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 AN ESSAY 
 
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 1798 : 1803 
 
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Thomas Robert Malthus, the son of Daniel Malthus, a 
 country gentleman living in Surrey, was born on Feb. 14, 
 1766. Entering Jesus College, Cambridge, in 1785, he was 
 9th Wrangler in the Mathematical Tripos in 1 788 ; took 
 Holy Orders ; and in 1797 was elected to a Fellowship at his 
 college. In 1805 he was appointed Professor of History 
 and Political Economy at the East India College at Hailey- 
 bury, a position which he retained until his death on Dec. 
 29, 1834. By his marriage in 1804 he had two daughters 
 and a son. 
 
 His Essay on the Principle of Population arose out of dis- 
 cussions with his father, — who had been the executor of 
 Rousseau, — over the opinions of William Godwin. In its 
 first form, as published in 1798, it was a small loosely 
 printed 8vo of 396 pp. : about one-third of it is here 
 reprinted. 
 
 In its second form, as published in 1803, it was a 4to of 
 604 pp., containing about four times as much matter : about 
 one-twentieth of it is here reprinted. The third edition 
 appeared in 1806, the fourth in 1807, the fifth in 181 7, the 
 sixth in 1826. It was translated into German by Hege- 
 wisch (1807), and into French by Prevost (1809, 2nd ed. 
 1852). 
 
 The other writings of Malthus were, The High Price of 
 Provisions (1800), Observations on the Com Laws, Grounds 
 of an Opinion on the Policy of restricting Importation, The 
 Nature and Progress of Petit (1814 and 1815), Political 
 
Economy (1820), Measure of Value (1823), Definitions in 
 Political Economy (1827), and Summary View (1830). 
 In 1823 he contributed an article to the Quarterly Review 
 on Tooke, and in 1824 another on The New Political Econ- 
 omy ; and in 1824 he also wrote the article on Population 
 in the Supplement to the Encyclopaedia Britannica. 
 
 The chief authorities for his life are the biographical 
 preface to the 2nd edition of his Political Economy (1836), 
 by his friend, Bishop Otter, and the review of it by his col- 
 league, Professor Empson, in the Edinburgh Review for 
 January, 1837. The particulars thus derived have been 
 supplemented from various sources in the biographical chap- 
 ter of Mr. James Bonar's Malthus and his Work (1885). 
 
 The relation of the argument of the first edition of the 
 Essay to that of the second has been the subject of com- 
 ment by several writers, among whom may be mentioned 
 Richard Jones {Literary Remains, 1859), Bagehot {Eco- 
 nomic Studies, 1880), Mr. James Bonar (as above cited, 
 and in Philosophy and Political Economy, 1893), Dr. J. K. 
 Ingram {History of Political Economy, 1888, reprinted from 
 Encyclopaedia Britannica 1887), Professor Luigi Cossa {In- 
 troduction to the Study of Political Economy, 1893), and 
 Mr. Edwin Cannan {Theories of Production and Distribu- 
 tion, 1893). 
 
 In reprinting the chapters from the first and second 
 editions the original spelling and punctuation have been 
 followed. After the second edition the text of the work 
 remained substantially the same ; but frequent changes of 
 diction were made, in most cases to improve the style, but 
 in some to remove objections by more carefully guarded 
 statement. 
 
PAGE 
 
 The Essay of 1798 ix 
 
 Preface xi 
 
 Table of Contents xv 
 
 Selected Chapters 1 
 
 The Essay of 1803 65 
 
 Preface 67 
 
 Table of Contents ....... 73 
 
 Selected Chapters 77 
 
 Passages from the Appendix to the Third Edition, 1807 108 
 
 Passages from the Preface to the Fifth Edition, 181 7 125 
 
 Passages from the Appendix to the Fifth Edition, 181 7 126 
 
AN 
 
 ESSAY 
 
 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 stat- 
 ing his thoughts to his friend, upon paper, in a clearer man- 
 ner 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, the 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 more 
 complete by a collection of a greater number of facts in the 
 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 concerning the future improvement of 
 
 xi 
 
x ii PREFACE. 
 
 mankind. As the Author contemplates this opinion at pres- 
 ent, 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 inter- 
 esting subject, he is actuated solely by a love of truth ; and 
 not by any prejudice against any particular set of men, or 
 of opinions. He professes to have read some of the specu- 
 lations 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 melan- 
 choly hue \ but he feels conscious, that he has drawn these 
 dark tints, from a conviction that they are really in the pict- 
 ure ; 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 judgment of his readers. 
 
PREFACE. xiii 
 
 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 con- 
 viction of his error. 
 
 June 7, 1798. 
 
CONTENTS. 1 
 
 CHAP. I. 
 
 Question stated. — Little prospect of a determination of i(, 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. page i 
 
 CHAP. II. 
 
 The different ratios in which popidation and food increase. — The 
 necessary effects of these different ratios of increase. — Oscillation 
 produced by them in the condition of the loiver classes of society. — 
 Reasons why this oscillation has not been so much observed as 
 might be expected. — Three propositions on which the general argu- 
 ment 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. p. g 
 
 CHAP. III. 
 
 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 poptdation to the means of subsistence, 
 the cause of the great tide of Northern Emigration. 
 
 1 The original tables of contents are given in order to display the char- 
 acter of the portions of the two Essays not reprinted. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAP. IV. 
 
 State of civilized nations. — Probability that Europe is much more 
 poptdous now than in the time of Julius Ccesar. — Best criterion 
 of population. — Probable error of Hume in one of 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. p. 19 
 
 CHAP. V. 
 
 The second, or positive check to poptdation examined, in England. — 
 The true cause why the immense sunt 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 popu- 
 lation may be resolved into misery or vice. p. 24 
 
 CHAP. VI. 
 
 New colonies. — Reasons of their rapid increase. — North American 
 Colonies. — Extraordinary instance of increase in the back settle- 
 ments. — Rapidity with which even old states recover the ravages of 
 war, pestilence, famine, or the convulsions of nature. 
 
 CHAP. VII. 
 
 A probable cause of epidemics. — Extracts from Mr. SusmilcWs 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 poptdation. 
 
 — Great frugality of living one of the causes of the famines of 
 China and Indostan. — Evil tendency op' one of the clauses in Mr. 
 
CONTENTS. xvii 
 
 PitCs Poor Bill. — Only one proper way of encouraging popula- 
 tion. — Causes of the happiness of nations. — Famine the last and 
 most dreadful mode by which nature represses a redundant popula- 
 tion. — The three propositions considered as established. p. 39 
 
 CHAP. VIII. 
 
 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, men- 
 tioned by Mr. Condorcet, ought to be applied to the human race. 
 
 CHAP. IX. 
 
 Mr. Condor eel's conjecture concerning the organic perfectibility of man, 
 and the indefinite prolongation of human life. — Fallacy of the argu- 
 ment, -which infers an unlimited progress from a partial improve- 
 ment, the limit of which cannot be ascertained, illustrated in the 
 breeding of animals, and the cultivation of plants. 
 
 CHAP. X. 
 
 Mr. Godzuin's system of equality. — Error of attributing all the vices of 
 mankind to human institutions. — Mr. Godwins first answer to 
 the difficulty arising from population totally insufficient. — Mr. 
 Godwins beautiful system of society supposed to be realized. — Its 
 utter destruction simply from the principle of population in so 
 short a time as thirty years. p. 46 
 
 CHAP. XI. 
 
 Mr. Godzuin'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. 
 
 CHAP. XII. 
 
 Mr. Godzvirts 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. 
 
xviii CONTENTS. 
 
 — Conjectures not founded on any indications in the past, not to be 
 considered as philosophical conjectttres. — Air. Godwin 's and Mr. 
 Condor cet' 's conjecture respecting the approach of man towards im- 
 mortality on earth, a curious instance of the inconsistency of 
 scepticism. 
 
 CHAP. XIII. 
 
 Error of Mr. Godwin in considering man too much in the light of a 
 being ?7ierely rational. — In the compound being, man, the passions 
 ivill always act as disturbing forces in the decisions of the under- 
 standing. — Reasonings of Mr. Godwin on the subject of coercion. 
 
 — Some truths of a nature not to be communicated from one man 
 to another. 
 
 CHAP. XIV. 
 
 Mr. Godwin's five propositions respecting political truth, on which his 
 zvhole work hinges, not established. — Reasons we have for suppos- 
 ing, from the distress occasioned by the principle of population, 
 that the vices, and moral weaknesses 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 per- 
 fectibility of man illustrated. 
 
 CHAP. XV. 
 
 Models too perfect, may sometimes rather ii7ipede than promote improve- 
 ment. — Air. Godwin's essay on avarice and profusion. — Im- 
 possibility 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 ahoays be an advantage to 
 the labourer. 
 
 CHAP. XVI. 
 
 Probable error of Dr. Adam Smith in representing every increase of 
 the revenue or stock of a society as an increase i?i 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 
 
CONTENTS. xix 
 
 in the fzmds for the maintenance of labour. — The state of the poor 
 in China zaould not be improved by an increase of wealth from 
 manufactures. 
 
 CHAP. XVII. 
 
 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 arti- 
 ficers 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. 
 
 CHAP. XVIII. 
 
 The constant pressure of distress on man, from the principle of popula- 
 tion, seems to direct our hopes to the future. — State of trial incon- 
 sistent with our ideas of the foreknowledge of God. — The world, 
 probably, a mighty process for awakening matter into miitd. — 
 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. 
 
 CHAP. XIX. 
 
 The sorrozvs of life necessary to soften and humanize the heart. — The 
 exciteijtents 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 improvement of the human faculties, and the moral 
 amelioration of mankind. — The idea that mind is created by 
 excitements, seems to account for the existence of natural and 
 moral evil. 
 
AN ESSAY ON THE PRINCIPLE OF 
 POPULATION. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Question stated. — Little prospect of a determination of it, from the en- 
 mity of the opposing parties. — The principal argument against the 
 perfectibility of man and of society has never been fairly answered. 
 — A r alure 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 dif- 
 fusion 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 understand- 
 ing ; and particularly that tremendous phenomenon in the 
 political horizon the French Revolution, which, like a blaz- 
 ing comet, seems destined either to inspire with fresh life 
 and vigour, or to scorch up and destroy the thinking inhabi- 
 tants of the earth, have all concurred to lead able men into 
 the opinion, that we were touching upon 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 im- 
 b 1 
 
2 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 provement ; or be condemned to a perpetual oscillation be- 
 tween 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 for- 
 wards 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 benevo- 
 lence, and draw captivating pictures of a happier state of 
 society, only the better to enable them to destroy the pres- 
 ent establishments, and to forward their own deep-laid 
 schemes of ambition : or, as wild and mad-headed enthusi- 
 asts, 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 miser- 
 able, 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 anything great and noble ; 
 who cannot see above five yards before him ; and who 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 3 
 
 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 ques- 
 tion are not allowed to have their proper weight. Each pur- 
 sues 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 conde- 
 scend 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 exposi- 
 tion of their fallacy. 
 
 The speculative philosopher equally offends against the 
 cause of truth. With eyes fixed on a happier state of soci- 
 ety, the blessings of which he paints in the most captivating 
 colours, he allows himself to indulge in the most bitter invec- 
 tives 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 pro- 
 gress 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 en- 
 larged and penetrating mind to foresee, that on few subjects 
 can any theory be pronounced just, that has not stood the 
 test of experience. But an untried theory cannot be ad- 
 vanced as probable, much less as just, till all the arguments 
 
4 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 against it have been maturely weighed, and clearly and 
 consistently confuted. 
 
 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. 1 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 triumphing 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 cer- 
 tainly 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 ac- 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 5 
 
 knowledged ability and penetration, scarcely deign to notice 
 it, and hold on their course in such speculations, with un- 
 abated 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 show 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 shown, 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 col- 
 
6 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 lecting 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 are now, 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, accord- 
 ing 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 conject- 
 ure, 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 in- 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 7 
 
 crease 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 only increases in an arithmetical ratio. A 
 slight acquaintance with numbers will show 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 some where ; 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 it, 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 
 
8 AN ESS A Y ON THE PRINCIPLE OF POPULA TION. 
 
 of seed, sickness, and premature death. Among mankind, 
 misery and vice. The former, misery, is an absolutely ne- 
 cessary consequence of it. Vice is a highly probable conse- 
 quence, 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 tempta- 
 tion 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 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 II. 
 
 The different ratios in which population and food ittcrease. — The 
 necessary effects of these different ratios of ittcrease. — 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 exa??iined with reference to these three 
 propositions. 
 
 I said that population, when unchecked, increased in a 
 geometrical ratio ; and subsistence for man in an arithmeti- 
 cal ratio. 
 
 Let us examine whether this proposition 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 subsist- 
 ence 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. Con- 
 sequently 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 dic- 
 tate of nature and virtue, seems to be an early attachment to 
 one woman. Supposing the liberty of changing in the case 
 
 9 
 
10 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 of an unfortunate choice, this liberty would not affect popu- 
 lation 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 sub- 
 sistence 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 pop- 
 ulation 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 sup- 
 posed 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 agricul- 
 ture, 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. 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULA TION. 11 
 
 In the next twenty-five years, it is impossible to suppose 
 that the produce could be quadrupled. It would be con- 
 trary 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 be- 
 yond 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 pres- 
 ent produces. The most enthusiastic speculator cannot sup- 
 pose 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 subsist- 
 ence 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 mil- 
 lions. 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. 
 
12 AN ESS A Y ON THE 
 
 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 inter- 
 rupted by the partial views of emigration, let us take the 
 whole earth, instead of one spot, and suppose that the re- 
 straints to population were universally removed. If the sub- 
 sistence 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 — i, 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 forever and be greater than any 
 assignable quantity ; yet still the power of population being 
 a power of superior order, the increase of the human species 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 13 
 
 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 com- 
 mon to animals and plants ; and among animals, by becom- 
 ing 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 re- 
 duced to the grating necessity of forfeiting his independ- 
 ence, and of being obliged to the sparing hand of charity 
 for support ? 
 
 These considerations are calculated to prevent, and cer- 
 
14 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 tainly 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 attach- 
 ment 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 meantime the cheapness of labour, 
 the plenty of labourers, and the necessity of an increased 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 15 
 
 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 pro- 
 gressive 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 pene- 
 trating 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 reflect- 
 ing 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 man- 
 ners and customs of that part of mankind, where these retro- 
 grade and progressive movements chiefly take place. A 
 satisfactory history of this kind, of 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 
 
16 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 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 vibration must necessarily be rendered 
 irregular, from the operation of many interrupting causes ; 
 such as, the introduction or failure of certain manufact- 
 ures : 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 shorten- 
 ing 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 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 17 
 
 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 ir9 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 reflection would shew them 
 that it must have risen long before, but from an unjust con- 
 spiracy 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 con- 
 jecture 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 illus- 
 tration. 
 
 That population does invariably increase where there are 
 c 
 
18 AN ESS A Y ON THE PRINCIPLE OF POPULA TION 
 
 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 two 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 
 view will, I think, be sufficient to convince us that these 
 propositions are incontrovertible truths. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 . . . Sloiv increase of population at present in most of the states of 
 Europe. — The tzvo principal checks to population. — The first or 
 preventive check examined with regard to England. 
 
 ... In examining the principal states of modern Europe, 
 we shall find, that though they have increased very consider- 
 ably in population since they were nations of shepherds, yet 
 that, at present, their progress is but slow ; and instead of doub- 
 ling 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 retro- 
 grade. 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 diffi- 
 culties attending the rearing of a family, acts as a preventive 
 check ; and the actual distress of some of the lower classes, 
 by which they are disabled from giving the proper food and 
 attention to their children, acts as a positive check, to the 
 natural increase of population. 
 
 19 
 
20 AN ESS A Y ON THE 
 
 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 expences that they must retrench, 
 and the fancied pleasures that they must deprive themselves 
 of, on the supposition of having a family. These considera- 
 tions 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 gentle- 
 men, 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 dif- 
 ferent 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 inclina- 
 tions? Two or three steps of descent in society, particu- 
 larly 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, 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 21 
 
 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 inclina- 
 tions in an early attachment. Others, guided either by a 
 stronger passion, or a weaker judgment, break through these 
 restraints ; and it would be hard indeed if the gratification 
 of so delightful a passion as virtuous love, did not some- 
 times 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 re- 
 press, 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 en- 
 able them to support a family. These events may not, per- 
 haps, 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 ex- 
 ertion of his manual strength, could preserve him from the 
 
22 AN ESSAY ON 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 con- 
 fessed, 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 re- 
 straints 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 alehouse, 
 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 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 23 
 
 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 V. 
 
 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. — 7 'he powerful tendency of the 
 poor laws to defeat their own purpose. — Palliative of the distress of 
 the poor proposed. — 1 "he absolute impossibility from the fixed laws of 
 our nature, that the pressure of want can ever be completely re- 
 moved from the lower classes of society. — All the checks to population 
 may be resolved into i7iisery or vice. 
 
 The positive check to population, by which I mean, the 
 check which 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 at- 
 tended 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 
 ail towns. It certainly does not prevail in an equal degree 
 
 24 
 
AN ESSA Y ON THE PRINCIPLE OF POPULA TION 25 
 
 in the country ; but the subject has not hitherto received 
 sufficient attention to enable any one 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 ploughs, which must cer- 
 tainly 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 of proper, or of sufficient 
 nourishment. 
 
 To remedy the frequent distress 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 gen- 
 eral 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 churchwardens and 
 
26 AN ESSA Y ON THE 
 
 overseers consume the greater part of it in dinners. All 
 agree that some how 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 materi- 
 ally to alter it. I will state a case which I hope will eluci- 
 date my meaning. 
 
 Suppose, that by a subscription of the rich, the eighteen 
 pence a day which men earn now, was made up five shil- 
 lings, 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 con- 
 clusion. 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 six pence or seven pence, 
 to two or three shillings in the pound ; and the commodity 
 would not be divided among many more than it is at pres- 
 ent. 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 sup- 
 pose 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 expence of the corn, 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 27 
 
 which would be a very disadvantageous 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 pro- 
 duce would be to be divided among a more than propor- 
 tionably 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 contribu- 
 tions or sacrifices of the rich, particularly in money, could 
 
28 AN ESS A Y ON THE 
 
 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 be- 
 come 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 propor- 
 tionably 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 
 then give him the produce, I then benefit both him, and all 
 the members of the society, because what he before con- 
 sumed 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 indi- 
 vidual instances, must be so small as to be totally impercep- 
 tible ; but still it must exist, as many other effects do, which 
 like some of the insects which 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 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 29 
 
 patent,* or the sum of money that he can afford to spend in 
 this commodity so universally in request. It is a demon- 
 strative 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 hun- 
 dred 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 dimin- 
 ished in value, or the same number of pieces of silver would 
 purchase a smaller quantity of subsistence. 
 
 An increase of population without a proportionate 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 subsist- 
 ence ; or from a different distribution of the money of the 
 society. The food of a country that has been long occu- 
 pied, if it be increasing, increases slowly and regularly, and 
 cannot be made to answer any sudden demands ; but varia- 
 tions in the distribution of the money of a society are not 
 unfrequently occurring, and are undoubtedly among the 
 
 * Mr. Godwin calls the wealth that a man received 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. 
 
30 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 causes that occasion the continual variations which we ob- 
 serve 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 obvi- 
 ous 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 inde- 
 pendence. They may be said therefore in some measure 
 to create the poor which they maintain ; and as the pro- 
 visions of the country must, in consequence of the increased 
 population, be distributed to every man in smaller propor- 
 tions, it is evident that the labour of those who are not sup- 
 ported 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 work- 
 houses upon a part of the society, that cannot be consid- 
 ered in general 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 conspicu- 
 ously to depress the condition of those out of the work- 
 houses, 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 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 31 
 
 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 indepen- 
 dence, they are not only unjustly tempted to bring unhappi- 
 ness 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 with- 
 out 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 con- 
 tributed to impoverish that class of people whose only pos- 
 session is their labour. It is also difficult to suppose that 
 they have not powerfully contributed to generate that care- 
 lessness, 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, gener- 
 
32 AN ESSA Y ON THE 
 
 ally 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 fail- 
 ure of any great manufactory, immediately fall upon the 
 parish ; when perhaps the wages earned in this manufac- 
 tory, 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 as- 
 sured 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 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 33 
 
 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 dis- 
 grace, which for the best and most humane reasons ought 
 to attach to it. 
 
 The mass of happiness among the common people can- 
 not 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 attend- 
 ing 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 essen- 
 tial 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 quan- 
 tity 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 
 
34 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 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 circum- 
 stances, is very far from being free from misery. But one 
 of the principal objections to them is, that for this assist- 
 ance which some of the poor receive, in itself almost a 
 doubtful blessing, the whole class of the common people of 
 England is subject 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 contrary to all ideas 
 of freedom. The parish persecution of men whose fami- 
 lies are likely to become chargeable, and of poor women 
 who are near lying-in, is a most disgraceful and disgusting 
 tyranny. And the obstructions continually 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 dis- 
 criminating the proper objects, and of managing the con- 
 cerns of the institutions that are necessary ; but any great 
 interference" with the concerns of other people, is a species 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 35 
 
 of tyranny ; and in the common course of things, the exer- 
 cise of this power may be expected to become grating to 
 those who are driven to ask for support. The tyranny of 
 Justices, Churchwardens, and Overseers, is a common com- 
 plaint 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 in- 
 stances 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 
 
36 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 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 inter- 
 ruption, 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 pre- 
 vent the price from rising according to the demand. 
 
 Secondly, Premiums might be given for turning up fresh 
 land, and all possible encouragements held out to agri- 
 culture 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 artizans. Such encourage- 
 ments 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 circum- 
 stances, 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 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 37 
 
 able obliged to work. It would be desirable, that they 
 should not be considered as comfortable asylums in all diffi- 
 culties ; but merely places where severe distress might find 
 some alleviation. A part of these houses might be sepa- 
 rated, or others built for a more beneficial purpose, which 
 has not been unfrequently taken notice of, that of providing 
 a place, where any person, whether native or foreign, might 
 do a day's work at all times, and receive the market price 
 for it. Many cases would undoubtedly be left for the exer- 
 tion 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 en- 
 deavour to obtain 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 un- 
 wholesome habitations, must operate as a constant check to 
 incipient population. 
 
38 AN ESS A Y ON THE PRINCIPLE OF POP VIA TIGN 
 
 To these two great checks to population, in all long occu- 
 pied 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 VII. 
 
 Best criterion of a permanent increase of population. — Great 
 frugality of living one of the causes of the famines of China and 
 Jndostan. — Evil tendency of one of the clauses of 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 zvhich nature represses a redundant population. — The 
 three propositions considered as established. 
 
 . . . The passion between the sexes has appeared in 
 every age to be so nearly the same, that it may always be con- 
 sidered, 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 pre- 
 vent, 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 propor- 
 tional increased or acquired produce of the country, we may 
 be perfectly certain, that unless #n emigration takes place, 
 
 39 
 
40 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 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 famines. 
 
 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 popu- 
 lation seems 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 countries, 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 defi- 
 ciency 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. 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 41 
 
 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 them- 
 selves. 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 inhabi- 
 tants, 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 
 seem 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 
 
42 AN ESSA Y ON THE 
 
 consequently increase the produce of the country, and 
 ameliorate the condition of the labourer, and no apprehen- 
 sions whatever need be entertained of the proportional in- 
 crease 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 expence 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 condi- 
 tion of the poor, it is calculated to defeat the very purpose 
 which it has in view. It has no tendency that I can dis- 
 cover to increase the produce of the country ; and if it tend 
 to increase 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. 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 43 
 
 I have mentioned some cases, where population may per- 
 manently 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 sup- 
 port, 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 
 
44 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 of the new one. In other cases, the youth or age of a State 
 is not in this respect of very great importance. It is pro- 
 bable, 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 in- 
 habited tracts of the Scotch Highlands, are as much dis- 
 tressed by an overcharged population, as the rich and 
 populous province of Flanders. 
 
 Were a country never to be over-run by a people more 
 advanced in arts, but left to its own natural progress in 
 civilization ; from the time that its produce might be con- 
 sidered 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 extermina- 
 tion, sickly seasons, epidemics, pestilence, and plague, ad- 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 45 
 
 vance 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 ex- 
 aminer 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 is repressed, and 
 the actual population kept equal to the means of subsistence 
 by misery and vice. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 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. God- 
 win's beautiful system of equality supposed to be realized. — Its utter 
 destruction simply frot?i 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 en- 
 quiries 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 
 
 46 
 
AN ESSAY ON THE PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION 47 
 
 more the promise of permanence, than any change effected 
 and maintained by force. The unlimited exercise of pri- 
 vate judgment, is a doctrine inexpressibly grand and capti- 
 vating, 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 con- 
 summation devoutly to be wished. In short, it is impos- 
 sible to contemplate the whole of this fair structure, without 
 emotions of delight and admiration, accompanied with ar- 
 dent 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 imagina- 
 tion. These " gorgeous palaces " of happiness and immor- 
 tality, 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 prin- 
 ciple 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 in- 
 creased 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 neces- 
 sity ; misery, and the fear of misery. 
 
 The great error under which Mr. Godwin labours through- 
 
48 AN ESSA Y ON THE 
 
 out his whole work, is, the attributing almost all the vices 
 and misery that are seen in civil society to human institu- 
 tions. Political regulations, and the established administra- 
 tion 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 hope- 
 less 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 tur- 
 bid 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 im- 
 mediate growth of the established administration of prop- 
 erty. 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 anx- 
 iety 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, 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 49 
 
 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 
 enquiries 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 trium- 
 phant. 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 suffi- 
 ciently 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 popu- 
 lation 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 popu- 
 lation before the earth absolutely refused to produce any 
 
50 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 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 in- 
 habitants of this terrestrial paradise live in hamlets and 
 farm-houses scattered over the face of the country. Every 
 house is clean, airy, sufficiently roomy, and in a healthy situ- 
 ation. 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 pro- 
 duce 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 vege- 
 table 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 monop- 
 oly. Let us suppose the commerce of the sexes established 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 51 
 
 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 unnat- 
 ural 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.* 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 con- 
 ceive 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, re- 
 moved, the numbers would necessarily increase faster than 
 in any society that has ever yet been known. I have men- 
 tioned, on the authority of a pamphlet published by a Dr. 
 
 * See B. 8. Chap. 8. P. 504. 
 
52 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 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 sup- 
 posed 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 possi- 
 ble, 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 North- 
 ern 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 em- 
 ployed 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 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 53 
 
 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 increas- 
 ing 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 know- 
 ledge of land, but would say, that it is 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, how- 
 ever 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 quan- 
 tity of food equal to the frugal support of twenty-one mil- 
 lions, 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 
 
54 AN ESSA Y ON THE 
 
 with anxiety and pain for his restless wants : where the nar- 
 row principle of selfishness did not exist : where Mind was 
 delivered from her perpetual anxiety about corporal sup- 
 port, and free to expatiate in the field of thought which is 
 congenial to her. This beautiful fabric of imagination van- 
 ishes at the severe touch of truth. The spirit of benevo- 
 lence, 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 hol- 
 low eye of misery. Benevolence yet lingers 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.* No opposition had been produced by them between 
 public and private good. No monopoly has 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, 
 
 * B. 8. Chap. 3. P. 340. 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 55 
 
 oppression, falsehood, misery, every hateful vice and every 
 form of distress, which degrade the present state of society, 
 seem to have been generated by the most imperious circum- 
 stances, by laws inherent in the nature of man, and absolutely 
 independent of all 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 sup- 
 port ; and before the conclusion of the first century, the popu- 
 lation 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 popu- 
 lation 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 
 
56 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 period strikes the men with impotence, and the women with 
 barrenness? Oi 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 gov- 
 ern civilized society, would be successively dictated by the 
 most imperious necessity. As man, according to Mr. God- 
 win, is the creature of the impressions to which he is sub- 
 ject, 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 immediate 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 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 57 
 
 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 in- 
 crease of food, and would, if they were not by some means 
 or other prevented, throw the whole community in confu- 
 sion : 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 in- 
 dispensable 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 sur- 
 
58 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 plus 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, inti- 
 mately 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 atten- 
 tion 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, notvvith- 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULA TION. 59 
 
 standing, was the case, it seemed necessary, for the example 
 of others, that the disgrace and inconvenience attending 
 such a conduct, should fall upon that 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 chil- 
 dren, 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 com- 
 pact to maintain her children, and aware of the inconven- 
 iences 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 incon- 
 venience to the society at the same time the greatest, there, 
 it was agreed, that the largest share of blame should fall. 
 The obligation of every man to maintain his children, the 
 
60 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 society would enforce, if there were occasion ; and the 
 greater degree of inconvenience or labour, to which a fam- 
 ily 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 suffi- 
 cient punishment for the man. 
 
 That a woman should at present be almost driven from 
 society, for an offence, which men commit nearly with impu- 
 nity, seems to be undoubtedly a breach of natural justice. 
 But the origin of the custom, as the most obvious and effect- 
 ual method of preventing the frequent recurrence of a seri- 
 ous inconvenience to a community, appears to be natural, 
 though not perhaps perfectly justifiable. This origin, how- 
 ever, 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 pre- 
 served, 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 es- 
 tablished, 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 every- 
 thing 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 divi- 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 61 
 
 sion 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 numbers of these claimants would soon ex- 
 ceed 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 bene- 
 fiting 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 numer- 
 ous, 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 numbers 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 
 
62 AN ESSAY ON THE 
 
 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 happi- 
 ness, or degree of misery, depends the increase, stationari- 
 ness, 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 cor- 
 rected 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 for the mainspring of the great machine. 
 
 In the supposition I have made, I have undoubtedly taken 
 the increase of population smaller, and the increase of pro- 
 duce 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 pro- 
 nounce 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 
 
PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 63 
 
 its utter destruction from the simple principle of popu- 
 lation. 
 
 I have taken no notice of emigration for obvious reasons. 
 If such societies were established 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 re- 
 jected by people who appeared to be almost starving. 
 

AN ESSAY 
 
 ON THE 
 
 PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION; 
 
 A VIEW OF ITS PAST AND PRESENT EFFECTS 
 
 HUMAN HAPPINESS; 
 
 WITH AN ENQUIRY INTO OUR PROSPECTS RESPECTING THE FUTURE 
 REMOVAL OR MITIGATION OF THE EVILS WHICH IT OCCASIONS. 
 
 A NEW EDITION, VERY MUCH ENLARGED 
 
 By T. R. MALTHUS, A.M. 
 
 FELLOW OF JESUS COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PRINTED FOR J. JOHNSON, IN ST PAUL'S CHURCHYARD, 
 BY T. BENSLEY, BOLT COURT, FLEET STREET. 
 
 1803. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The Essay on the Principle of Population, which I pub- 
 lished in 1798, was suggested, as is expressed in the pref- 
 ace, by a paper in Mr. Godwin's Inquirer. It was written 
 on the spur of the occasion, and from the few materials 
 which were then within my reach in a country situation. 
 The only authors from whose writings I had deduced the 
 principle, which formed the main argument of the essay, 
 were Hume, Wallace, Dr. Adam Smith, and Dr. Price ; and 
 my object was to apply it to try the truth of those specula- 
 tions on the perfectibility of man and society, which at that 
 time excited a considerable portion of the publick attention. 
 
 In the course of the discussion, I was naturally led into 
 some examination of the effects of this principle on the 
 existing state of society. It appeared to account for much 
 of that poverty and misery observable among the lower 
 classes of people in every nation, and for those reiterated 
 failures in the efforts of the higher classes to relieve them. 
 The more I considered the subject in this point of view, the 
 more importance it seemed to acquire ; and this considera- 
 tion, joined to the degree of publick attention which the 
 essay excited, determined me to turn my leisure reading 
 
 67 
 
68 PREFACE. 
 
 towards an historical examination of the effects of the prin- 
 ciple of population on the past and present state of society ; 
 that, by illustrating the subject more generally, and drawing 
 those inferences from it, in application to the actual state 
 of things which experience seemed to warrant, I might 
 give it a more practical and permanent interest. 
 
 In the course of this inquiry, I found that much more had 
 been done than I had been aware of when I first published 
 the essay. The poverty and misery arising from a too 
 rapid increase of population had been distinctly seen, and 
 the most violent remedies proposed, so long ago as the 
 times of Plato and Aristotle. And of late years the subject 
 has been treated in such a manner, by some of the French 
 Economists, occasionally by Montesquieu, and, among our 
 own writers, by Dr. Franklin, Sir James Steuart, Mr. Arthur 
 Young, and Mr. Townsend, as to create a natural surprise, 
 that it had not excited more of the publick attention. 
 
 Much, however, remained yet to be done. Indepen- 
 dently of the comparison between the increase of popula- 
 tion and food, which had not perhaps been stated with 
 sufficient force and precision ; some of the most curious and 
 interesting parts of the subject had been either wholly 
 omitted or treated very slightly. Though it had been stated 
 distinctly, that population must always be kept down to the 
 level of the means of subsistence ; yet few inquiries had been 
 made into the various modes by which this level is effected ; 
 and the principle had never been sufficiently pursued to its 
 consequences, and those practical inferences drawn from 
 it, which a strict examination of its effects on society appears 
 
PREFACE. 69 
 
 These therefore are the points which I have treated most 
 in detail in the following essay. In its present shape, it 
 may be considered as a new work, and I should probably 
 have published it as such, omitting the few parts of the 
 former which I have retained, but that I wished it to form 
 a whole of itself, and not to need a continual reference to 
 the other. On this account I trust that no apology is neces- 
 sary to the purchasers of the first edition. I should hope 
 that there are some parts of it, not reprinted in this, which 
 may still have their use ; as they were rejected, not because 
 I thought them all of less value than what has been inserted, 
 but because they did not suit the different plan of treating 
 the subject which I had adopted. 
 
 To those who either understood the subject before, or 
 saw it distinctly on the perusal of the first edition, I am 
 fearful that I shall appear to have treated some parts of it 
 too much in detail, and to have been guilty of unnecessary 
 repetitions. These faults have arisen partly from want of 
 skill, and partly from intention. In drawing similar infer- 
 ences from the state of society in a number of different 
 countries, I found it very difficult to avoid some repetitions ; 
 and in those parts of the inquiry which led to conclusions 
 different from our usual habits of thinking, it appeared to 
 me that, with the slightest hope of producing conviction, it 
 was necessary to present them to the reader's mind at differ- 
 ent times and on different occasions. I was willing to sacri- 
 fice all pretensions to merit of composition, to the chance of 
 making an impression on a larger class of readers. 
 
 The main principle advanced is so incontrovertible, that, 
 if I had confined myself merely to general views, I could 
 
70 PREFACE. 
 
 have entrenched myself in an impregnable fortress, and the 
 work in this form would probably have had a much more 
 masterly air. But such general views, though they may 
 advance the cause of abstract truth, rarely tend to promote 
 any practical good ; and I thought that I should not do 
 justice to the subject, and bring it fairly under discussion, 
 if I refused to consider any of the consequences which 
 appeared necessarily to flow from it, whatever these conse- 
 quences might be. By pursuing this plan, however, I am 
 aware that I have opened a door to many objections, and 
 probably to much severity of criticism : but I console my- 
 self with the reflection, that even the errors into which I 
 may have fallen, by affording a handle to argument and an 
 additional excitement to examination, may be subservient 
 to the important end, of bringing a subject so nearly con- 
 nected with the happiness of society into more general 
 notice. 
 
 Throughout the whole of the present work, I have so far 
 differed in principle from the former, as to suppose another 
 check to population possible, which does not strictly come 
 under the head either of vice or misery ; and, in the latter 
 part, I have endeavoured to soften some of the harshest con- 
 clusions of the first essay. In doing this, I hope that I 
 have not violated the principles of just reasoning ; nor ex- 
 pressed any opinion respecting the probable improvement 
 of society, in which I am not borne out by the experience 
 of the past. To those who shall still think that any check to 
 population whatever, would be worse than the evils which 
 it would relieve, the conclusions of the former essay will 
 remain in full force ; and if we adopt this opinion, we shall 
 
PREFACE. 71 
 
 be compelled to acknowledge that the poverty and misery 
 which prevail among the lower classes of society are abso- 
 lutely irremediable. 
 
 I have taken as much pains as I could to avoid any 
 errors in the facts and calculations which have been pro- 
 duced in the course of the work. Should any of them 
 nevertheless turn out to be false, the reader will see that 
 they will not materially affect the general tenour of the 
 reasoning. 
 
 From the crowd of materials which presented themselves 
 in illustration of the first branch of the subject, I dare not 
 flatter myself that I have selected the best, or arranged them 
 in the most perspicuous method. To those who take an 
 interest in moral and political questions, I hope that the 
 novelty and importance of the subject will compensate the 
 imperfections of its execution. 
 
 London, June 8, 1803. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 BOOK I. 
 
 OF THE CHECKS TO POPULATION IN THE LESS CIVILIZED PARTS OF 
 THE WORLD, AND IN PAST TIMES. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. Statement of the subject. Ratios of the increase of popu- 
 lation and food 77 
 
 II. Of the general checks to population, and the mode of 
 
 their operation 87 
 
 III. Of the checks to population in the lowest stage of human 
 
 society. 
 
 IV. Of the checks to population among the American Indians. 
 V. Of the checks to population in the islands of the South Sea. 
 
 VI. Of the checks to population among the ancient inhabitants 
 
 of the North of Europe. 
 VII. Of the checks to population among modern pastoral 
 nations. 
 VIII. Of the checks to population in different parts of Africa. 
 IX. Of the checks to population in Siberia, northern and 
 
 southern. 
 X. Of the checks to population in the Turkish dominions, and 
 
 Persia. 
 XI. Of the checks to population in Indostan and Tibet. 
 XII. Of the checks to population in China and Japan. 
 XIII. Of the checks to population among the Greeks. 
 XIV. Of the checks to population among the Romans. 
 
 73 
 
74 COXTE. - 
 
 BOOK II. 
 
 OF 7 KS TO POPULATION IN THE DIFF1 
 
 : z. 
 
 ;" the checks to population in X 
 
 II. Of the checks to population in - 
 
 III. Of the checks to population in 
 
 IV. On the fruitfulness of marriages. 
 
 V. Of the checks to population in the middle parts of Europe. 
 
 VI. Enects of epidemicks on tables of mo:: 
 
 VII. Of the checks to population in Switzerland. 
 
 VIII. Of the checks to population in France. 
 
 IX. Of the checks to population in England. 
 
 X. Of the checks to population in Scotland and Ireland, 
 
 XI. General deductions from the preceding view of sock 
 
 : OK in. 
 :? the diffei - 
 
 : :: ::; leofi 
 
 I. - of equality. Wallace. Condorcet. 
 
 n. Of systems of equality. Godwin. 
 
 III. Observations on the Reply of Mr. Godwin. 
 
 IV. Of emigration. 
 
 V. Of the English poor h 
 VI. - zontinued. 
 
 VII. Of increasing wealth as it affects the condition of the 
 
 VIII. Of the definitions of wealth. Agricultural and commercial 
 
 - ; : : r. - 
 
 IX. Different effects of the agricultural and commercial systems. 
 
 X. Of bounties on the exportation of corn. 
 XL Of the principal sources of the prevailing errors on the sub- 
 : jf population. 
 
COXTEXTS. 
 
 BOOK IV 
 
 OF OUR FUTURE PROSPECTS RESPECTING THE REMOVAL OR MITIGATION 
 OF THE EVILS ARISING FROM THE PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. Of moral restraint, and the foundations of our obligation 
 
 to practise this virtue ....... 97 
 
 II. Of the effects which -would result to society from the 
 
 general practice of this virtue . . . 99 
 
 III. Of the only effectual mode of improving the condition of 
 
 the poor. 
 
 IV. Objections to this mode considered. 
 
 V. Of the consequences of pursuing the opposite mode. 
 VI. Effects of the knowledge of the principal cause of povertv 
 on civil liberty. 
 VII. Plan of the gradual abolition of the poor laws proposed. 
 VIII. Of the modes of correcting the prevailing opinions on the 
 subject of Population. 
 IX. Of the direction of our charity. 
 X. Of the errors in different plans which have been proposed, 
 
 to improve the condition of the poor . . . .102 
 
 XI. Of the necessity of general principles on this subject. 
 XII. Of our rational expectations respecting the future im- 
 provement of society. 
 
ESSAY, &c. 
 
 BOOK I. 
 
 OF THE CHECKS TO POPULATION IN THE LESS CIVI- 
 LIZED PARTS OF THE WORLD AND IN PAST TIMES. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Statement of the Subject. Ratios of the Increase of Population and 
 
 Food. 
 
 In an inquiry concerning the improvement of society, the 
 mode of conducting the subject which naturally presents 
 itself, is 
 
 i. An investigation of the causes that have hitherto im- 
 peded the progress of mankind towards happiness ; and, 
 
 2. An examination into the probability of the total or 
 partial removal of these causes in future. 
 
 To enter fully into this question, and to enumerate all the 
 causes that have hitherto influenced human improvement, 
 would be much beyond the power of an individual. The 
 
 77 
 
78 STATEMENT OF THE SUBJECT. RATIOS OF [bk. i 
 
 principal object of the present essay is to examine the 
 effects of one great cause intimately united with the very 
 nature of man, which, though it has been constantly and 
 powerfully operating since the commencement of society, 
 has been little noticed by the writers who have treated this 
 subject. The facts which establish the existence of this 
 cause have, indeed, been repeatedly stated and acknow- 
 ledged ; but its natural and necessary effects have been 
 almost totally overlooked ; though probably among these 
 effects may be reckoned a very considerable portion of 
 that vice and misery, and of that unequal distribution of 
 the bounties of nature, which it has been the unceasing 
 object of the enlightened philanthropist in all ages to 
 correct. 
 
 The cause to which I allude, is the constant tendency in 
 all animated life to increase beyond the nourishment pre- 
 pared for it. 
 
 It is observed by Dr. Franklin, that there is no bound to 
 the prolific nature of plants or animals, but what is made by 
 their crowding and interfering with each other's means of 
 subsistence. Were the face of the earth, he says, vacant of 
 other plants, it might be gradually sowed and overspread 
 with one kind only ; as, for instance, with fennel : and were 
 it empty of other inhabitants, it might in a few ages be re- 
 plenished from one nation only ; as, for instance, with Eng- 
 lishmen. a 
 
 This is incontrovertibly true. Throughout the animal 
 and vegetable kingdoms Nature has scattered the seeds of 
 life abroad with the most profuse and liberal hand ; but has 
 
 « Franklin's Miscell. p. 9. 
 
ch. i] THE INCREASE OF POPULATION AND FOOD. 79 
 
 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 man cannot by any efforts of reason 
 escape from it. 
 
 In 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 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 plants and 
 animals • and among animals, by their becoming the prey 
 of each other. 
 
 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 support. If he 
 attend to this natural suggestion, the restriction too fre- 
 quently produces vice. If he hear it not, the human race 
 will be constantly endeavouring to increase beyond the 
 means of subsistence. But as by that law of our nature 
 which makes food necessary to the life of man, population 
 can never actually increase beyond the lowest nourishment 
 capable of supporting it \ a strong check on population, from 
 
80 STATEMENT OF THE SUBJECT. RATIOS OF [bk. i 
 
 the difficulty of acquiring food, must be constantly in opera- 
 tion. This difficulty must fall somewhere ; and must neces- 
 sarily be severely felt in some or other of the various forms 
 of misery, or the fear of misery, by a large portion of man- 
 kind. 
 
 That population has this constant tendency to increase 
 beyond the means of subsistence, and that it is kept to its 
 necessary level by these causes, will sufficiently appear from 
 a review of the different states of society in which man has 
 existed. But before we proceed to this review, the subject 
 will perhaps be seen in a clearer light, if we endeavour to 
 ascertain what would be the natural increase of population 
 if left to exert itself with perfect freedom ; and what might 
 be expected to be the rate of increase in the productions 
 of the earth, under the most favourable circumstances of 
 human industry. A comparison of these two rates of in- 
 crease will enable us to judge of the force of that tendency 
 in population to increase beyond the means of subsistence, 
 which has been stated to exist. 
 
 It will be allowed, that no country has hitherto been 
 known, where the manners were so pure and simple, and the 
 means of subsistence so abundant, that no check whatever 
 has existed to early marriages from the difficulty of provid- 
 ing for a family ; and no waste of the human species has been 
 occasioned afterwards by vicious customs, by towns, by un- 
 healthy occupations, or too severe labour. 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 dic- 
 tate of nature and virtue seems to be an early attachment to 
 
CH. i] THE INCREASE OF POPULA TION AND FOOD. 81 
 
 one woman ; and where there were no impediments of any 
 kind in the way of a union to which such an attachment 
 would lead, and no causes of depopulation afterwards, the 
 increase of the human species would be evidently much 
 greater than any increase which has been hitherto known. 
 
 In the northern states of America, where the means of 
 subsistence have been more ample, the manners of the people 
 more pure, and the checks to early marriages fewer, than in 
 any of the modern states of Europe, the population was 
 found to double itself, for some successive periods every 
 twenty-five years. Yet, even during these periods, in some 
 of the towns, the deaths exceeded the births ; a and they 
 consequently required a continued supply from the country 
 to support their population. 
 
 In the back settlements, where the sole employment is 
 agriculture, and vicious customs and unwholesome occu- 
 pations are little known, the population was found to 
 double itself in fifteen years. 6 Even this extraordinary rate 
 of increase is probably short of the utmost power of popu- 
 lation. Very severe labour is requisite to clear a fresh 
 country ; such situations are not in general considered as 
 particularly healthy ; and the inhabitants probably were oc- 
 casionally subject to the incursions of the Indians, which 
 might destroy some lives, or at any rate diminish the fruits 
 of industry. 
 
 According to a table of Euler, calculated on a mortality 
 of i in 36, if the births be to the deaths in the proportion of 
 3 to 1, the period of doubling will be only i2i years. And 
 
 a Price's Observ. on Revers. Pay. vol. i. p. 274. 
 & Id. p. 282. 
 G 
 
82 STATEMENT OF THE SUBJECT. RATIOS OF [bk. i 
 
 these proportions are not only possible suppositions, but have 
 actually occurred for short periods in more countries than one. 
 
 Sir William Petty supposes a doubling possible in so short 
 a time as ten years." 
 
 But to be perfectly sure that we are far within the truth, 
 we will take the slowest of these rates of increase, a rate in 
 which all concurring testimonies agree, and which has been 
 repeatedly ascertained to be from procreation only. 
 
 It may safely be pronounced therefore, that population, 
 when unchecked, goes on doubling itself every twenty-five 
 years, or increases in a geometrical ratio. 
 
 The rate according to which the productions of the 
 earth may be supposed to increase, it will not be so easy 
 to determine. Of this, however, we may be perfectly 
 certain, that the ratio of their increase must be totally 
 of a different nature from the ratio of the increase of pop- 
 ulation. A thousand millions are just as easily doubled 
 every twenty-five years by the power of population as a 
 thousand. But the food to support the increase from the 
 greater number will by no means be obtained with the same 
 facility. Man is necessarily confined in room. When acre 
 has been added to acre till all the fertile land is occupied, 
 the yearly increase of food must depend upon the melioration 
 of the land already in possession. This is a stream, which, 
 from the nature of all soils, instead of increasing, must 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. 
 
 « Polit. Arith. p. 14. 
 
ch. i] THE INCREASE OF POPULA TION AND FO OD. 83 
 
 From the accounts we have of China and Japan, it may 
 be fairly doubted, whether the best directed efforts of human 
 industry could double the produce of these countries even 
 once in any number of years. There are many parts of the 
 globe, indeed, hitherto uncultivated and almost unoccupied ; 
 but the right of exterminating, or driving into a corner 
 where they must starve, even the inhabitants of these thinly- 
 peopled regions, will be questioned in a moral view. The 
 process of improving their minds and directing their indus- 
 try, would necessarily be slow; and during this time, as 
 population would regularly keep pace with the increasing 
 produce, it would rarely happen that a great degree of 
 knowledge and industry would have to operate at once upon 
 rich unappropriated soil. Even where this might take place, 
 as it does sometimes in new colonies, a geometrical ratio 
 increases with such extraordinary rapidity, that the advantage 
 could not last long. If America continue increasing, which 
 she certainly will do, though not with the same rapidity as 
 formerly, the Indians will be driven further and further 
 back into the country, till the whole race is ultimately 
 exterminated. 
 
 These observations are, in a degree, applicable to all the 
 parts of the earth where the soil is imperfectly cultivated. 
 To exterminate the inhabitants of the greatest part of Asia 
 and Africa, is a thought that could not be admitted for a 
 moment. To civilize and direct the industry of the various 
 tribes of Tartars, and Negroes, would certainly be a work 
 of considerable time, and of variable and uncertain suc- 
 cess. 
 
 Europe is by no means so fully peopled as it might be. 
 
84 ST A TEMENT OF THE SUBJECT. RA TIOS OF [bk. i 
 
 In Europe there is the fairest chance that human industry- 
 may receive its best direction. The science of agriculture 
 has been much studied in England and Scotland ; and there 
 is still a great portion of uncultivated land in these coun- 
 tries. Let us consider at what rate the produce of this 
 island might be supposed to increase under circumstances 
 the most favourable to improvement. 
 
 If it be allowed that by the best possible policy, and great 
 encouragements to agriculture, the average produce of the 
 island could be doubled in the first twenty-five years, it will 
 be allowing, probably, a greater increase than could with 
 reason be expected. 
 
 In the next twenty-five years, it is impossible to suppose 
 that the produce could be quadrupled. It would be con- 
 trary to all our knowledge of the properties of land. The 
 improvement of the barren parts would be a work of time 
 and labour ; and it must be evident to those who have the 
 slightest acquaintance with agricultural subjects, that in pro- 
 portion as cultivation extended, the additions that could 
 yearly be made to the former average produce, must be 
 gradually and regularly diminishing. That we may be the 
 better able to compare the increase of population and food, 
 let us make a supposition, which, without pretending to 
 accuracy, is clearly more favourable to the power of pro- 
 duction in the earth, than any experience we have had of 
 its qualities will warrant. 
 
 Let us suppose that the yearly additions which might be 
 made to the former average produce, instead of decreasing, 
 which they certainly would do, were to remain the same ; 
 and that the produce of this island might be increased every 
 
ch. i] THE INCREASE OF POPULA TION AND FOOD. 85 
 
 twenty-five years, by a quantity equal to what it at present 
 produces : the most enthusiastic speculator cannot sup- 
 pose a greater increase than this. In a few centuries it 
 would make every acre of land in the island like a garden. 
 
 If this supposition be applied to the whole earth, and if 
 it be allowed that the subsistence for man which the earth 
 affords might be increased every twenty-five years by a 
 quantity equal to what it at present produces, this will be 
 supposing a rate of increase much greater than we can imag- 
 ine that any possible exertions of mankind could make it. 
 
 It may be fairly pronounced therefore, that, considering 
 the present average state of the earth, the means of subsist- 
 ence, under circumstances the most favourable to human 
 industry, could not possibly be made to increase faster than 
 in an arithmetical ratio. 
 
 The necessary effects of these two different rates of in- 
 crease, when brought together, will be very striking. Let 
 us call the population of this island eleven millions ; and sup- 
 pose the present produce equal to the easy support of sucli 
 a number. In the first twenty-five years the population 
 would be twenty-two 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 forty-four millions, and the means of subsistence 
 only equal to the support of thirty-three millions. In the 
 next period the population would be eighty-eight millions, 
 and the means of subsistence just equal to the support of 
 half that number. And, at the conclusion of the first cen- 
 tury, the population would be a hundred and seventy-six 
 millions, and the means of subsistence only equal to the 
 
86 STATEMENT OF THE SUBJECT [bk. i 
 
 support of fifty-five millions, leaving a population of a hun- 
 dred and twenty-one millions totally unprovided for. 
 
 Taking the whole earth, instead of this island, emigration 
 would of course be excluded ; and, supposing the present 
 population equal to a thousand millions, the human species 
 would increase as the numbers, i, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 
 256, and subsistence as 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. In two 
 centuries the population would be to the means of subsist- 
 ence as 256 to 9; in three centuries as 4096 to 13, and 
 in two thousand years the difference would be almost 
 incalculable. 
 
 In this supposition no limits whatever are placed to the 
 produce of the earth. It may increase for ever, and be 
 greater than any assignable quantity ; yet still the power of 
 population being in every period so much superior, the 
 increase of the human species can only be kept down to 
 the level of the means of subsistence by the constant oper- 
 ation of the strong law of necessity, acting as a check upon 
 the greater power. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 Of the general Checks to Population, and the Mode of their Operation. 
 
 The checks to population, which are constantly operat- 
 ing with more or less force in every society, and keep down 
 the number to the level of the means of subsistence, may be 
 classed under two general heads ; the preventive and the 
 positive checks. 
 
 The preventive check, is peculiar to man, and arises from 
 that distinctive superiority in his reasoning faculties, which 
 enables him to calculate distant consequences. Plants and 
 animals have apparently no doubts about the future support 
 of their offspring. The checks to their indefinite increase, 
 therefore, are all positive. But man cannot look around 
 him, and .. see the distress which frequently presses upon 
 those who have large families ; he cannot contemplate his 
 present possessions or earnings, which he now nearly con- 
 sumes himself, and calculate the amount of each share, 
 when with very little addition they must be divided, perhaps, 
 among seven or eight, without feeling a doubt, whether if 
 he follow the bent of his inclinations, he may be able to 
 support the offspring which he will probably bring into the 
 world. In a state of equality, if such can exist, this would 
 be the simple question. In the present state of society, 
 
 87 
 
38 OF THE GENERAL CHECKS TO POPULATION, [bk. i 
 
 other considerations occur. Will he not lower his rank in 
 life, and be obliged to give up in great measure his former 
 society? Does any mode of employment present itself by 
 which he may reasonably hope to maintain a family? Will 
 he not at any rate subject himself to greater difficulties, and 
 more severe labour than in his single state ? Will he not be 
 unable to transmit to his children the same advantages of 
 education and improvement that he had himself possessed ? 
 Does he even feel secure that, should he have a large family, 
 his utmost exertions can save them from rags, and squalid 
 poverty, and their consequent degradation in the commu- 
 nity ? 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 cer- 
 tainly do prevent, a great number of persons in all civilized 
 nations from pursuing the dictate of nature in an early at- 
 tachment to one woman. 
 
 If this restraint do not produce vice, as in many instances 
 is the case, and very generally so among the middle and 
 higher classes of men, it is undoubtedly the least evil that 
 can arise from the principle of population. Considered as a 
 restraint on an inclination, otherwise innocent, and always 
 natural, it must be allowed to produce a certain degree of 
 temporary unhappiness ; but evidently slight, compared 
 with the evils which result from any of the other checks 
 to population. 
 
 When this restraint produces vice, as it does most fre- 
 quently among men, and among a numerous class of females, 
 the evils which follow are but too conspicuous. A pro- 
 
ch. ii] AND THE MODE OF THEIR OPERA TION. 89 
 
 miscuous intercourse to such a degree as to prevent the 
 birth of children, seems to lower in the most marked manner 
 the dignity of human nature. It cannot be without its effect 
 on men, and nothing can be more obvious than its tendency 
 to degrade the female character, and to destroy all its most 
 amiable and distinguishing characteristics. Add to which, 
 that among those unfortunate females with which all great 
 towns abound, more real distress and aggravated misery are, 
 perhaps, to be found, than in any other department of human 
 life. 
 
 When a general corruption of morals, with regard to the 
 sex, pervades all the classes of society, its effects must neces- 
 sarily be, to poison the springs of domestic happiness, to 
 weaken conjugal and parental affection, and to lessen the 
 united exertions and ardour of parents in the care and edu- 
 cation of their children ; effects, which cannot take place 
 without a decided diminution of the general happiness and 
 virtue of society ; particularly, as the necessity of art in the 
 accomplishment and conduct of intrigues, and in the con- 
 cealment of their consequences, necessarily leads to many 
 other vices. 
 
 The positive checks to population are extremely various, 
 and include every cause, whether arising from vice or mis- 
 ery, which in any degree contribute to shorten the natural 
 duration of human life. Under this head therefore may be 
 enumerated, all unwholesome occupations, severe labour and 
 exposure to the seasons, extreme poverty, bad nursing of 
 children, great towns, excesses of all kinds, the whole train of 
 common diseases and epidemics, wars, pestilence, plague, 
 and famine. 
 
90 OF THE GENERAL CHECKS TO POPULATION, [bk. i 
 
 On examining these obstacles to the increase of popula- 
 tion which are classed under the heads of preventive and 
 positive checks, it will appear that they are all resolvable 
 into moral restraint, vice, and misery. 
 
 Of the preventive checks, that which is not followed by 
 irregular gratifications, may properly be termed moral 
 restraint. 1 
 
 Promiscuous intercourse, unnatural passions, violations of 
 the marriage bed, and improper arts to conceal the conse- 
 quences of irregular connections, are preventive checks that 
 clearly come under the head of vice. 
 
 Of the positive checks, those which appear to arise una- 
 voidably from the laws of nature, may be called exclusively 
 misery ; and those which we obviously bring upon ourselves, 
 such as wars, excesses, and many others which it would be 
 in our power to avoid, are of a mixed nature. They are 
 brought upon us by vice, and their consequences are mis- 
 ery.* 
 
 1 [It will be observed, that I here use the term moral in its most confined 
 sense. By moral restraint I would be understood to mean a restraint from 
 marriage from prudential motives, with a conduct strictly moral during the 
 period of this restraint; and I have never intentionally deviated from this 
 sense. When I have wished to consider the restraint from marriage uncon- 
 nected with its. consequences, I have either called it prudential restraint, or 
 a part of the preventive check, of which indeed it forms the principal branch. 
 
 In my review of the different stages of society, I have been accused of not 
 allowing sufficient weight in the preventi©n of population to moral restraint; 
 but when the confined sense of the term, which I have here explained, is 
 adverted to, I am fearful that I shall not be found to have erred much in 
 this respect. I should be very glad to believe myself mistaken. Note added 
 later.] 
 
 a As the general consequence of vice is misery, and as this consequence 
 is the precise reason why an action is termed vicious, it may appear that 
 the term misery alone would be here sufficient, and that it is superfluous to 
 
 
ch. ii] AND THE MODE OF THEIR OPERATION. 91 
 
 In every country, some of these checks are, with more or 
 less force, in constant operation ; yet, notwithstanding their 
 general prevalence, there are few states in which there is 
 not a constant effort in the population to increase beyond 
 the means of subsistence. This constant effort as constantly 
 tends to subject the lower classes of society to distress, and 
 to prevent any great permanent melioration of their condi- 
 tion. 
 
 These effects, in the present state of society, seem to be 
 produced in the following manner. 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 eleven millions, must now be divided 
 among eleven millions and a half. The poor consequently 
 must live much worse, and many of them be reduced to 
 severe distress. The number of labourers also being above 
 
 use both. But the rejection of the term vice would introduce a consider- 
 able confusion into our language and ideas. We want it particularly to 
 distinguish those actions, the general tendency of which is to produce mis- 
 ery, but which, in their immediate or individual effects, may produce 
 perhaps exactly the contrary. The gratification of all our passions in its 
 immediate effect is happiness, not misery ; and, in individual instances, even 
 the remote consequences (at least in this life) come under the same 
 denomination. I have little doubt that there have been some irregular 
 connections with women, which have added to the happiness of both parties, 
 and have injured no one. These individual actions therefore cannot come 
 under the head of misery. But they are still evidently vicious, because 
 an action is so denominated the general tendency of which is to produce 
 misery, whatever may be its individual effect ; and no person can doubt 
 the general tendency of an illicit intercourse between the sexes, to injure the 
 happiness of society. 
 
92 OF THE GENERAL CHECKS TO POPULATION, [bk.i 
 
 the proportion of work in the market, the price of labour 
 must tend to fall ; while the price of provisions would at the 
 same time tend to rise. The labourer therefore must do 
 more work 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 nearly at a stand. In the meantime, the cheapness of 
 labour, the plenty of labourers, and the necessity of an 
 increased industry among 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 
 may 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 re- 
 straints to population are in some degree loosened ; and, 
 after a short period, the same retrograde and progressive 
 movements, with respect to happiness, are repeated. 
 
 This sort of oscillation will not probably be obvious to 
 common view; and it may be difficult even for the most 
 attentive observer to calculate its periods. Yet that, in 
 the generality of old states, some such vibration does exist, 
 though 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. 
 
 One principal reason why this oscillation has been less 
 remarked, and less decidedly confirmed by experience than 
 might naturally be expected, is, that the histories of man- 
 kind which we possess, are, in general, histories only of the 
 higher classes. We have not many accounts, that can be 
 
ch.ii] AND THE MODE OF THEIR OPERATION. 93 
 
 depended upon, of the manners and customs of that part 
 of mankind where these retrograde and progressive move- 
 ments chiefly take place. A satisfactory history of this 
 kind, of one people and of one period, would require the 
 constant and minute attention of many observing minds in 
 local and general remarks on the state of the lower classes 
 of society, and the causes that influenced it ; and, to draw 
 accurate inferences upon this subject, a succession of such 
 historians for some centuries would be necessary. This 
 branch of statistical knowledge has, of late years, been 
 attended to in some countries," and we may promise our- 
 selves a clearer insight into the internal structure of human 
 society from the progress of these inquiries. But the sci- 
 ence may be said yet to be in its infancy, and many of the 
 objects, on which it would be desirable to have information, 
 have been either omitted or not stated with sufficient accu- 
 racy. Among these perhaps may be reckoned the propor- 
 tion of the number of adults to the number of marriages ; 
 the extent to which vicious customs have prevailed in con- 
 sequence of the restraints upon matrimony ; the comparative 
 mortality among the children of the most distressed part of 
 the community, and of those who live rather more at their 
 ease ; the variations in the real price of labour ; the observ- 
 able differences in the state of the lower classes of society 
 with respect to ease and happiness, at different times during 
 a certain period; and very accurate registers of births, 
 
 « The judicious questions which Sir John Sinclair circulated in Scotland, 
 and the valuable accounts which he has collected in that part of the island, 
 do him the highest honour; and these accounts will ever remain an extraor- 
 dinary monument of the learning, good sense, and general information of 
 
94 OF THE GENERAL CHECKS TO POPULATION, [bk. i 
 
 deaths, and marriages, which are of the utmost importance 
 in this subject. 
 
 A faithful history, including such particulars, would tend 
 greatly to elucidate the manner in which the constant check 
 upon population acts ; and would probably prove the exist- 
 ence of the retrograde and progressive movements that have 
 been mentioned ; though the times of their vibration 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, sickly seasons, poor laws, emigration, and 
 other causes of a similar nature. 
 
 A circumstance which has perhaps more than any other, 
 contributed to conceal this oscillation from common view, 
 is, the difference between the nominal and real • price of 
 labour. It very rarely happens that the nominal price of 
 labour universally falls ; but ws well know that it frequently 
 remains the same, while the n®minal price of provisions has 
 been gradually rising. This is, in effect, a real fall in the 
 
 the clergy of Scotland. It is to be regretted that the adjoining parishes are 
 not put together in the work, which would have assisted the memory both 
 in attaining and recollecting the state of particular districts. The repetitions 
 and contradictory opinions which occur are not in my opinion so objec- 
 tionable, as, to the result of such testimony, more faith may be given than 
 we could possibly give to the testimony of any individual. Even were this 
 result drawn for us by some master hand, though much valuable time 
 would undoubtedly be saved, the information would not be so satisfactory. 
 If, with a few subordinate improvements, this work had contained accurate 
 and complete registers for the last 150 years, it would have been inestima- 
 ble, and would have exhibited a better picture of the internal state of a 
 country, than has yet been presented to the world. But this last most essen- 
 tial improvement no diligence could have effected. 
 
ch. ii] AND THE MODE OF THEIR OPERA TION. 95 
 
 price of labour ; and, during this period, the condition of 
 the lower classes of the community must be gradually 
 growing worse. But the farmers and capitalists are growing 
 rich from the real cheapness of labour. Their increasing 
 capitals enable them to employ a greater number of men ; 
 and, as the population had probably suffered some check 
 from the greater difficulty of supporting a family, the demand 
 for labour, after a certain period, would be great in pro- 
 portion to the supply, and its price would of course rise, if 
 left to find its natural level ; and thus the wages of labour, 
 and consequently the condition of the lower classes of 
 society, might have progressive and retrograde movements, 
 though the price of labour might never nominally fall. 
 
 In savage life, where there is no regular price of labour, 
 it is little to be doubted that similar oscillations take 
 place. When population has increased nearly to the utmost 
 limits of the food, all the preventive and the positive checks 
 will naturally operate with increased force. Vicious habits 
 with respect to the sex will be more general, the exposing 
 of children more frequent, and both the probability and 
 fatality, of wars and epidemicks will be considerably greater ; 
 and these causes will probably continue their operation till 
 the population is sunk below the level of the food ; and then 
 the return to comparative plenty will again produce an in- 
 crease, and, after a certain period, its further progress will 
 again be checked by the same causes. 
 
 a Sir James Steuart very justly compares the generative faculty to a spring 
 loaded with a variable weight (Polit. Econ., vol. i., b. i., c. 4, p. 20) which 
 would of course produce exactly that kind of oscillation which has been 
 mentioned. In the first book of his Political Economy, he has explained 
 many parts of the subject of population very ably. 
 
96 CHECKS TO POPULATION. [bk. i 
 
 But without attempting to establish in all cases these pro- 
 gressive and retrograde movements in different countries, 
 which would evidently require more minute histories than 
 we possess, the following propositions are proposed to be 
 proved : 
 
 i. Population is necessarily limited by the means of sub- 
 sistence. 
 
 2. Population invariably increases, where the means of 
 subsistence increase, unless prevented by some very power- 
 ful and obvious checks. 1 
 
 3. These checks, and the checks which repress the 
 superior power of population, and keep its effects on a 
 level with the means of subsistence, are all resolvable into 
 moral restraint, vice, and misery. 
 
 The first of these propositions scarcely needs illustration. 
 The second and third will be sufficiently established by a 
 review of the immediate checks to population in the past 
 and present state of society. 
 
 This review will be the subject of the following chapters. 
 
 1 [I have expressed myself in this cautious manner, because I believe 
 there are some instances where population does not keep up to the level 
 of the means of subsistence. But these are extreme cases ; and, generally 
 speaking, it might be said that — 
 
 1. Population is necessarily limited by the means of subsistence. 
 
 2. Population always increases where the means of subsistence increase. 
 
 3. The checks which repress the superior power of population, and keep 
 its effects on a level with the means of subsistence, are all resolvable into 
 moral restraint, vice, and misery. 
 
 It should be observed that, by an increase in the means of subsistence, 
 is here meant such an increase as will enable the mass of the society to 
 command more food. An increase might certainly take place which in the 
 actual state of a particular society would not be distributed to the lower 
 classes, and consequently would give no stimulus to the population. Note 
 added later, .1 
 
BOOK IV. 
 
 OF OUR FUTURE PROSPECTS RESPECTING THE RE- 
 MOVAL OR MITIGATION OF THE EVILS ARISING 
 FROM THE PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Of moral restraint, and the foundations of our obligation to practise 
 this virtue. 
 
 As it appears, that in the actual state of every society 
 which has come within our review, the natural progress of 
 population has been constantly and powerfully checked ; and 
 as it seems evident, that no improved form of government, 
 no plans of emigration, no benevolent institutions, and no 
 degree or direction of national industry, can prevent the 
 continued action of a great check to increase in some 
 form or other ; it follows, that we must submit to it as an 
 inevitable law of nature ; and the only inquiry that remains, 
 is, how it may take place with the least possible prejudice 
 to the virtue and happiness of human society. The various 
 checks to population, which have been observed to prevail 
 in the same and different countries, seem all to be resolv- 
 able into moral restraint, vice, and misery ; and if our choice 
 h 97 
 
98 OF MORAL RESTRAINT. [bk. iv 
 
 be confined to these three, we cannot long hesitate in our 
 decision respecting which it would be most eligible to en- 
 courage. 
 
 In the first edition of this essay, I observed, that, as from 
 the laws of nature it appeared, that some check to popula- 
 tion must exist, it was better that this check should arise 
 from a foresight of the difficulties attending a family, and 
 the fear of dependent poverty, than from the actual presence 
 of want and sickness. This idea will admit of being pursued 
 farther, and I am inclined to think, that, from the prevailing 
 opinions respecting population, which undoubtedly orig- 
 inated in barbarous ages, and have been continued and 
 circulated by that part of every community, which may be 
 supposed to be interested in their support, we have been 
 prevented from attending to the clear dictates of reason and 
 nature on this subject. . . . 
 
 . . . Our obligation not to marry till we have a fair prospect 
 of being able to support our children . . . will appear to de- 
 serve the attention of the moralist, if it can be proved, 
 that an attention to this obligation is of more effect in the 
 prevention of misery, than all the other virtues combined ; 
 and that if, in violation of this duty, it were the general cus- 
 tom to follow the first impulse of nature and marry at the age 
 of puberty, the universal prevalence of every known virtue in 
 the greatest conceivable degree, would fail of rescuing society 
 from the most wretched and desperate state of want, and all 
 the diseases and famines which usually accompany it. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 Of the Effects which would result to Society from the general practice of 
 this virtue. 
 
 One of the principal reasons, which have prevented an 
 assent to the doctrine of the constant tendency of popula- 
 tion to increase beyond the means of subsistence, is, a great 
 unwillingness to believe, that the Deity would, by the laws 
 of nature, bring beings into existence, which, by the laws of 
 nature, could not be supported in that existence. But if, in 
 addition to that general activity and direction of our industry 
 put in motion by these laws, we further consider that the 
 incidental evils arising from them, are constantly directing 
 our attention to the proper check to population, moral re- 
 straint ; and if it appear, that by a strict obedience to those 
 duties which are pointed out to us by the light of nature and 
 reason, and are confirmed and sanctioned by revelation, these 
 evils may be avoided, the objection will, I trust, be removed, 
 and all apparent imputation on the goodness of the Deity 
 be done away. 
 
 The heathen moralists never represented happiness as 
 attainable on earth, but through the medium of virtue ; and 
 among their virtues, prudence ranked in the first class, and 
 by some was even considered as including every other. The 
 christian religion places our present as well as future happi- 
 
 99 
 
100 OF THE EFFECTS ON SOCIETY [bk. iv 
 
 ness in the exercise of those virtues which tend to fit us for 
 a state of superior enjoyment ; and the subjection of the 
 passions to the guidance of reason, which, if not the whole, 
 is a principal branch of prudence, is in consequence most 
 particularly inculcated. 
 
 If, for the sake of illustration, we might be permitted to 
 draw a picture of society, in which, each individual endeav- 
 oured to attain happiness by the strict fulfilment of those 
 duties which the most enlightened of the antient philoso- 
 phers deduced from the laws of nature, and which have 
 been directly taught, and received such powerful sanctions 
 in the moral code of Christianity, it would present a very 
 different scene from that which we now contemplate. Every 
 act which was prompted by the desire of immediate grati- 
 fication, but which threatened an ultimate overbalance of 
 pain, would be considered as a breach of duty ; and, conse- 
 quently, no man whose earnings were only sufficient to main- 
 tain two children, would put himself in a situation in which 
 he might have to maintain four or five, however he might 
 be prompted to it by the passion of love. This prudential 
 restraint, if it were generally adopted, by narrowing the 
 supply of labour in the market, would, in the natural course 
 of things, soon raise its price. The period of delayed grati- 
 fication would be passed in saving the earnings which were 
 above the wants of a single man, and in acquiring habits of 
 sobriety, industry, and economy, which would enable him, 
 in a few years, to enter into the matrimonial contract without 
 fear of its consequences. The operation of the preventive 
 check in this way, by constantly keeping the population 
 within the limits of the food, though constantly following its 
 
ch. ii] OF MORAL RESTRAINT. 101 
 
 increase, would give a real value to the rise of wages, and 
 the sums saved by labourers before marriage, very different 
 from those forced advances in the price of labour, or arbi- 
 trary parochial donations, which, in proportion to their mag- 
 nitude and extensiveness, must of necessity be followed by 
 a proportional advance in the price of provisions. As the 
 wages of labour would thus be sufficient to maintain with 
 decency a large family, and as every married couple would 
 set out with a sum for contingencies, all squalid poverty 
 would be removed from society, or, at least, be confined to 
 a very few, who had fallen into misfortunes against which, 
 no prudence or foresight could provide. 
 
 The interval between the age of puberty, and the period 
 at which each individual might venture on marriage, must, 
 according to the supposition, be passed in strict chastity ; 
 because the law of chastity cannot be violated without pro- 
 ducing evil. The effect of anything like a promiscuous 
 intercourse, which prevents the birth of children, is evidently 
 to weaken the best affections of the heart, and, in a very 
 marked manner, to degrade the female character. And any 
 other intercourse, would, without improper arts, bring as 
 many children into the society as marriage, with a much 
 greater probability of their becoming a burden to it. 
 
 These considerations show that the virtue of chastity is not, 
 as some have supposed, a forced produce of artificial society; 
 but that it has the most real and solid foundation in nature 
 and reason ; being apparently the only virtuous means of 
 avoiding the vice and misery which result so often from the 
 principle of population. . . . 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 Of the errors in different plans zvhich have been proposed, to improve 
 the condition of the Poor. 
 
 . . . Arthur Young, in most of his works, appears clearly 
 to understand the principle of population, and is fully aware 
 of the evils which must necessarily result from an increase 
 of people beyond the demand for labour, and the means of 
 comfortable subsistence. In his tour through France, he 
 has particularly laboured this point, and shown most forcibly 
 the misery, which results, in that country, from the excess of 
 population occasioned by the too great division of property. 
 Such an increase, he justly calls, merely a multiplication of 
 wretchedness. " Couples marry and procreate on the idea, 
 not the reality, of a maintenance ; they increase beyond the 
 demand of towns and manufactures; and the consequence 
 is, distress, and numbers dying of diseases arising from 
 insufficient nourishment." a . . . 
 
 After having once so clearly understood the principle of 
 population as to express these and many other sentiments on 
 the subject, equally just and important, it is not a little sur- 
 prising to find Mr. Young, in a pamphlet, intitled, The 
 Question of Scarcity plainly stated, and Remedies considered, 
 {published in 1800,) observing that "the means which would 
 
 <* Travels in France, vol. i. c. xii. p. 408. 
 102 
 
ch. x] OF THE ERRORS IN DIFFERENT PLANS. 103 
 
 of all others perhaps tend most surely to prevent future 
 scarcities so oppressive to the poor as the present, would be 
 to secure to every country labourer in the kingdom, that has 
 three children and upwards, half an acre of land for potatoes, 
 and grass enough to feed one or two cows. ... If each 
 had his ample potatoe ground and a cow, the price of wheat 
 would be of little more consequence to them than it is to 
 their brethren in Ireland." 
 
 " Every one admits the system to be good, but the question 
 is how to enforce it." 
 
 I was by no means aware, that the excellence of the system 
 had been so generally admitted. For myself I strongly pro- 
 test against being included in the general term of every one, 
 as I should consider the adoption of this system, as the most 
 cruel and fatal blow to the happiness of the lower classes of 
 people in this country, that they had ever received. 
 
 Mr. Young, however, goes on to say, that, " The magnitude 
 of the object should make us disregard any difficulties, but 
 such as are insuperable : none such would probably occur if 
 something like the following means were resorted to : 
 
 " I. Where there are common pastures, to give to a labour- 
 ing man having children a right to demand an allot- 
 ment proportioned to the family, to be set out by the parish 
 officers, etc., . . . and a cow bought. Such labourer to 
 have both for life, paying 40s. a year till the price of the cow, 
 etc., was reimbursed : at his death to go to the labourer 
 having the most numerous family, for life, paying 
 shillings a week to the widow of his predecessor. 
 
 " II. Labourers thus demanding allotments by reason of 
 their families to have land assigned, and cows bought, till the 
 
104 OF THE ERRORS [bk. iv 
 
 proportion so allotted amounts to one of the extent of 
 
 the common. 
 
 " III. In parishes where there are no commons, and the 
 quality of the land adequate, every cottager having 
 children, to whose cottage there is not within a given time 
 land sufficient for a cow, and half an acre of potatoes, 
 assigned at a fair average rent, subject to appeal to the ses- 
 sions, to have a right to demand shillings per week of 
 the parish for every child, till such land be assigned ; leaving 
 to landlords and tenants the means of doing it. Cows to be 
 found by the parish under an annual reimbursement. 
 
 " The great object is, by means of milk and potatoes, to 
 take the mass of the country poor from the consumption of 
 wheat, and to give them substitutes equally wholesome and 
 nourishing, and as independent of scarcities, natural and 
 artificial, as the providence of the Almighty will admit." 
 
 Would not this plan operate, in the most direct manner, 
 as an encouragement to marriage and a bounty on children, 
 which Mr. Young has with so much justice reprobated in his 
 travels in France ? and does he seriously think that it would 
 be an eligible thing, to feed the mass of the people in this 
 country on milk and potatoes, and make them as independent 
 of the price of corn, and of the demand for labour, as their 
 brethren in Ireland ? 
 
 The specifick cause of the poverty and misery of the lower 
 classes of people in France and Ireland, is, that from the 
 extreme subdivision of property in the one country, and the 
 facility of obtaining a potatoe ground in the other, a popula- 
 tion is brought into existence, which is not demanded by the 
 quantity of capital and employment in the country ; and the 
 
ch.x] IN DIFFERENT PIANS. 105 
 
 consequence of which must therefore necessarily be ... to 
 lower in general the price of labour by too great competition ; 
 from which must result complete indigence to those who 
 cannot find employment, and an incomplete subsistence even 
 to those who can. 
 
 The obvious tendency of Mr. Young's plan is, by en- 
 couraging marriage and furnishing a cheap food, independent 
 of the price of corn, and, of course, of the demand for labour, 
 to place the lower classes of people exactly in this situation. 
 . . . Mr. Young's plan would be incomparably more power- 
 ful in encouraging a population beyond the demand for 
 labour than our present poor laws. A laudable repug- 
 nance to the receiving of parish relief, arising partly from a 
 spirit of independence not yet extinct, and partly, from the 
 disagreeable mode in which the relief is given, undoubtedly 
 deters many from marrying with a certainty of falling on the 
 parish ; and the proportion of marriages to the whole popu- 
 lation, which has before been noticed, clearly proves that 
 the poor laws, though they have undoubtedly a considera- 
 ble influence in this respect, do not encourage marriage so 
 much as might be expected from theory. But the case would 
 be very different, if, when a labourer had an early marriage 
 in contemplation, the terrific forms of workhouses and par- 
 ish officers, which might disturb his resolution, were to be 
 exchanged for the fascinating visions of land and cows. 
 If the love of property, as Mr. Young has repeatedly said, 
 will make a man do much, it would be rather strange if it 
 would not make him marry ; an action to which, it appears 
 from experience, that he is by no means disinclined. 
 
 The population which would be thus called into being, 
 
106 OF THE ERRORS [bk. iv 
 
 would be supported by the extended cultivation of potatoes, 
 and would of course go on without any reference to the 
 demand for labour. In the present state of things, notwith- 
 standing the flourishing condition of our manufactures, and 
 the numerous checks to our population, there is no practical 
 problem so difficult as to find employment for the poor ; but 
 this difficulty would evidently be aggravated a hundredfold, 
 under the circumstances here supposed. . . . 
 
 When the commons were all divided and difficulties began 
 to occur in procuring potatoe grounds, the habit of early 
 marriages which had been introduced, would occasion the 
 most complicated distress ; and when, from the increasing 
 population and diminishing sources of subsistence, the aver- 
 age growth of potatoes was not more than the average con- 
 sumption, a scarcity of potatoes would be in every respect, 
 as probable, as a scarcity of wheat at present, and when it 
 did arrive it would be beyond all comparison more dreadful. 
 
 When the common people of a country live principally 
 upon the dearest grain, as they do in England on wheat, they 
 have great resources in a scarcity ; and barley, oats, rice, 
 cheap soups, and potatoes, all present themselves as less 
 expensive, yet at the same time wholesome means of nourish- 
 ment ; but when their habitual food is the lowest in this scale, 
 they appear to be absolutely without resources, except in the 
 bark of trees, like the poor Swedes ; and a great portion of 
 them must necessarily be starved. . . . 
 
 The wages of labour will always be regulated by the 
 proportion of the supply to the demand. And as, upon the 
 potatoe system, a supply more than adequate to the demand 
 would very soon take place, and this supply might be con- 
 
ch. x] IN DIFFERENT PIANS. 107 
 
 tinued at a very cheap rate, on account of the cheapness 
 of the food which would furnish it, the common price of 
 labour would soon be regulated principally by the price of 
 potatoes, instead of the price of wheat, as at present, and 
 the rags and wretched cabins of Ireland would follow of 
 course. . . . 
 
 Upon the same principle, it would by no means be eligible 
 that the cheap soups of Count Rumford should be adopted 
 as the general food of the common people. They are excel- 
 lent inventions for publick institutions, and as occasional 
 resources ; but if they were once universally adopted by the 
 poor it would be impossible to prevent the price of labour 
 from being regulated by them ; and the labourer, though 
 at first he might have more to spare for other expenses, 
 besides food, would ultimately have much less to spare than 
 before. . . . 
 
From the 
 
 APPENDIX 
 
 to the 
 
 THIRD EDITION, 
 
 1807. 
 
 ... It has been said by some that the natural checks to 
 population will always be sufficient to keep it within bounds 
 without resorting to any other aids ; and one ingenious 
 writer has remarked that I have not deduced a single origi- 
 nal fact from real observation to prove the inefficiency of 
 the checks which already prevail.* These remarks are cor- 
 rectly true, and are truisms exactly of the same kind as the 
 assertion that man cannot live without food. For undoubt- 
 edly as long as this continues to be a law of his nature, what 
 are here called the natural checks cannot possibly fail of 
 being effectual. Besides the curious truism that these asser- 
 tions involve, they proceed upon the very strange supposi- 
 
 I should like much to know what description of facts this gentleman 
 had in view when he made this observation. If I could have found one of 
 the kind which seems here to be alluded to, it would indeed have been 
 truly original. 
 
 108 
 
APPENDIX TO THIRD EDITION. 109 
 
 tion that the ultimate object of my work is to check 
 population, as if anything could be more desirable than the 
 most rapid increase of population, unaccompanied by vice 
 and misery. But of course my ultimate object is to diminish 
 vice and misery, and any checks to population which may 
 have been suggested are solely as means to accomplish this 
 end. To a rational being the prudential check to popula- 
 tion ought to be considered as equally natural with the check 
 from poverty and premature mortality which these gentle- 
 men seem to think so entirely sufficient and satisfactory; 
 and it will readily occur to the intelligent reader that one 
 class of checks may be substituted for another, not only 
 without essentially diminishing the population of a country, 
 but even under a constantly progressive increase of it. a 
 
 On the possibility of increasing very considerably the 
 effective population of this country, I have expressed my- 
 self in some parts of my work more sanguinely perhaps than 
 experience would warrant. I have said that in the course 
 of some centuries it might contain two or three times as 
 many inhabitants as at present, and yet every person be 
 both better fed and better clothed. And in the comparison 
 of the increase of population and food at the beginning of 
 the essay that the argument might not seem to depend upon 
 a difference of opinion respecting facts, I have allowed the 
 produce of the earth to be unlimited, which is certainly 
 going too far. It is not a little curious therefore that it 
 should still continue to be urged against me as an argument 
 
 a Botli Norway and Switzerland, where the preventive check prevails 
 the most, are increasing with some rapidity in their population ; and in 
 proportion to their means of subsistence, they can produce more males of 
 a military age than any other country of Europe. 
 
110 APPENDIX 
 
 that this country might contain two or three times as many 
 inhabitants ; and it is still more curious that some persons 
 who have allowed the different ratios of increase on which 
 all my principal conclusions are founded, have still asserted 
 that no difficulty or distress could arise from population 
 till the productions of the earth could not be further in- 
 creased. I doubt whether a stronger instance could readily 
 be produced of the total absence of the power of reasoning 
 than this assertion after such a concession affords. It in- 
 volves a greater absurdity than the saying that because a 
 farm can by proper management be made to carry an addi- 
 tional stock of four head of cattle every year, that therefore 
 no difficulty or inconvenience would arise if an additional 
 forty were placed in it yearly. 
 
 The power of the earth to produce subsistence is certainly 
 not unlimited, but it is strictly speaking indefinite ; that is, 
 its limits are not defined, and the time will probably never 
 arrive when we shall be able to say that no further labour 
 or ingenuity of man could make further additions to it. But 
 the power of obtaining an additional quantity of food from 
 the earth by proper management and in a certain time, 
 has the most remote relation imaginable to the power of 
 keeping pace with an unrestricted increase of population. 
 The knowledge and industry which would enable the natives 
 of New Holland to make the best use of the natural resources 
 of their country must, without an absolute miracle, come to 
 them gradually and slowly, and even then as it has amply 
 appeared would be perfectly ineffectual as to the grand 
 object; but the passions which prompt to the increase of 
 population are always in full vigour, and are ready to pro- 
 
TO THIRD EDITION. Ill 
 
 duce their full effect even in a state of the most helpless 
 ignorance and barbarism. It will be readily allowed that 
 the reason why New Holland in proportion to its natural 
 powers is not so populous as China, is the want of those 
 human institutions which protect property and encourage 
 industry ; but the misery and vice which prevail almost 
 equally in both countries from the tendency of population 
 to increase faster than the means of subsistence, form a 
 distinct consideration and arise from a distinct cause. They 
 arise from the incomplete discipline of the human passions, 
 and no person with the slightest knowledge of mankind has 
 ever had the hardihood to affirm that human institutions 
 could completely discipline all the human passions. But I 
 have already treated this subject so fully in the course of the 
 work that I am ashamed to add anything further here. 
 
 The next grand objection which has been urged against 
 me is my denial of the right of the poor to support. 
 
 Those who would maintain this objection with any degree 
 of consistency are bound to show that the different ratios of 
 increase with respect to population and food which I at- 
 tempted to establish at the beginning of the essay, are 
 fundamentally erroneous ; since on the supposition of their 
 being true, the conclusion is inevitable. If it appear, as it 
 must appear on these ratios being allowed, that it is not pos- 
 sible for the industry of man to produce on a limited territory 
 sufficient food for all that would be born if every person 
 were to marry at the time when he was first prompted to 
 it by inclination, it follows irresistibly that all cannot have 
 a right to support. Let us for a moment suppose an equal 
 division of property in any country. If under these circum- 
 
112 APPENDIX 
 
 stances one half of the society were by prudential habits so 
 to regulate their increase that it exactly kept pace with their 
 increasing cultivation, it is evident that the individuals of 
 this portion of society would always remain as rich as at 
 first. If the other half during the same time married at the 
 age of puberty, when they would probably feel most inclined 
 to it, it is evident that they would soon become wretchedly 
 poor. But upon what plea of justice or equity could this 
 second half of the society claim a right in virtue of their 
 poverty to any of the possessions of the first half? This 
 poverty, had arisen entirely from their own ignorance or 
 imprudence ; and it would be perfectly clear from the man- 
 ner in which it had come upon them that if their plea were 
 admitted, and they were not suffered to feel the particular 
 evils resulting from their conduct, the whole society would 
 shortly be involved in the same degree of wretchedness. 
 Any voluntary and temporary assistance which might be 
 given as a measure of charity by the richer members of the 
 society to the others while they were learning to make a 
 better use of the lessons of nature would be quite a distinct 
 consideration, and without doubt most properly applied ; 
 but nothing like a claim of right to support can possibly be 
 maintained till we deny the premises ; till we affirm that the 
 American increase of population is a miracle, and does not 
 arise from the greater facility of obtaining the means of 
 subsistence.* 
 
 a It has been said that I have written a quarto volume to prove that 
 population increases in a geometrical and food in an arithmetical ratio, 
 but this is not quite true. The first of these propositions I considered as 
 proved the moment the American increase was related, and the second 
 proposition as soon as it was enunciated. The chief object of my work 
 
TO THIRD EDITION. 113 
 
 In fact whatever we may say in our declamations on this 
 subject, almost the whole of our conduct is founded on the 
 non-existence of this right. If the poor had really a claim 
 of right to support, I do not think that any man could justify 
 his wearing broadcloth or eating as much meat as he likes 
 for dinner ; and those who assert this right, and yet are roll- 
 ing in their carriages, living every day luxuriously, and keep- 
 ing even their horses on food of which their fellow-creatures 
 are in want, must be allowed to act with the greatest incon- 
 sistency. Taking an individual instance without reference to 
 consequences, it appears to me that Mr. Godwin's argument 
 is irresistible. Can it be pretended for a moment that a 
 part of the mutton which I expect to eat to-day would not 
 be much more beneficially employed on some hard-working 
 labourer who has not perhaps tasted animal food for the last 
 week, or on some poor family who cannot command suffi- 
 cient food of any kind fully to satisfy the cravings of hunger? 
 If these instances were not of a nature to multiply in pro- 
 portion as such wants were indiscriminately gratified, the 
 gratification of them, as it would be practicable, would be 
 highly beneficial ; and in this case I should not have the 
 smallest hesitation in most fully allowing the right. But as 
 it appears clearly both from theory and experience that if 
 
 was to inquire what effects these laws, which I considered as established 
 in the first six pnges, had produced and were likely to produce on society; 
 a subject not very readily exhausted. The principal fault of my details 
 is that they are not sufficiently particular; but this was a fault which it 
 was not in my power to remedy. It would be a most curious, and to every 
 philosophical mind a most interesting piece of information, to know the 
 exact share of the full power of increase which each existing check pre- 
 vents ; but at present I see no mode of obtaining such information. 
 
114 APPENDIX 
 
 the claim were allowed it would soon increase beyond the 
 possibility of satisfying it, and that the practical attempt to 
 do so would involve the human race in the most wretched 
 and universal poverty, it follows necessarily that our conduct 
 which denies the right is more suited to the present state of 
 our being than our declamations which allow it. 
 
 The great author of nature indeed with that wisdom which 
 is apparent in all His works has not left this conclusion to 
 the cold and speculative consideration of general conse- 
 quences. By making the passion of self-love beyond com- 
 parison stronger than the passion of benevolence, He 
 has at once impelled us to that line of conduct which is 
 essential to the preservation of the human race. If all 
 that might be born could be adequately supplied, we can- 
 not doubt that He would have made the desire of giving 
 to others as ardent as that of supplying ourselves. But 
 since under the present constitution of things this is not 
 so, He has enjoined every man to pursue as his primary 
 object his own safety and happiness, and the safety and 
 happiness of those immediately connected with him; and 
 it is highly instructive to observe that in proportion as the 
 sphere contracts and the power of giving effectual assistance 
 increases, the desire increases at the same time. In the 
 case of children who have certainly a claim of right to the 
 support and protection of their parents, we generally find 
 parental affection nearly as strong as self-love ; and except 
 in a few anomalous cases the last morsel will be divided into 
 equal shares. 
 
 By this wise provision the most ignorant are led to pro- 
 mote the general happiness, an end which they would have 
 
TO THIRD EDITION. 115 
 
 totally failed to attain if the moving principle of their con- 
 duct had been benevolence." Benevolence indeed as the 
 great and constant source of action, would require the most 
 perfect knowledge of causes and effects, and therefore can 
 only be the attribute of the Deity. In a being so short- 
 sighted as man it would lead into the grossest errors, and 
 soon transform the fair and cultivated soil of civilized society 
 into a dreary scene of want and confusion. . . . 
 
 Among those who have objected to my declaration that the 
 poor have no claim of right to support is Mr. Young, who 
 with a harshness not quite becoming a candid inquirer after 
 truth has called my proposal for the gradual abolition of the 
 poor-laws a horrible plan, and asserted that the execution of 
 it would be a most iniquitous proceeding. Let this plan 
 however be compared for a moment with that which he him- 
 self and others have proposed of fixing the sum of the poor's 
 rates, which on no account is to be increased. Under such 
 a law, if the distresses of the poor were to be aggravated ten- 
 fold, either by the increase of numbers or the recurrence of 
 a scarcity, the same sum would invariably be appropriated to 
 their relief. If the statute which gives the poor a right to 
 support were to remain unexpunged, we should add to the 
 cruelty of starving them the injustice of still professing to 
 relieve them. If this statute were expunged or altered we 
 should virtually deny the right of the poor to support, and 
 only retain the absurdity of saying that they had a right to a 
 
 a In saying this let me not be supposed to give the slightest sanction to 
 the system of morals inculcated in the " Fable of the Bees," a system which 
 I consider as absolutely false, and directly contrary to the just definition of 
 virtue. The great art of Dr. Mandeville consisted in misnomers. 
 
116 APPENDIX 
 
 certain sum, an absurdity on which. Mr. Young justly com- 
 ments with much severity in the case of France. In both 
 cases the hardships which they would suffer would be much 
 more severe, and would come upon them in a much more 
 unprepared state than upon the plan proposed in the 
 essay. 
 
 According to this plan all that are already married, and 
 even all that are engaged to marry during the course of the 
 year, and all their children, would be relieved as usual ; and 
 only those who marry subsequently, and who of course may 
 be supposed to have made better provision for contingencies, 
 would be out of the pale of relief. 
 
 Any plan for the abolition of the poor-laws must pre-sup- 
 pose a general acknowledgment that they are essentially 
 wrong and that it is necessary to tread back our steps. With 
 this acknowledgment, whatever objections may be made to 
 my plan in the too frequently short-sighted views of policy, I 
 have no fear of comparing it with any other that has yet 
 been advanced in point of justice and humanity ; and of 
 course the terms iniquitous and horrible " pass by me like 
 the idle wind which I regard not." 
 
 Mr. Young it would appear has now given up this plan. 
 He has pleaded for the privilege of being inconsistent, and 
 has given such reasons for it that I am disposed to acquiesce 
 in them. . . . 
 
 Mr. Young objects very strongly to that passage of the 
 essay in which I observe that a man who plunges himself 
 into poverty and dependence by marrying without any 
 prospect of being able to maintain his family, has more 
 reason to accuse himself than the price of labour, the parish, 
 
TO THIRD EDITION. 117 
 
 the avarice of the rich, the institutions of society, and the 
 dispensations of Providence ; except as far as he has been 
 deceived by those who ought to have instructed him. In 
 answer to this, Mr. Young says that the poor fellow is justified 
 in every one of these complaints, that of Providence alone 
 excepted ; and that seeing other cottagers living comfortably 
 with three or four acres of land, he has cause to accuse insti- 
 tutions which deny him that which the rich could well spare, 
 and which would give him all he wants." I would beg Mr. 
 Young for a moment to consider how the matter would stand 
 if his own plan were completely executed. After all the 
 commons had been divided as he has proposed, if a labourer 
 had more than one son, in what respect would the second or 
 third be in a different situation from the man that I have 
 supposed? Mr. Young cannot posssibly mean to say that 
 if he had the very natural desire of marrying at twenty, he 
 would still have a right to complain that the society did not 
 give him a house and three or four acres of land. . . . 
 
 To much of Mr. Young's plan as he has at present ex- 
 plained it I should by no means object. The peculiar evil 
 which I apprehended from it, that of taking the poor from 
 the consumption of wheat and feeding them on milk and 
 potatoes, might certainly be avoided by a limitation of the 
 number of cottages ; and I entirely agree with him in think- 
 ing that we should not be deterred from making 500,000 
 families more comfortable because we cannot extend the 
 same relief to all the rest. I have indeed myself ventured 
 to recommend a general improvement of cottages, and even 
 the cow system on a limited scale ; and perhaps, with proper 
 
 a Annals of Agriculture, No. 239, p. 226. 
 
113 APPENDIX 
 
 precautions, a certain portion of land might be given to a 
 considerable body of the labouring classes. 
 
 If the law which entitles the poor to support were to be 
 repealed, I should most highly approve of any plan which 
 would tend to render such repeal more palatable on its first 
 promulgation ; and in this view some kind of compact with 
 the poor might be very desirable. A plan of letting land to 
 labourers under certain conditions has lately been tried in 
 the parish of Long Newnton, in Gloucestershire ; and the 
 result with a general proposal founded on it has been sub- 
 mitted to the public by Mr. Estcourt. The present success 
 has been very striking ; but in this and every other case of 
 the kind we should always bear in mind that no experiment 
 respecting a provision for the poor can be said to be com- 
 plete till succeeding generations have arisen. I doubt if 
 ever there has been an instance of anything like a liberal 
 institution for the poor which did not succeed on its first 
 establishment, however it might have failed afterwards. 
 But this consideration should by no means deter us from 
 making such experiments when present good is to be ob- 
 tained by them, and a future overbalance of evil is not justly 
 to be apprehended. It should only make us less rash in 
 drawing our inferences. 
 
 With regard to the general question of the advantages to 
 
 a In any plan, particularly of a distribution of land as a compensation 
 for the relief given by the poor laws, the succeeding generations would form 
 the grand difficulty. All others would be perfectly trivial in comparison. 
 For a time everything might go on very smoothly and the rates be much 
 diminished ; but afterwards they would either increase again as rapidly as 
 before or the scheme would be exposed to all the same objections which 
 have been made to mine, without the same justice and consistency to palli- 
 ate them. 
 
TO THIRD EDITION. 119 
 
 the lower classes of possessing land, it should be recollected 
 that such possessions are by no means a novelty. Formerly 
 this system prevailed in almost every country with which we 
 are acquainted, and prevails at present in many countries 
 where the peasants are far from being remarkable for their 
 comforts, but are on the contrary very poor and particularly 
 subject to scarcities. With respect to this latter evil indeed 
 it is quite obvious that a peasantry which depends princi- 
 pally on its possessions in land must be more exposed to it 
 than one which depends on the general wages of labour. 
 When a year of deficient crops occurs in a country of any 
 extent and diversity of soil, it is always partial, and some 
 districts are more affected than others. But when a bad 
 crop of grass, corn, or potatoes, or a mortality among cattle, 
 falls on a poor man whose principal dependence is on two 
 or three acres of land, he is in the most deplorable and help- 
 less situation. He is comparatively without money to pur- 
 chase supplies, and is not for a moment to be compared 
 with the man who depends on the wages of labour, and who 
 will of course be able to purchase that portion of the general 
 crop, whatever it may be, to which his relative situation in 
 the society entitles him. In Sweden, where the farmers' 
 labourers are paid principally in land and often keep two 
 or three cows, it is not uncommon for the peasants of one 
 district to be almost starving while their neighbours at a 
 little distance are living in comparative plenty. It will be 
 found indeed generally that in almost all the countries which 
 are particularly subject to scarcities and famines, either the 
 farms are very small or the labourers are paid principally in 
 land. China, Indostan, and the former state of the High- 
 
120 APPENDIX 
 
 lands of Scotland, furnish some proofs among many others 
 of the truth of this observation ; and in reference to the 
 small properties of France, Mr. Young himself in his Tour 
 particularly notices the distress arising from the least failure 
 of the crops, and observes that such a deficiency as in Eng- 
 land passes almost without notice, in France is attended with 
 dreadful calamities." 
 
 Should any plan therefore of assisting the poor by land be 
 adopted in this country, it would be absolutely essential to 
 its ultimate success to prevent them from making it their 
 principal dependence. And this might probably be done 
 by attending strictly to the two following rules. Not to let 
 the division of land be so great as to interrupt the cottager 
 essentially in his usual labours ; and always to stop in the 
 further distribution of land and cottages when the price of 
 labour, independently of any assistance from land, would not 
 at the average price of corn maintain three or at least two 
 children. Could the matter be so ordered that the labourer 
 in working for others should still continue to earn the same 
 real command over the necessaries of life that he did before, 
 a very great accession of comfort and happiness might accrue 
 to the poor from the possession of land without any evil that 
 I can foresee at present. But if these points were not at- 
 tended to, I should certainly fear an approximation to the 
 state of the poor in France, Sweden, and Ireland ; nor do I 
 think that any of the partial experiments that have yet taken 
 place afford the slightest presumption to the contrary. The 
 
 a Travels in France, vol. i. c. xii. p. 409. That country will probably be 
 the least liable to scarcities in which agriculture is carried on as the most 
 flourishing manufacture of the state. 
 
 
TO THIRD EDITION. 121 
 
 result of these experiments is indeed exactly such as one 
 should have expected. Who could ever have doubted that 
 if without lowering the price of labour, or taking the labourer 
 off from his usual occupations, you could give him the pro- 
 duce of one or two acres of land and the benefit of a cow, 
 you would decidedly raise his condition? But it by no 
 means follows that he would retain this advantage if the sys- 
 tem were so extended as to make the land his principal 
 dependence, to lower the price of labour, and in the lan- 
 guage of Mr. Young, to take the poor from the consumption 
 of wheat and feed them on milk and potatoes. It does not 
 appear to me so marvellous as it does to Mr. Young that the 
 very Same system, which in Lincolnshire and Rutlandshire 
 may produce now the most comfortable peasantry in the 
 British dominions, should in the end if extended without 
 proper precautions assimilate the condition of the labourers 
 of this country to that of the lower classes of the Irish. . . . 
 There is only one subject more which I shall notice, and 
 that is rather a matter of feeling than of argument. Many 
 persons whose understandings are not so constituted that 
 they can regulate their belief or disbelief by their likes or 
 dislikes, have professed their perfect conviction of the truth 
 of the general principles contained in the essay, but at 
 the same time have lamented this conviction as throwing a 
 darker shade over our views of human nature, and tending 
 particularly to narrow our prospects of future improvement. 
 In these feelings I cannot agree with them. If from a re- 
 view of the past I could not only believe that a fundamental 
 and very extraordinary improvement in human society was 
 possible, but feel a firm confidence that it would take place, 
 
122 APPENDIX 
 
 I should undoubtedly be grieved to find that I had over- 
 looked some cause the operation of which would at once 
 blast my hopes. But if the contemplation of the past 
 history of mankind, from which alone we can judge of the 
 future, renders it almost impossible to feel such confidence, 
 I confess that I had much rather believe that some real and 
 deeply-seated difficulty existed, the constant struggle with 
 which was calculated to rouse the natural inactivity of man, 
 to call forth his faculties, and invigorate and improve his 
 mind, — a species of difficulty which it must be allowed is 
 most eminently and peculiarly suited to a state of probation, 
 than that nearly all the evils of life might with the most per- 
 fect facility be removed but for the perverseness and wicked- 
 ness of those who influence human institutions. a 
 
 A person who held this latter opinion must necessarily 
 live in a constant state of irritation and disappointment. 
 The ardent expectations with which he might begin life 
 would soon receive the most cruel check. The regular 
 progress of society under the most favourable circumstances, 
 would to him appear slow and unsatisfactory; but instead 
 even of this regular progress his eye would be more fre- 
 quently presented with retrograde movements and the most 
 disheartening reverses. The changes to which he had 
 looked forward with delight would be found big with new 
 
 o The misery and vice arising from the pressure of the population too 
 hard against tne limits of subsistence, and the misery and vice arising from 
 promiscuous intercourse, may be considered as the Scylla and Charybdis 
 of human life. That it is possible for each individual to steer clear of both 
 these rocks is certainly true, and a truth which I have endeavoured strongly 
 to maintain ; but that these rocks do not form a difficulty independent of 
 human institutions no person with any knowledge of the subject can venture 
 to assert. 
 
TO THIRD EDITIOX. 123 
 
 and unlooked-for evils, and the characters on which he had 
 reposed the most confidence would be seen frequently de- 
 serting his favourite cause, either from the lessons of expe- 
 rience or the temptations of wealth and power. In this 
 state of constant disappointment he would be but too apt to 
 attribute everything to the worst motives, he would be in- 
 clined to give up the cause of improvement in despair, and 
 judging of the whole from a part, nothing but a peculiar 
 goodness of heart and amiableness of disposition could pre- 
 serve him from that sickly and disgusting misanthropy which 
 is but too frequently the end of such characters. 
 
 On the contrary, a person who held the other opinion, as 
 he would set out with more moderate expectations, would 
 of course be less liable to disappointment. A comparison 
 of the best with the worst states of society, and the obvious 
 inference from analogy that the best were capable of further 
 improvement, would constantly present to his mind a pros- 
 pect sufficiently animating to warrant his most persevering 
 exertions. But aware of the difficulties with which the sub- 
 ject was surrounded, knowing how often in the attempt to 
 attain one object some other had been lost, and that though 
 society had made rapid advances in some directions it had 
 been comparatively stationary in others, he would be con- 
 stantly prepared for failures. These failures instead of cre- 
 ating despair would only create knowledge, instead of check- 
 ing his ardour would give it a wiser and more successful 
 direction, and having founded his opinion of mankind on 
 broad and general grounds, the disappointment of any par- 
 ticular views would not change this opinion : but even in 
 declining age he would probably be found believing as 
 
124 APPENDIX TO THIRD EDITION. 
 
 firmly in the reality and general prevalence of virtue as in 
 the existence and frequency of vice, and to the last looking 
 forward with a just confidence to those improvements in so- 
 ciety which the history of the past, in spite of all the reverses 
 with which it is accompanied, seems clearly to warrant. 
 
 It may be true that if ignorance is bliss 'tis folly to be 
 wise ; but if ignorance be not bliss, as in the present in- 
 stance, if all false views of society must not only impede 
 decidedly the progress of improvement, but necessarily ter- 
 minate in the most bitter disappointments to the individuals 
 who formed them, I shall always think that the feelings and 
 prospects of those who make the justest estimates of our 
 future expectations are the most consolatory, and that the 
 characters of this description are happier themselves, at the 
 same time that they are beyond comparison more likely to 
 contribute to the improvement and happiness of society. 
 
From the 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 to the 
 
 FIFTH EDITION, 
 1817. 
 
 This essay was first published at a period of extensive 
 warfare, combined, from peculiar circumstances, with a most 
 prosperous foreign commerce. 
 
 It came before the public, therefore, at a time when there 
 would be an extraordinary demand for men, and very little 
 disposition to suppose the possibility of any evil arising from 
 the redundancy of population. Its success under these 
 disadvantages was greater than could have been reasonably 
 expected • and it may be presumed that it will not lose its 
 interest, after a period of a different description has suc- 
 ceeded, which has in the most marked manner illustrated 
 its principles and confirmed its conclusions. . . . 
 
 East India College, June 7, 181 7. 
 125 
 
From the 
 
 APPENDIX 
 
 to the 
 
 FIFTH EDITION, 
 1817. 
 
 Since the publication of the last edition of this essay in 
 1807 two works have appeared, the avowed objects of which 
 are directly to oppose its principles and conclusions. These 
 are " The Principles of Population and Production," by Mr. 
 Weyland ; and " An Inquiry into the Principle of Popula- 
 tion," by Mr. James Grahame. 
 
 I would willingly leave the question as it at present stands 
 to the judgment of the public without any attempt on my 
 part to influence it further by a more particular reply ; but 
 as I professed my readiness to enter into the discussion of 
 any serious objections to my principles and conclusions 
 which were brought forward in a spirit of candour and 
 truth, and as one at least of the publications above men- 
 tioned may be so characterized, and the other is by no 
 means deficient in personal respect, I am induced shortly 
 to notice them. . . . 
 
 126 
 
APPENDIX TO FIFTH EDITION. \T1 
 
 Mr. Grahame in his second chapter, speaking of the ten- 
 dency exhibited by the law of human increase to a redun- 
 dancy of population, observes that some philosophers have 
 considered this tendency as a mark of the foresight of 
 nature, which has thus provided a ready supply for the waste 
 of life occasioned by human vices and passions ; while 
 " others, of whom Mr. Malthus is the leader, regard the 
 vices and follies of human nature and their various pro- 
 ducts, famine, disease, and war, as benevolent remedies by 
 which nature has enabled human beings to correct the dis- 
 orders that would arise from that redundance of popula- 
 tion which the unrestrained operation of her laws would 
 create." x 
 
 These are the opinions imputed to me and the philoso- 
 phers with whom I am associated. If the imputation were 
 just, we have certainly on many accounts great reason to 
 be ashamed of ourselves. For what are we made to say? 
 In the first place, we are stated to assert that famine is a 
 benevolent remedy for want of food, as redundance of 
 population admits of no other interpretation than that of a 
 people ill supplied with the means of subsistence, and 
 consequently the benevolent remedy of famine here noticed 
 can only apply to the disorders arising from scarcity of 
 food. 
 
 Secondly, We are said to affirm that nature enables human 
 beings by means of diseases to correct the disorders that 
 would arise from a redundance of population — that is, that 
 mankind willingly and purposely create diseases with a view 
 to prevent those diseases which are the necessary conse- 
 
 1 P. IOO. 
 
128 APPENDIX 
 
 quences of a redundant population, and are not worse or 
 more mortal than the means of prevention. 
 
 And thirdly, it is imputed to us generally that we consider 
 the vices and follies of mankind as benevolent remedies for 
 the disorders arising from a redundant population, and it 
 follows as a matter of course that these vices ought to be 
 encouraged rather than reprobated. 
 
 It would not be easy to compress in so small a compass 
 a greater quantity of absurdity, inconsistency, and unfounded 
 assertion. 
 
 The two first imputations may perhaps be peculiar to Mr. 
 Grahame, and protection from them may be found in their 
 gross absurdity and inconsistency. With regard to the third 
 it must be allowed that it has not the. merit of novelty. 
 Although it is scarcely less absurd than the two others, and 
 has been shown to be an opinion nowhere to be found in the 
 essay nor legitimately to be inferred from any part of it, it 
 has been continually repeated in various quarters for four- 
 teen years, and now appears in the pages of Mr. Grahame. 
 For the last time I will now notice it, and should it still 
 continue to be brought forward I think I may be fairly 
 excused from paying the slightest further attention either 
 to the imputation itself or to those who advance it. 
 
 If I had merely stated that the tendency of the human 
 race to increase faster than the means of subsistence was 
 kept to a level with these means by some or other of the 
 forms of vice and misery, and that these evils were abso- 
 lutely unavoidable and incapable of being diminished by 
 any human efforts, still I could not with any semblance of 
 justice be accused of considering vice and misery as the 
 
TO FIFTH EDITION. 129 
 
 remedies of these evils instead of the very evils themselves. 
 As well nearly might I be open to Mr. Grahame's imputa- 
 tions of considering the famine and disease necessarily aris- 
 ing from a scarcity of food as a benevolent remedy for the 
 evils which this scarcity occasions. 
 
 But I have not so stated the proposition. I have not 
 considered the evils of vice and misery arising from a re- 
 dundant population as unavoidable and incapable of being 
 diminished. On the contrary, I have pointed out a mode 
 by which these evils may be removed or mitigated by 
 removing or mitigating their cause. I have endeavoured to 
 show that this may be done consistently with human virtue 
 and happiness. I have never considered any possible 
 increase of population as an evil, except as far as it might 
 increase the proportion of vice and misery. Vice and 
 misery, and these alone, are the evils which it has been my 
 great object to contend against. I have expressly proposed 
 moral restraint as their rational and proper remedy; and 
 whether the remedy be good or bad, adequate or inade- 
 quate, the proposal itself and the stress which I have laid 
 upon it is an incontrovertible proof that I never can have 
 considered vice and misery as themselves remedies. 
 
 But not only does the general tenour of my work and the 
 specific object of the latter part of it clearly show that I do 
 not consider vice and misery as remedies, but particular pas- 
 sages in various parts of it are so distinct on the subject as 
 not to admit of being misunderstood by the most perverse 
 blindness. 
 
 It is therefore quite inconceivable that any writer with the 
 slightest pretensions to respectability should venture to bring 
 
130 APPENDIX 
 
 forward such imputations, and it must be allowed to show 
 either such a degree of ignorance or such a total want of 
 candour as utterly to disqualify him for the discussion of 
 such subjects. 
 
 But Mr. Grahame's misrepresentations are not confined 
 to the passage above referred to. In his introduction he 
 observes that in order to check a redundant population, the 
 evils of which I consider as much nearer than Mr. Wallace, 
 I "recommend immediate recourse to human efforts to the 
 restraint prescribed by Condorcet for the correction or miti- 
 gation of the evil." This is an assertion entirely without 
 foundation. I have never adverted to the check suggested 
 by Condorcet without the most marked disapprobation. 
 Indeed I should always particularly reprobate any artificial 
 and unnatural modes of checking population, both on 
 account of their immorality and their tendency to remove 
 a necessary stimulus to industry. If it were possible for 
 each married couple to limit by a wish the number of their 
 children, there is certainly reason to fear that the indolence 
 of the human race would be very greatly increased, and 
 that neither the population of individual countries nor of 
 the whole earth would ever reach its natural and proper 
 extent. But the restraints which I have recommended are 
 quite of a different character. They are not only pointed 
 out by reason and sanctioned by religion, but tend in the 
 most marked manner to stimulate industry. It is not easy 
 to conceive a more powerful encouragement to exertion and 
 good conduct than the looking forward to marriage as a 
 state peculiarly desirable : but only to be enjoyed in com- 
 fort by the acquisition of habits of industry, economy, and 
 
TO FIFTH EDITION. 131 
 
 prudence. And it is in this light that I have always wished 
 to place it. . . . 
 
 With regard to the substance and aim of Mr. Grahame's 
 work, it seems to be intended to show that emigration is the 
 remedy provided by nature for a redundant population, and 
 that if this remedy cannot be adequately applied there is 
 no other that can be proposed which will not lead to con- 
 sequences worse than the evil itself. These are two points 
 which I have considered at length in the essay, and it 
 cannot be necessary to repeat any of the arguments here. 
 Emigration, if it could be freely used, has been shown to be 
 a resource which could not be of long duration. It cannot 
 therefore under any circumstances be considered as an ade- 
 quate remedy. The latter position is a matter of opinion, 
 and may rationally be held by any person who sees reason 
 to think it well founded. It appears to me, I confess, that 
 experience most decidedly contradicts it, but to those who 
 think otherwise there is nothing more to be said than that 
 they are bound in consistency to acquiesce in the necessary 
 consequences of their opinion. These consequences are 
 that the poverty and wretchedness arising from a redun- 
 dant population, or in other words from very low wages and 
 want of employment, are absolutely irremediable and must be 
 continually increasing as the population of the earth proceeds ; 
 and that all the efforts of legislative wisdom and private 
 charity, though they may afford a wholesome and beneficial 
 exercise of human virtue and may occasionally alter the 
 distribution and vary the pressure of human misery, can do 
 absolutely nothing towards diminishing the general amount 
 or checking the increasing weight of this pressure. . . . 
 
132 APPENDIX 
 
 It was my object in the two chapters on Moral Restraint, 
 and its Effects on Society, to show that the evils arising from 
 the principle of population were exactly of the same nature 
 as the evils arising from the excessive or irregular gratifica- 
 tion of the human passions in general, and that from the 
 existence of these evils we had no more reason to conclude 
 that the principle of increase was too strong for the purpose 
 intended by the Creator, than to infer from the existence of 
 the vices arising from the human passions that these passions 
 required diminution or extinction, instead of regulation and 
 direction. 
 
 If this view of the subject be allowed to be correct, it 
 will naturally follow that notwithstanding the acknowledged 
 evils occasioned by the principle of population, the advan- 
 tages derived from it under the present constitution of 
 things may very greatly overbalance them. 
 
 A slight sketch of the nature of these advantages as far 
 as the main object of the essay would allow was given in 
 the two chapters to which I have alluded ; but the subject 
 has lately been pursued with great ability in the work of 
 Mr. Sumner on the " Records of the Creation; " and I am 
 happy to refer to it as containing a masterly development 
 and completion of views of which only an intimation could 
 be given in the essay. 
 
 I fully agree with Mr. Sumner as to the beneficial effects 
 which result from the principle of population, and feel en- 
 tirely convinced that the natural tendency of the human 
 race to increase faster than the possible increase of the 
 means of subsistence could not be either destroyed or essen- 
 tially diminished without diminishing that hope of rising and 
 
TO FIFTH EDITION. 133 
 
 fear of falling in society so necessary to the improvement of 
 the human faculties and the advancement of human happi- 
 ness. But with this conviction on my mind, I feel no wish 
 to alter the view which I have given of the evils arising 
 from the principle of population. These evils do not lose 
 their name or nature because they are overbalanced by 
 good, and to consider them in a different light on this ac- 
 count and cease to call them evils would be as irrational as 
 the objecting to call the irregular indulgences of passion 
 vicious, and to affirm that they lead to misery because 
 our passions are the main sources of human virtue and 
 happiness. 
 
 I have always considered the principle of population as a 
 law peculiarly suited to a state of discipline and trial. In- 
 deed I believe that, in the whole range of the laws of nature 
 with which we are acquainted, not one can be pointed out 
 which in so remarkable a manner tends to strengthen and 
 confirm this scriptural view of the state of man on earth. 
 And as each individual has the power of avoiding the evil 
 consequences to himself and society resulting from the prin- 
 ciple of population by the practice of a virtue clearly dic- 
 tated to him by the light of nature, and sanctioned by 
 revealed religion, it must be allowed that the ways of God 
 to man with regard to this great law of nature are completely 
 vindicated. 
 
 I have therefore certainly felt surprise as well as regret 
 that no inconsiderable part of the objections which have 
 been made to the principles and conclusions of the " Essay 
 on Population " has come from persons for whose moral 
 and religious character I have so high a respect that it would 
 
134 APPENDIX TO FIFTH EDITION. 
 
 have been particularly gratifying to me to obtain their ap- 
 probation and sanction. This effect has been attributed to 
 some expressions used in the course of the work which have 
 been thought too harsh, and not sufficiently indulgent to 
 the weakness of human nature and the feelings of Christian 
 charity. 
 
 It is probable that having found the bow bent too much 
 one way I was induced to bend it too much the other in 
 order to make it straight. But I shall always be quite ready 
 to blot out any part of the work which is considered by a 
 competent tribunal as having a tendency to prevent the bow 
 from becoming finally straight and to impede the progress 
 of truth. In deference to this tribunal I have already ex- 
 punged the passages which have been most objected to, 
 and I have made some few further corrections of the same 
 kind in the present edition. By these alterations I hope 
 and believe that the work has been improved without im- 
 pairing its principles. But I still trust that whether it is 
 read with or without these alterations, every reader of can- 
 dour must acknowledge that the practical design uppermost 
 in the mind of the writer, with whatever want of judgment 
 it may have been executed, is to improve the condition and 
 increase the happiness of the lower classes of society.