supposition that mind in
+this world is in a state of formation. Upon this idea, the being
+that has seen moral evil and has felt disapprobation and disgust
+at it is essentially different from the being that has seen only
+good. They are pieces of clay that have received distinct
+impressions: they must, therefore, necessarily be in different
+shapes; or, even if we allow them both to have the same lovely
+form of virtue, it must be acknowledged that one has undergone
+the further process, necessary to give firmness and durability to
+its substance, while the other is still exposed to injury, and
+liable to be broken by every accidental impulse. An ardent love
+and admiration of virtue seems to imply the existence of
+something opposite to it, and it seems highly probable that the
+same beauty of form and substance, the same perfection of
+character, could not be generated without the impressions of
+disapprobation which arise from the spectacle of moral evil.
+
+When the mind has been awakened into activity by the
+passions, and the wants of the body, intellectual wants arise;
+and the desire of knowledge, and the impatience under ignorance,
+form a new and important class of excitements. Every part of
+nature seems peculiarly calculated to furnish stimulants to
+mental exertion of this kind, and to offer inexhaustible food for
+the most unremitted inquiry. Our mortal Bard says of Cleopatra:
+
+Custom cannot stale
+Her infinite variety.
+
+The expression, when applied to any one object, may be considered
+as a poetical amplification, but it is accurately true when
+applied to nature. Infinite variety seems, indeed, eminently her
+characteristic feature. The shades that are here and there
+blended in the picture give spirit, life, and prominence to her
+exuberant beauties, and those roughnesses and inequalities, those
+inferior parts that support the superior, though they sometimes
+offend the fastidious microscopic eye of short-sighted man,
+contribute to the symmetry, grace, and fair proportion of the
+whole.
+
+The infinite variety of the forms and operations of nature,
+besides tending immediately to awaken and improve the mind by the
+variety of impressions that it creates, opens other fertile
+sources of improvement by offering so wide and extensive a field
+for investigation and research. Uniform, undiversified perfection
+could not possess the same awakening powers. When we endeavour
+then to contemplate the system of the universe, when we think of
+the stars as the suns of other systems scattered throughout
+infinite space, when we reflect that we do not probably see a
+millionth part of those bright orbs that are beaming light and
+life to unnumbered worlds, when our minds, unable to grasp the
+immeasurable conception, sink, lost and confounded, in admiration
+at the mighty incomprehensible power of the Creator, let us not
+querulously complain that all climates are not equally genial,
+that perpetual spring does not reign throughout the year, that
+God's creatures do not possess the same advantages, that clouds
+and tempests sometimes darken the natural world and vice and
+misery the moral world, and that all the works of the creation
+are not formed with equal perfection. Both reason and experience
+seem to indicate to us that the infinite variety of nature (and
+variety cannot exist without inferior parts, or apparent
+blemishes) is admirably adapted to further the high purpose of
+the creation and to produce the greatest possible quantity of
+good.
+
+The obscurity that involves all metaphysical subjects appears
+to me, in the same manner, peculiarly calculated to add to that
+class of excitements which arise from the thirst of knowledge. It
+is probable that man, while on earth, will never be able to
+attain complete satisfaction on these subjects; but this is by no
+means a reason that he should not engage in them. The darkness
+that surrounds these interesting topics of human curiosity may be
+intended to furnish endless motives to intellectual activity and
+exertion. The constant effort to dispel this darkness, even if it
+fail of success, invigorates and improves the thinking faculty.
+If the subjects of human inquiry were once exhausted, mind would
+probably stagnate; but the infinitely diversified forms and
+operations of nature, together with the endless food for
+speculation which metaphysical subjects offer, prevent the
+possibility that such a period should ever arrive.
+
+It is by no means one of the wisest sayings of Solomon that
+'there is no new thing under the sun.' On the contrary, it is
+probable that were the present system to continue for millions of
+years, continual additions would be making to the mass of human
+knowledge, and yet, perhaps, it may be a matter of doubt whether
+what may be called the capacity of mind be in any marked and
+decided manner increasing. A Socrates, a Plato, or an Aristotle,
+however confessedly inferior in knowledge to the philosophers of
+the present day, do not appear to have been much below them in
+intellectual capacity. Intellect rises from a speck, continues in
+vigour only for a certain period, and will not perhaps admit
+while on earth of above a certain number of impressions. These
+impressions may, indeed, be infinitely modified, and from these
+various modifications, added probably to a difference in the
+susceptibility of the original germs, arise the endless diversity
+of character that we see in the world; but reason and experience
+seem both to assure us that the capacity of individual minds does
+not increase in proportion to the mass of existing knowledge. (It
+is probable that no two grains of wheat are exactly alike. Soil
+undoubtedly makes the principal difference in the blades that
+spring up, but probably not all. It seems natural to suppose some
+sort of difference in the original germs that are afterwards
+awakened into thought, and the extraordinary difference of
+susceptibility in very young children seems to confirm the
+supposition.)
+
+The finest minds seem to be formed rather by efforts at
+original thinking, by endeavours to form new combinations, and to
+discover new truths, than by passively receiving the impressions
+of other men's ideas. Could we suppose the period arrived, when
+there was not further hope of future discoveries, and the only
+employment of mind was to acquire pre-existing knowledge, without
+any efforts to form new and original combinations, though the
+mass of human knowledge were a thousand times greater than it is
+at present, yet it is evident that one of the noblest stimulants
+to mental exertion would have ceased; the finest feature of
+intellect would be lost; everything allied to genius would be at
+an end; and it appears to be impossible, that, under such
+circumstances, any individuals could possess the same
+intellectual energies as were possessed by a Locke, a Newton, or
+a Shakespeare, or even by a Socrates, a Plato, an Aristotle or a
+Homer.
+
+If a revelation from heaven of which no person could feel the
+smallest doubt were to dispel the mists that now hang over
+metaphysical subjects, were to explain the nature and structure
+of mind, the affections and essences of all substances, the mode
+in which the Supreme Being operates in the works of the creation,
+and the whole plan and scheme of the Universe, such an accession
+of knowledge so obtained, instead of giving additional vigour and
+activity to the human mind, would in all probability tend to
+repress future exertion and to damp the soaring wings of
+intellect.
+
+For this reason I have never considered the doubts and
+difficulties that involve some parts of the sacred writings as
+any ardent against their divine original. The Supreme Being
+might, undoubtedly, have accompanied his revelations to man by
+such a succession of miracles, and of such a nature, as would
+have produced universal overpowering conviction and have put an
+end at once to all hesitation and discussion. But weak as our
+reason is to comprehend the plans of the great Creator, it is yet
+sufficiently strong to see the most striking objections to such a
+revelation. From the little we know of the structure of the human
+understanding, we must be convinced that an overpowering
+conviction of this kind, instead of tending to the improvement
+and moral amelioration of man, would act like the touch of a
+torpedo on all intellectual exertion and would almost put an end
+to the existence of virtue. If the scriptural denunciations of
+eternal punishment were brought home with the same certainty to
+every man's mind as that the night will follow the day, this one
+vast and gloomy idea would take such full possession of the human
+faculties as to leave no room for any other conceptions, the
+external actions of men would be all nearly alike, virtuous
+conduct would be no indication of virtuous disposition, vice and
+virtue would be blended together in one common mass, and though
+the all-seeing eye of God might distinguish them they must
+necessarily make the same impressions on man, who can judge only
+from external appearances. Under such a dispensation, it is
+difficult to conceive how human beings could be formed to a
+detestation of moral evil, and a love and admiration of God, and
+of moral excellence.
+
+Our ideas of virtue and vice are not, perhaps, very accurate
+and well-defined; but few, I think, would call an action really
+virtuous which was performed simply and solely from the dread of
+a very great punishment or the expectation of a very great
+reward. The fear of the Lord is very justly said to be the
+beginning of wisdom, but the end of wisdom is the love of the
+Lord and the admiration of moral good. The denunciations of
+future punishment contained in the scriptures seem to be well
+calculated to arrest the progress of the vicious and awaken the
+attention of the careless, but we see from repeated experience
+that they are not accompanied with evidence of such a nature as
+to overpower the human will and to make men lead virtuous lives
+with vicious dispositions, merely from a dread of hereafter. A
+genuine faith, by which I mean a faith that shews itself in it
+the virtues of a truly Christian life, may generally be
+considered as an indication of an amiable and virtuous
+disposition, operated upon more by love than by pure unmixed
+fear.
+
+When we reflect on the temptations to which man must
+necessarily be exposed in this world, from the structure of his
+frame, and the operation of the laws of nature, and the
+consequent moral certainty that many vessels will come out of
+this mighty creative furnace in wrong shapes, it is perfectly
+impossible to conceive that any of these creatures of God's hand
+can be condemned to eternal suffering. Could we once admit such
+an idea, it our natural conceptions of goodness and justice would
+be completely overthrown, and we could no longer look up to God
+as a merciful and righteous Being. But the doctrine of life and
+Mortality which was brought to light by the gospel, the doctrine
+that the end of righteousness is everlasting life, but that the
+wages of sin are death, is in every respect just and merciful,
+and worthy of the great Creator. Nothing can appear more
+consonant to our reason than that those beings which come out of
+the creative process of the world in lovely and beautiful forms
+should be crowned with immortality, while those which come out
+misshapen, those whose minds are not suited to a purer and
+happier state of existence, should perish and be condemned to mix
+again with their original clay. Eternal condemnation of this kind
+may be considered as a species of eternal punishment, and it is
+not wonderful that it should be represented, sometimes, under
+images of suffering. But life and death, salvation and
+destruction, are more frequently opposed to each other in the New
+Testament than happiness and misery. The Supreme Being would
+appear to us in a very different view if we were to consider him
+as pursuing the creatures that had offended him with eternal hate
+and torture, instead of merely condemning to their original
+insensibility those beings that, by the operation of general
+laws, had not been formed with qualities suited to a purer state
+of happiness.
+
+Life is, generally speaking, a blessing independent of a
+future state. It is a gift which the vicious would not always be
+ready to throw away, even if they had no fear of death. The
+partial pain, therefore, that is inflicted by the supreme
+Creator, while he is forming numberless beings to a capacity of
+the highest enjoyments, is but as the dust of the balance in
+comparison of the happiness that is communicated, and we have
+every reason to think that there is no more evil in the world
+than what is absolutely necessary as one of the ingredients in
+the mighty process.
+
+The striking necessity of general laws for the formation of
+intellect will not in any respect be contradicted by one or two
+exceptions, and these evidently not intended for partial
+purposes, but calculated to operate upon a great part of mankind,
+and through many ages. Upon the idea that I have given of the
+formation of mind, the infringement of the general law of nature,
+by a divine revelation, will appear in the light of the immediate
+hand of God mixing new ingredients in the mighty mass, suited to
+the particular state of the process, and calculated to give rise
+to a new and powerful train of impressions, tending to purify,
+exalt, and improve the human mind. The miracles that accompanied
+these revelations when they had once excited the attention of
+mankind, and rendered it a matter of most interesting discussion,
+whether the doctrine was from God or man, had performed their
+part, had answered the purpose of the Creator, and these
+communications of the divine will were afterwards left to make
+their way by their own intrinsic excellence; and, by operating as
+moral motives, gradually to influence and improve, and not to
+overpower and stagnate the faculties of man.
+
+It would be, undoubtedly, presumptuous to say that the
+Supreme Being could not possibly have effected his purpose in any
+other way than that which he has chosen, but as the revelation of
+the divine will which we possess is attended with some doubts and
+difficulties, and as our reason points out to us the strongest
+objections to a revelation which would force immediate, implicit,
+universal belief, we have surely just cause to think that these
+doubts and difficulties are no argument against the divine origin
+of the scriptures, and that the species of evidence which they
+possess is best suited to the improvement of the human faculties
+and the moral amelioration of mankind.
+
+The idea that the impressions and excitements of this world
+are the instruments with which the Supreme Being forms matter
+into mind, and that the necessity of constant exertion to avoid
+evil and to pursue good is the principal spring of these
+impressions and excitements, seems to smooth many of the
+difficulties that occur in a contemplation of human life, and
+appears to me to give a satisfactory reason for the existence of
+natural and moral evil, and, consequently, for that part of both,
+and it certainly is not a very small part, which arises from the
+principle of population. But, though, upon this supposition, it
+seems highly improbable that evil should ever be removed from the
+world; yet it is evident that this impression would not answer
+the apparent purpose of the Creator; it would not act so
+powerfully as an excitement to exertion, if the quantity of it
+did not diminish or increase with the activity or the indolence
+of man. The continual variations in the weight and in the
+distribution of this pressure keep alive a constant expectation
+of throwing it off.
+
+"Hope springs eternal in the Human breast,
+Man never is, but always to be blest."
+
+Evil exists in the world not to create despair but activity.
+We are not patiently to submit to it, but to exert ourselves to
+avoid it. It is not only the interest but the duty of every
+individual to use his utmost efforts to remove evil from himself
+and from as large a circle as he can influence, and the more he
+exercises himself in this duty, the more wisely he directs his
+efforts, and the more successful these efforts are; the more he
+will probably improve and exalt his own mind, and the more
+completely does he appear to fulfil the will of his Creator.
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg Etext of An Essay on the Principle of Population
+by Thomas Malthus
+
diff --git a/old/prppl10.zip b/old/prppl10.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..17f3f85
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/prppl10.zip