BIUK -J^JV rrt: 1 1(7 1 Ifi fiiMsifitt <%) _/ ^\c IkWJ mil d g | o< L?J ID si /**-* 1 ""1 I 11 '^WHaiB^ ^AtfVHHIH^' \WE -UNIVER5//, ^:LOS ANCELj> 3 *-~ 2 ^otainihv^ ^EUNIVERVA ^cLOSANGElij> <^130NVS01^ "^flHAINfHW^ & ^JBRARYQ?. ^UIBRARYQ^ >#UNIVE ^OJITO-JO* ~%HITCHtf^ C OFCALIFO% OFCAiIF0% ^whhih^ ^ommm^ "%fjnv$< IVERS/a KLOSANGEIfx, 1 o i ^mNVSOl^ "%83AlNfHVfc svlOSANGFLfj> ADDITIONS FOURTH AND FORMER EDITIONS OF AN ESSAY PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION, BY T. R. MALTHUS, A. M. Late Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge, and Professor of History and Political Economy in the East-India College, Hertfordshire. LONDON: JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE-STREET. 1817. rrinted by W. CLOWES, NorthnmbrrUnd-coyrt, Strand, London. H3 El 2 CONTENTS. sot>. BOOK II. OF THE CHECKS TO POPULATION IN THE DIFFERENT STATES OF MODERN EUROPE. (Continued.) Chap. Pg I. Of the Checks to Population in France (continued) 1 IX. Of the Checks to Population in England (continued) 12 BOOK III. OF THE DIFFERENT SYSTEMS OR EXPEDIENTS WHICH HAVE BEEN PROPOSED OR HAVE PREVAILED IN SOCIETY, AS THEY AFFECT THE EVILS ARISING FROM THE PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. (Continued.) Chap. Pa ge III. Of Systems of Equality (continued) 37 IV. Of Emigration (continued) 53 VII. Of Poor-Laws (continued) 56 VIII. Of the Agricultural System 86 IX. Of the Commercial System 107 X. Of the Systems of Agriculture and Com- merce combined ...,*...,.,....... 125 Chap. IT CONTENTS. Chap. Page XI. Of Corn-Laws. Bounties upon Importation, 148 XII. Of Corn-Laws. Restrictions upon Impor- tation 1 80 XIII. Of increasing Wealth, as it affects the Con- dition of the Poor 213 XIV. General Observations (continued) 230 BOOK IV. OF OUR FUTURE PROSPECTS RESPECTING THE RE- MOVAL OR MITIGATION OF THE EVILS ARISING FROM THE PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. (Co)it inued.) Chap. Page VII. Effects of the Knowledge of the principal Cause of Poverty on Civil Liberty (continued) 252 XII. Different Plans of improving the Condition of the Poor, considered, (continued,) .... 261 Appendix 287 ADDITIONS, &c. BOOK II. CHAP. VII, [To follow Paffe 448, Vol. I. Edition 1807.] Of the Checks to Population in France (continued). 1 HAVE not thought it advisable to alter the conjectural calculations and supposi- tions of the preceding chapter, on account of the returns of the prefects for the year IX, as well as some returns published since by the government in 1813, having given a smaller proportion of births than I had thought probable; first, because these re- turns do not contain the early years of the revolution, when the encouragement to mar- riage and the proportion of births might be expected to be the greatest; and secondly, because they still seem fully to establish the main fact, which it was the object of the chapter to account for, namely, the undi- *VOL. III. B 2 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. minished population of France, notwith- standing the losses sustained during the revolution ; although it may ha ve been ef- fected rather by a decreased proportion of deaths than an increased proportion of births. According to the returns of the year IX, the proportions of the births, deaths, and marriages, to the whole population, are as follows : Births. Deaths. Marriages. 1 in 33 1 in 38 \ 1 in 157*. But these are in fact only the proportion* of one year, from which no certain inference can be drawn. They are also applied to a population between three and four millions greater than was contained in ancient France, which population may have always had a smaller proportion of births, deaths, and marriages; and further, it appears highly probable from some of the statements in the Analyse des Process Verbavx, that the registers See a valuable note of M. Prevost of Geneva to hit Translation of this Work, vol. ii. p. 88. M. Prevost thinks it probable that there are omissions in the returns of the births, deaths, and marriages, for the year IX. He further shews that the proportion of the population to the square league Ch. vii. in France (continued). 3 registers had not been very carefully kept. Under these circumstances, they cannot be considered as proving what the numbers imply. In the year XI., according to the Statis- tique Elementaire by Peuchet, published subsequently to his Essai, an inquiry was instituted under the orders of M. Chaptal for the express purpose of ascertaining the average proportion of births to the popula- tion*; and such an inquiry, so soon after the returns of the year IX., affords a clear proof that these returns were not considered by the minister as correct. In order to ac- complish the object in view, choice was made of those communes in 30 depart- ments distributed over the whole surface of France, which were likely to afford the most accurate returns. And these returns forthe years VIII., IX., and X., gave a pro- portion of births as 1 in 28 T Vo-; of deaths, league for Old France should be 1014, and not 1086. But if there is reason to believe that there are omissions in the registers, and that the population is made too great, the real proportions will be essentially different from those which arc here given. P. 331. Paris, 1805. b 2 as 4 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. as 1 in 30-j-fo-; and of marriages, as 1 in It is observed by M. Peuchet that the proportion of population to the births is here much greater than had been formerly assumed, but he thinks that, as this calcula- tion had been made from actual enumera- tions, it should be adopted in preference. The returns published by the govern- ment in 1813 make the population of an- cient France 28,786,911, which, compared with 28,000,000, the estimated population of the year IX., shew an increase of about 800,000 in the 11 years, from 1802 to 181S. No returns of marriages are given, and the returns of births and deaths are given only for fifty departments. In these fifty departments, during the ten years beginning with 1802 and ending with 1811, the whole number of births amounted to 5,478,669, and of deaths to 4,696,857, which, on a population of 16,710,719, indi- cates a proportion of births as 1 in30^, and of deaths as 1 in 35$. It is natural to suppose that these fifty de- partments were chosen on account of their shewing the greatest increase. They con- tain Ch. vii. in France {continued). 5 tain indeed nearly the whole increase that had taken place in all the departments, from the time of the enumeration in the year IX.; and consequently the population of the other departments must have been almost stationary. It may further be reasonably conjectured that the returns of marriages were not published on account of their be- ing considered as unsatisfactory, and shew- ing a diminution of marriages, and an in- creased proportion of illegitimate births. From these returns, and the circum- stances accompanying them, it may be con- cluded 9 that whatever might have been the real proportion of births before the revolu- tion, and for the six or seven subsequent years, when the manages prSmaturSs are al- luded to in the Proces Verbaux, and propor- tions of births as 1 in 21, 22, and 23, are mentioned in the Statistique Gen6rale, the proportions of births, deaths, and mar- riages, are now all considerably less than they were formerly supposed to be a . It has been asked, whether if this fact be allowed, * In the year 1792 a law was passed extremely favour- able to early marriages. This was repealed in the year IX.. 6 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. allowed, it does not clearly follow that the population was incorrectly estimated before the revolution, and that it has been dimi- nished rather than increased since 1792? To this question I should distinctly answer, that it does not follow. It has been seen, in many of the preceding chapters, that the proportions of births, deaths, and marriages, are extremely different in different coun- tries, and there is the strongest reason for believing that they are very different in the same country at different periods, and under different circumstances. That changes of this kind have taken place in Switzerland has appeared to be al- most certain. A similar effect from in- creased healthiness in our own country may be considered as an established fact. And if we give any credit to the best authorities that can be collected on the subject, it can scarcely be doubted that the rate of morta- IX., and a law substituted which threw great obstacles in the way of marriage, according to Peuchet (p. 234). These two laws will assist in accounting for a small pro- portion of births and marriages in the ten years previous to 1813, consistently with the possibility of a large pro- portion in the first six or seven years after the commence- ment of the revolution. lity Ch. vii. in France (continued). 7 lity has diminished, during the last one or two hundred years, in almost every country in Europe. There is nothing therefore that ought to surprise us in the mere fact of the same population being kept up, or even a decided increase taking place, under a smaller proportion of births, deaths, and marriages. And the only question is, whe- ther the actual circumstances of France seem to render such a change probable. Now it is generally agreed that the con- dition of the lower classes of people in France before the revolution was very wretched. The wages of labour were about 20 sous, or ten pence a day, at a time when the wages of labour in England were nearly seventeen pence, and the price of wheat of the same quality in the two countries wa not very different. Accordingly Arthur Young represents the labouring classes of France, just at the commencement of the re- volution, as " 76 per cent, worse fed, worse clothed, and worse supported, both in sickness and health, than the same classes in England V And though this statement is perhaps rather too strong, and sufficient * Young's Travels in France, vol. i. p. 437. allowance 8 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. allowance is not made for the real difference of prices, yet his work every where abounds with observations which shew the depressed condition of the labouring classes in France at that time, and imply the pressure of the population very hard against the limits of subsistence. On the other hand, it is universally al- lowed that the condition of the French pea- santry has been decidedly improved by the revolution and the division of the national domains. All the writers who advert to the subject notice a considerable rise in the price of labour, partly occasioned by the extension of cultivation, and partly by the demands of the army. In the Statistique Elementairc of Peuchet, common labour is stated to have risen from 20 to 30 sous\ while the price of provisions appears to have remained nearly the same; and Mr. Bir- beck, in his late Agricultural Tour in France b , says that the price of labour with- out board is twenty^77ceaday,andthat pro- visions of all kinds are full as cheap again as in England. This would give the French 'P. 391. >P. 13. labourer Ch. vii. in France (continued). 9 labourer the same command of subsistence as an English labourer would have with three shillings and four pence a day. But at no time were the wages of common day-labour in England so high as three shillings and four pence. Allowing for some errors in these state- ments, they are evidently sufficient to esta- blish a very marked improvement in the con- dition of the lower classes of people in France. But it is next to a physical im- possibility that such a relief from the pres- sure of distress should take place without a diminution in the rate of mortality; and if this diminution in the rate of mortality has not been accompanied by a rapid increase of population, it must necessarily have been accompanied by a smaller proportion of births. In the interval between 1802 and 1815 the population seems to have increased, but to have increased slowly. Consequent- ly a smaller proportion of births, deaths, and marriages, or the more general opera- tion of prudential restraint, is exactly what the circumstances would have led us to ex- pect. There is perhaps no proposition more 10 Of the Chech to Population Bk.fi. more incontrovertible than this, that, in two countries, in which the rate of increase, the natural healthiness of climate, and the state of towns and manufactures are supposed to be nearly the same, the one in which the pressure of poverty is the greatest will have the greatest proportion of births, deaths, and marriages. It does not then by any means follow, as has been supposed, that because since 1802 the proportion of births in France has been as 1 in 30, Necker ought to have used SO as his multiplier instead of 25}. If the representations given of the state of the la- bouring classes in France before and since the revolution be .in any degree near the truth, as the march of the population in both periods seems to have been nearly the same, the present proportion of births could not have been applicable at the period when Necker wrote. At the same time it is by no means improbable that he took too low a multiplier. It is hardly credible under all circumstances that the population of France should have increased in the interval between 1785 and 1802 so much as from 25j millions to Ch. vii. in France {continued). 11 to 28. But if we allow that the multiplier might at that time have been 27 instead of 25f , it will be allowing as much as is in any degree probable, and yet this will imply an increase of nearly two millions from 1785 to 1813; an increase far short of the rate that has taken place in England, but still sufficient amply to shew the force of the principle of population in overcoming ob- stacles apparently the most powerful. With regard to the question of the in- crease of births in the six or seven first years after the commencement of the revolution, there is no probability of its ever being de- termined. In the confusion of the times, it is scarcely possible to suppose that the re- gisters should have been regularly kept; and as they were not collected in the year IX., there is no chance of their being brought forward in a correct state at a sub- sequent period. BOOK ( 12 ) BOOK II. CHAP. IX. (To follow Page 481, Vol. I. Edition 1807.] Of the Checks to Population in England (continued). 1 HE returns of the Population Act in 1811 undoubtedly presented extraordinary results. They shewed a greatly accelerated rate of progress, and a greatly improved healthiness of the people, notwithstanding the increase of the towns and the increased proportion of the population engaged in manufacturing employments. They thus furnished another striking instance of the readiness with which population starts forwards, under almost any weight, when the resources of a country are rapidly in- creasing. The amount of the population in 1800, together with the proportions of births, deaths and marriages, given in the registers, made it appear that the population had been for some time increasing at a rate rather exceeding what would result from a proportion Ch. ix. Of the Checks to Population, fyc. 13 proportion of births to deaths as 4 to 3, with a mortality of 1 in 40. These proportions would add to the po- pulation of a country every year i-hrth part; and if they were to continue, would ac- cording to table ii., page 168, double the population in every successive period of 83 years. This is a rate of progress which in a rich and well-peopled country might reasonably be expected to diminish rather than to increase. But instead of any such diminution, it appears that as far as 1810 it had been considerably accelerated. In 1810, according to the returns from each parish, with the addition of-Vforthe soldiers, sailors, &c, the population of Eng- land and Wales was estimated at 10,488,000% which compared with 9,168,000, the popu- lation of 1800 estimated in a similar man- ner, shews an increase in the ten years of 1,320,000. r The registered baptisms during ten years were 2,878,906, and the registered burials 1,950,189. The excess of the births is a See the Population Abstracts published in 1811, and the valuable Preliminary Observations by Mr.*Rickman. therefore 14 Of the Checks to Population Bk. i. therefore 928,717, which falls very consi- derably short of the increase shewn by the two enumerations. This deficiency could only be occasioned either by the enumera- tion in 1800 being below the truth, or by the inaccuracy of the registers of births and burials, or by the operation of these two causes combined ; as it is obvious that, if the population in 1800 were estimated cor- rectly, and the registers contained all the births and burials, the difference must ex- ceed rather than fall short of the real addi- tion to the population; that is, it would exceed it exactly by the number of persons dying abroad in the army, navy, &c. There is reason to believe that both causes had a share in producing the effect observed, though the latter, that is, the in- accuracy of the registers, in much the greatest degree. In estimating the population throughout the century % the births have been assumed to bear the same proportion at all times to * See a table of the population throughout the cen- tury, in page xxv. of the Preliminary Observations to the Population Abstracts, printed in 1811. the Ch. ix. in England (continued). 15 the number of people. It has been seen that such an assumption might often lead to a very incorrect estimate of the population of a country at different and distant periods. As the population however is known to have increased with great rapidity from 1800 to 1810, it is probable that the proportion of births did not essentially diminish during that period. But if, taking the last enume- ration as correct, we compare the births of 1810 with the births of 1800, the result will imply a larger population in 1800 than is given in the enumeration for that year. Thus the average of the last five years' births to 1810 is 297,000, and the average of the five years' births to 1800 is 263,000 But 297,000 is to 263,000 as 10,488,000, the population of 1810, to 9,287,000, which must therefore have been the population in 1800 if the proportion of births be assumed to be the same, instead of 9,168,000, the re- sult of the enumeration. It is further to be observed that the increase of population from 1795 to 1800 is according to the table unusually small, compared with most of the preceding periods of five years. And a slight 16 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. slight inspection of the registers will shew that the proportion of births for five years from 1795, including the diminished num- bers of 1796 and 1800, was more likely to be below than above the general average. For these reasons, together with the general impression on the subject, it is probable that the enumeration in 1800 was short of the truth, and perhaps the population at that time may be safely taken at as much as 9,287,000 at the least, or about 119,000 greater than the returns gave it. But even upon this supposition, neither the excess of births above the deaths in the whole of the ten years, nor the proportion of births to deaths, as given in the registers, will account for an increase from 9,287,000 to 10,488,000. Yet it is not probable that the increase has been much less than is shewn by the proportion of the births at the two periods. Some allowance must therefore necessarily be made for omissions in the registers of births and deaths, which are known to be very far from correct, particularly the registers of births. There is reason to believe that there are few Ch. ix. in England (continued). 17 tew or no omissions in the register of mar- riages ; and if we suppose the omissions in the births to be one-6*th, this will preserve a proportion of the births to the marriages as 4 to 1, a proportion which appears to be satisfactorily established upon other grounds a ; but if we are warranted in this supposition, it will be fair to take the omis- sions in the deaths at such a number as will make the excess of the births above the deaths in the ten years accord with the in- crease of population estimated by the in- crease of the births. The registered births in the ten years, as was mentioned before, are 2,878,906, which increased by one-6'th will be 3,358,723. The registered burials are 1,950,189, which in- creased by one-12th will be 2,112,704. The latter subtracted from the former will give 1,246,019 for the excess of births, and the increase of population in the ten years, which number added to 9,287,000, the corrected population of 1800, will give 10,533,019, forty-five thousand above the enumeration of 1810, leaving almost exactly a See the Preliminary Observations on the Population Abstracts, p. xx\\. *VOL. III. c the 18 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. the number which in the course of the ten years appears to have died abroad. This number has been calculated generally at about 4i per cent, on the male births ; but in the present case there are the means of ascertaining more accurately the number of males dying abroad during the period in question. In the last population returns the male and female births and deaths are separated ; and from the excess of the male births above the female births, compared with the male and female deaths, it appears that forty-five thousand males died abroad a . The assumed omissions therefore in the births and burials seem to answer so far very well. It remains to see whether the same suppo- sitions will give such a proportion of births to deaths, with such a rate of mortality, as will also account for an increase of numbers in ten years from 9,287,000 to 10,488,000. If we divide the population of 1810 by * See Population Abstracts, 1811, page 196 of the Parish Register Abstract. It is certainly very extraordinary that a smaller pro- portion of males than usual should appear to have died abroad from 1800 to 1810; but as the registers for this period seem to prove it, 1 have made my calculations ac- cordingly. the Ch. ix. in England (cont'mued). 19 the average births of the preceding five years, with the addition of one-6tb, it will appear that the proportion of births to the popula- tion is as 1 to 30. But it is obvious that if the population be increasing with some rapidity, the average of births for five }^ears, compared with the population at the end of such period, must give the proportion of births too small. And further there is al- ways a probability that a proportion which is correct for five years may not be correct for ten years. In order to obtain the true proportion applicable to the progress of population during the period in question, we must compare the annual average of the births for the whole term, with the average or mean population of the whole term. The whole number of births, with the addition of |, is, as before stated, 3,358,723, and the annual average during the ten years 335,872. The mean population, or the mean between 10,488,000 (the population of 1810) and 9,287,000 (the corrected po- pulation of 1800) is 9,887,000; and the latter number divided by the average of c 2 the 20 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. the births will give a proportion of births to the population as 1 to rather less than 291, instead of 30, which will make a consider- able difference. In the same manner, if we divide the population of 1810 by the average of the burials for the preceding five years, with the addition of one- 12th, the mortality will appear to be as I in nearly 50 ; but upon the same grounds as with regard to the births, an average of the burials for five years, compared with the population at the end of such term, must give the proportion of burials too small; and further it is known, in the present case, that the proportion of burials to the population by no means con- tinued the same during the whole time. In fact the registers clearly shew an improve- ment in the healthiness of the country, and a diminution of mortality progressively through the ten years ; and while the ave- rage number of annual births increased from 265,000 to 297,000, or more than one- 8th, the burials increased only from 192,000 to 196,000, or one-48th. It is obviously ne- cessary Ch. ix. in England (continued). 21 cessary then for the purpose in view to compare the average mortality with the average or mean population. The whole number of burials in the ten years, with the addition of one-12th, is, as was before stated, 2,112,704, and the mean population 9,887,000. The latter, divided by the former, gives the annual average of burials compared with the population as 1 to rather less than 47. But a proportion of births as 1 to 291, with a proportion of deaths as 1 to 47, will add yearly to the numbers of a country one-79th of the whole, and in ten years will increase the population from9,287,000 to 10,531,000, leaving 43,000 for the deaths abroad, and agreeing very nearly with the calculation founded on the excess of births a . We * A general formula for estimating the population of a country at any distance from a certain period, under given circumstances of births and mortality, may be found in Bridge's Elements of Algebra, p. 225. Log. A log. P + n x log. 1 + m b m b A representing the required population at the end of any number of years ; n the number of years ; P the actual population 22 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. We may presume therefore that the as- sumed omissions in the births and deaths from 1800 to 1810 are not far from the truth. But if these omissions of one-6th for the births and one-12th for the burials, may be considered as nearly right for the period be- tween 1800 and 1810, it is probable that they may be applied without much danger of error to the period between 1780 and 1800, and may serve to correct some of the con- clusions founded on the births alone. Next to an accurate enumeration, a calculation from the excess of births above the deaths is the most to be depended upon. Indeed population at the given period; ^ the proportion of yearly deaths to the population, or ratio of mortality ; \ the proportion of yearly births to the population, or ratio of births. In the present case, P = 9,287,000 ; n 10 ; m = 47 ; b = 29l. m b _ = y v and 1 + m b _ in b The log. of $-- = 00546; .'. n X log. 1 - f m b m b = 05460. Log. P. = 6.96787, which added to 05460 = 7.02247 the log. of A, the number answering to which is 10.531,000. when Ch. ix. in England (continued). 23 when the registers contain all the births and deaths, and these are the means of setting out from a known population, it is obviously the same as an actual enumera- tion ; and where a nearly correct allowance can be made for the omissions in the re- gisters, and for the deaths abroad, a much nearer approximation to it may be obtained in this way than from the proportion of births to the whole population, which is known to be liable to such frequent va- riations. The whole number of births returned in the twenty years,from 1780 to 1800, is 5,014,899, and of the burials 3,840,455. If we addone- 6th to the former, and one-12th to the latter, the two numbers will be 5,850,715; and 4,160,492, and subtracting the latter from the former, the excess of the births above the deaths will be 1,690,223. Adding this ex- cess tothe population of 1780, as calculated in Mr. Rickman's tables, from the births, which is7,95S,000,the result willbe9,643,000, a number which, after making a proper al- lowance for the deaths abroad, is very much above the population of 1800, as be- fore corrected, and still more above the number 24 Of the Checks to Population Blc. t\. number which is given in the table as the result of the enumeration. But if we proceed upon the safer ground just suggested, and, taking the corrected population of 1800 as established, subtract from it the excess of the births during the twenty years, diminished by the probable number of deaths abroad, which in this case will be about 124,000, we shall have the number 7,721,000 for the population of 1780, instead of 7,953,000 ; and there is good reason to believe that this is nearer the truth a ; and that not only in 1780, but in many of the intermediate periods, the esti- mate from the births has represented the population as greater, and increasing more irregularly, than would be found to be true, if recourse could be had to enumerations. This has arisen from the proportion of births to the^ population being variable, and, on the whole, greater in 1780, and at other periods during the course of the twenty years, than it was in 1800, In 1795, for instance, the population is The very small difference between the population of 1780 and 1785, as given in the table, seems strongly to imply that one of the two estimates is erroneous. represented Ch. ix. in England (continued). 25 represented to be 9,055,000, and in 1800 9,168,000 a ; but if we suppose the first number to be correct, and add the excess of the births above the deaths in the five intervening years, even without making any allowance for omissions in the registers, we shall find that the population in 1800 ought to have been 9,398,000 instead of 9,168,000 ; or if we take the number re- turned for 1800 as correct, it will appear by subtracting from it the excess of births during the five preceding years, that the population in 1795 ought to have been 8,825,000, instead of 9,055,000. Hence it follows, that the estimate from the births in 1795 cannot be correct. To obtain the population at that period, the safest way is to apply the before-men- tioned corrections to the registers, and, hav- ing made the allowance of 4| per cent, on the male births for the deaths abroad, subtract the remaining excess of the births from the corrected returns of 1800. The result in a Population Abstracts, 1811. Preliminary View, p. XXV. this 26 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. this case will be 8,831,086 for the popula- tion of 1795, implying an increase in the five years of 455,9 14, instead of only 1 13,000, as shewn by the table calculated from the births. If we proceed in the same manner with the period from 1790 to 1795, we shall find that the excess of births above the deaths (after the foregoing corrections have been applied, and an allowance has been made of 4j per cent, upon the male births for the deaths abroad), will be 415,669, which, subtracted from 8,831,086, the population of 1795, as above esti- mated, leaves 8,415,417 for the population of 1790. Upon the same principle, the excess of the births above the deaths in the interval between 1785 and 1790 will turn out to be 416,776. The population in 1785 will therefore be 7,998,641 . And in like manner the excess of the births above the deaths in the interval between 1780 and 1785 will be 277,544, and the population in 1780 7,721,097. The Ch. ix. in England (continued). 27 The two tables therefore, of the popu- lation, from 1780 to 1810, will stand thus: Table, calculated from the excess of the births above the deaths, after an allow- ance made for the omis- sions in the registers, and the deaths abroad. Table, calculated from the births alone, in the Pre- liminary Observations to the Population Abstracts printed in 1811. Population in 1780 1785 1790 1795 1800 1805 1810 7,953,000 8,016,000 8,675,000 9,055,000 9,168,000 9,828,000 10,488,000 Population in 1780 1785 1790 1795 1800 1805 1810 7,721,000 7,998,000 8,415,000 8,831,000 9,287,000 9,837,000 10,488,000 In the first table, or table calculated from the births alone, the additions made to the population in each period of five years are as follow : From 1780 to 1785 63,000 From 1785 to 1790 659,000 From 1790 to 1795 380,000 From 1795 to 1800 113,000 From 1800 to 1805 660,000 From 1805 to 1810 660,000 In 28 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. In the second table, or table calculated from the excess of the births above the deaths, after the proposed corrections have been applied, the additions made to the population in each period of five years will stand thus : From 1780 to 1785 277,000 From 1785 to 1790 417,000 From 1790 to 1795 416,000 From 1795 to 1800 456,000 From 1800 to 1805 550,000 From 1805 to 1810 651,000 The progress of the population, according to this latter table, appears much more na- tural and probable than according to the former. It is in no respect likely that, in the in- terval between 1780 and 1785, the increase of the population should only have been 63,000, and in the next period 659,000 ; or that, in the interval between 1795 and 1800, it should have been only 113,000, and in the next period 660,000. But it is not necessary to dwell on probabilities ; the most distinct proofs may be brought to Ch. ix. in England (continued). 29 to shew that, whether the new table be right or not, the old table must be wrong. Without any allowances being made for omissions in the registers, the excess of the births above the deaths, in the period from 1780 to 1785, shews an increase of 193,000, instead of 63,000. And, on the other hand, no allowances for omissions in the registers, that could with the slightest de- gree of probability be supposed, would make the excess of births above the deaths in the period from 1785 to 1790 equal to 659,000. Making no allowance for omissions, this excess only amounts to 317,406 ; and if we were to suppose the omissions in the births one 4th, instead of one 6th, and that there were no omissions in the registers of burials, and that no one died abroad, the excess would still fall short of the number stated by many thousands. The same results would follow, if we were to estimate the progress of popula- tion during these periods by the proportion of births to deaths, and the rate of mor- tality. In the first period the increase would turn out to be very much greater than 30 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. than the increase stated, and in the other very much less. Similar observations may be made with regard to some of the other periods in the old table, particularly that between 179-5 and 1800, which has been already noticed. It will be found on the other hand that, if the proportion of births to deaths during each period be estimated with tolerable accuracy and compared with the mean population, the rate of the progress of the population determined by this criterion will, in every period, agree very nearly with the rate of pro- gress determined by the excess of the births above the deaths, after applying the pro- posed corrections. And it is further worthy of remark that, if the corrections proposed should be in some degree inaccurate, as is probable, the errors arising from any such inaccuracies are likely to be very much less considerable than those which must necessarily arise from the assumption on which the old table is founded ; namely, that the births bear at all times the same proopition to the population. Of Ch. ix. in England f continued J. 31 Of course I do not mean to reject any estimates of population formed in this way, when no better materials are to be found ; but, in the present case, the registers of the burials as well as baptisms are given every year, as far back as 1780, and these regis- ters, with the firm ground of the last enu- meration to stand upon, afford the means of giving a more correct table of the popu- lation from 1780 than was before furnished, and of shewing at the same time the un- certainty of estimates from the births alone, particularly with a view to the progress of population during particular periods. In estimating the whole population of a large country, two or three hundred thousand are not of much importance ; but, in estimating the rate of increase during a period of five or ten years, an error to this amount is quite fatal. It will be allowed, I conceive, to make an essential difference in our con- clusions respecting the rate of increase for any five years which we may fix upon, whether the addition made to the popula- tion during the term in question is 63,000 or 32 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. or 277,000, 115,000 or 456,000, 659,000 or 417,000. With regard to the period of the century previous to 1780, as the registers of the bap- tisms and burials are not returned for every year, it is not possible to apply the same cor- rections. And it will be obvious that, in the table calculated from the births previous to this period, when the registers are only given for insulated years at some distance from each other, very considerable errors may arise, not merely from the varying propor- tion of the births to the population, on averages of five years, but from the indi- vidual years produced not representing with tolerable correctness these averages \ A very slight glance at the valuable table of baptisms, burials and marriages, given in the Preliminary Observations, to the Population Abstracts b , will shew ' From the one or the other of these causes, I have little doubt, that the numbers in the table for 1 760 and 1770, which imply so rapid an increase of population in that interval, do not bear the proper relation to each other. It is probable that the number given for 1770 is too great. b P. 20. how Ch. ix. in England (continued). 33 how very little dependence ought to be placed upon inferences respecting the population drawn from the number of births, deaths or marriages in individual years. If, for instance, we were estimating the population in the two years 1800 and 1801, compared with the two following years 1802 and 1803, from the proportion of mar- riages to the population, assuming this pro- portion to be always the same, it would ap- pear that, if the population in the first two years were nine millions, in the second two years immediately succeeding it would be considerably above twelve millions, and thus it would seem to have increased above three millions, or more than one-third, in this short interval. Nor would the result of an estimate, formed from the births for the two years 1800 and 1801, compared with the two years 1803 and 1804, be materially dif- ferent ; at least such an estimate would in- dicate an increase of two millions six hun- dred thousand in three years. The reader can hardly be surprised at these results, if he recollects that the births, deaths and marriages bear but a small *vol. in. d proportion 34 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. proportion to the whole population ; and that consequently variations in either of these, which may take place from temporary causes, cannot possibly be accompanied by similar variations in the whole mass of the population. An increase in the births of one-third, which might occur in a single year, instead of increasing the population one-third, would only perhaps increase it one-eightieth or ninetieth. It follows therefore, as I stated in the last chapter, that the table of the population for the century previous to 1780, calculated from the returns of the births alone, at the distance of ten years each, can only be consi- dered as a very rough approximation towards the truth, in the absence of better mate- rials, and can scarcely in any degree be depended upon for the comparative rate of increase at particular periods. The population in 1810, compared with that of 1800, corrected as proposed in this chapter, implies a less rapid increase than the difference between the two enumera- tions ; and it has further appeared that the assumed proportion of births to deaths as 47 to Oil. ix. in England (continued). 35 47 to 29$ is rather below than above the truth. Yet this proportion is quite extra- ordinary for a rich and well-peopled terri- tory. It would add to the population of a country one 79th every year, and, were it to continue, would, according to table ii. p. 168 in this volume, double the number of inhabitants in less than fifty-five years. This is a rate of increase, which in the nature of things cannot be permanent. It has been occasioned by the stimulus of a greatly-increased demand for labour, com- bined with a greatly-increased power of production, both in agriculture and manu- factures. These are the two elements ne- cessary to form an effective encouragement to a rapid increase of population. A failure of either of these must immediately weaken the stimulus ; and there is but too much reason to fear the failure of one of them at present. But what has already taken place is a striking illustration of the principle of population, and a proof that in spite of great towns, manufacturing occupations, and the gradually-acquired habits of an opulent and luxuriant people, if the re- d 2 sources 36 Of the Checks to Population, 8$c. Bk. ii. sources of a country will admit of a rapid increase, and if these resources are so ad- vantageously distributed as to occasion a constantly-increasing demand for labour, the population will not fail to keep pace with them. BOOK ( 37 ) BOOK III. CHAP. III. [To follow Page 45, Vol. II. Edition 1807.] Of Systems of Equality (continued). IT was suggested to me some years since by persons for whose judgment I have a high respect, that it might be advisable, in a new edition, to throw out the matter rela- tive to systems of equality, to Wallace, Condorcet and Godwin, as having in a con- siderable degree lost its interest, and as not being strictly connected with the main sub- ject of the Essay, which is an explanation and illustration of the theory of population. But independently of its being natural for me to have some little partiality for that part of the work which led to those inqui- ries on which the main subject rests; I really think that there should be somewhere on record an answer to systems of equality founded on the principle of population ; and perhaps such an answer is as appropri- ately placed, and is likely to have as much effect, among the illustrations and applica- tions 38 Of Systems of Equality, continued* Bk. iii. tions of the principle of population, as in any other situation to which it could be assigned. The appearances in all human societies, particularly in all those which are the furthest advanced in civilization and improvement, will ever be such, as to inspire superficial observers with a belief that a prodigious change for the better might be effected by the introduction of a system' of equality and of common property. They see abundance in some quarters, and want in others ; and the natural and obvious remedy seems to be an equal division of the produce. They see a pro- digious quantity of human exertion wasted upon trivial, useless, and sometimes per- nicious objects, which might either be wholly saved or more effectively em- ployed. They see invention after invention in machinery brought forward, which is seemingly calculated, in the most marked manner, to abate the sum of human toil. Yet with these apparent means of giving plenty, leisure and happiness to all, they still sec the labours of the great mass of so- ciety undiminished, and their condition, if not Ch. iii. Of Systems of Equality, continued. 39 not deteriorated, in no very striking and palpable manner improved. Under these eireumstances, it cannot be a matter of wonder that proposals for systems of equality should be continually reviving. After periods when the subject has under- gone a thorough discussion, or when some great experiment in improvement has failed, it is likely that the question should lie dor- mant for a time, and that the opinions of the advocates of equality should be ranked among those errors which had passed away to be heard of no more. But it is probable that if the world were to last for any num- ber of thousand years, systems of equality would be among those errors, which like the tunes of a barrel organ, to use the illus- tration of Dugald Stewart a , will never cease to return at certain intervals. I am induced to make these remarks, and to add a little to what I have already said on systems of equality, instead of leaving out the whole discussion, by a tendency to a revival of this kind at the present moment. a Preliminary Dissertation to Supplement to the Ency- clopaedia Britannica, p. 121. A gentleman, 40 Of Systems of Equality, continued. Bk.iii. A gentleman, for whom I have a very sincere respect, Mr. Owen, of Lanark, has lately published a work entitled A New View of Society, which is intended to prepare the public mind for the introduction of a system involving a community of labour and of goods. It is also generally known that an idea has lately prevailed among some of the lower classes of society, that the land is the people's farm, the rent of which ought to be equally divided among them; and that they have been deprived of the benefits which belong to them from this their natural inheritance, by the injustice and oppres- sion of their stewards, the landlords. Mr. Owen is, I believe, a man of real be- nevolence, who has done much good ; and every friend to humanity must heartily wish him success in his endeavours to procure an Act of Parliament for limiting the hours of working among the children in the cotton manufactories, and preventing them from being employed at too early an age. He is further entitled to great attention on all subjects relating to education, from the ex- perience and knowledge which he must have Ch. iii. Of Systems of Equality, continued. 41 have gained in an intercourse of many years with two thousand manufacturers, and from the success which is said to have resulted from his modes of management. A theory professed to be founded on such experience is no doubt worthy of much more considera- tion than one formed in a closet. The claims to attention possessed by the author of the new doctrines relating to land are certainly very slender ; and the doc- trines themselves indicate a very great de- gree of ignorance; but the errors of the la- bouring classes of society are always en- titled to great indulgence and consideration. They are the natural and pardonable re- sults of their liability to be deceived by first appearances, and by the arts of designing- men, owing to the nature of their situation, and the scanty knowledge which in general falls to their share. And, except in ex- treme cases, it must always be the wish of those who are better informed, that they should be brought to a sense of the truth, rather by patience and the gradual diffusion of education and knowledge, than by any harsher methods. After 42 Oj f Systems of Equality, continued. Bk. iii. After what I have already said on systems of equality in the preceding chapters, I shall not think it necessary to enter into a long and elaborate refutation of these doc- trines. I merely mean to give an additional reason for leaving on record an answer to systems of equality, founded on the princi- ple of population, together with a concise restatement of this answer for practical application. Of the two decisive arguments against such systems, one is, the unsuitableness of a state of equality, both according to expe- rience and theory, to the production of those stimulants to exertion which can alone over- come the natural indolence of man, and prompt him to the proper cultivation of the earth and the fabrication of those conve- niences and comforts which are necessary to his happiness. And the other, the inevitable and neces- sary poverty and misery in which every sys- tem of equality must shortly terminate from the acknowledged tendency of the human race to increase faster than the means of subsistence, unless such increase be pre- vented Ch. iii. Of Systems of Equality, continued. 43 vented by means infinitely more cruel than those which result from the laws of private property, and the moral obligation imposed on every man by the commands of God and natme to support his own children. The first of these arguments has, I confess, always appeared to my own mind sufficient- ly conclusive. A state, in which an inequa- lity of conditions offers the natural rewards of good conduct, and inspires widely and generally the hopes of rising and the fears of falling in society, is unquestionably the best calculated to develope the energies and faculties of man, and the best suited to the exercise and improvement of human virtue 3 . And history, in every case of equality that has yet occurred, has uniformly borne wit- ness to the depressing and deadening effects which arise from the want of this stimulus. But still perhaps it may be true that neither experience northeoryonthis subject is quite so decisive as to preclude all plausible ar- a See this subject very ably treated in a work on the Re- cords of the Creation, and the M oral Attributes of the Creator, by the Rev. John Bird Sumner, not long since published; a work of very great merit, which I hope soon to see in as extensive circulation as it deserves. guments 44 Of Systems of Equality, continued. Bk. iii. guments on the other side. It may be said that the instances which history records of systems of equality really carried into exe- cution are so few, and those in societies so little advanced from a state of barbarism, as to afford no fair conclusions relative to pe- riods of great civilization and improve- ment ; that in other instances in ancient times, where approaches were made toward a tolerable equality of conditions, examples of considerable energy of character in some lines of exertion are not unfrequent ; and that in modern times some societies, parti- cularly of Moravians, are known to have had much of their property in common without occasioning the destruction of their industry. It may be said that, allowing the stimulus of inequality of conditions to have been necessary, in order to raise man from the indolence and apathy of the savage to the activity and intelligence of civilized life, it does not follow that the continuance of the same stimulus should be necessary when this activity and energy of mind has been once gained. It may then be allow- able quietly to enjoy the benefit of a re- gimen Ch. iii. Of Systems of Equality, continued. 45 gimen which, like many other stimulants, having produced its proper effect at a cer- tain point must be left off, or exhaustion, disease and death will follow. These observations are certainly not of a nature to produce conviction in those who have studied the human character ; but they are to a certain degree plausible, and do not admit of so definite and decisive an answer as to make the proposal for an expe- riment in modern times utterly absurd and unreasonable. The peculiar advantage of the other ar- gument against systems of equality, that which is founded on the principle of popu- lation, is, that it is not only still more ge- nerally and uniformly confirmed by expe- rience, in every age and in every part of the world, but it is so pre-eminently clear in theory, that no tolerably plausible answer can be given to it ; and consequently no decent pretence can be brought forward for an experiment. The affair is a matter of the most simple calculation applied to the known properties of land, and the propor- tion of births to deaths which takes place in 46 Of Systems of Equality, continued. Bk. iii. in almost every country village. There are many parishes in England, where, notwith- standing the actual difficulties attending the support of a family which must necessarily occur in every well-peopied country, and making no allowances for omissions in the registers, the births are to the deaths in the proportion of 2 to 1. This proportion, with the usual rate of mortality in country places, of about 1 in 50, would continue doubling the population in 41 years, if there were no emigrations from the parish. But in any system of equality, either such as that pro- posed by Mr. Owen, or in parochial part- nerships i r i land, not only would there be no means of emigration to other parishes with any prospect of relief, but the rate of increase at first would of course be much greater than in the present state of society. What then, I would ask, is to prevent the division of the produce of the soil to each individual from becoming every year less and less, till the whole society and every individual member of it are pressed down by want and misery a ? ' This In the Spencean system, as published by the secretary of Ch. iii. Of Systems of Equality, continued. 47 This is a very simple and intelligible question. And surely no man ought to propose or support a system of equality, who is not able to give a rational answer to it, at least in theory. But even in theory, I have never yet heard any thing approach- ing to a rational answer to it. It is a very superficial observation which has sometimes been made, that it is a con- tradiction to lay great stress upon the ef- ficacy of moral restraint hi an improved and improving state of society, according of the Society of Spencean Philanthropists, it unfor- tunately happens, that after the proposed allowances have been made for the expenses of the government, and of the other bodies in the state which are intended to be supported, there would be absolutely no remainder ; and the people would not derive a single sixpence from their estate, even at first, and on the supposition of the national debt being entirely abolished, without the slightest com- pensation to the national creditors. The annual rent of the land, houses, mines and fish- eries, is estimated at 150 millions, about three times its real amount ; yet, even upon this extravagant estimate, it is calculated that the division would only come to about four pounds a head, not more than is sometimes given to individuals from the poor's rates; a miserable provision ' and yet constantly diminishing. to 48 Of Systems of Equality , continued. Bk. iii. to the present structure of it, and yet to suppose that it would not act with sufficient force in a system of equality, which almost always presupposes a great diffusion of in- formation, and a great improvement of the human mind. Those who have made this observation do not see that the encourage- ment and motive to moral restraint are at once destroyed in a system of equality, and community of goods. Let us suppose that in a system of equality, in spite of the best exertions to procure more food, the population is pressing hard against the limits of subsistence, and all are becoming very poor. It is evidently necessary under these circumstances, in order to prevent the society from starving, that the rate at which the population increases, should be retarded. But who are the persons that are to exercise the restraint thus called for, and either to marry late or not at all ? It does not seem to be a necessary consequence of a system of equality that all the human passions should be at once extinguished by it ; but if not, those who might wish to marry would feel it hard that they should be among the Ch. iii. Of Systems of Equality, continued. 49 the number forced to restrain their inclina- tions. As all would be equal, and in similar circumstances, there would be no reason whatever why one individual should think himself obliged to practise the duty of re- straint more than another. The thing however must be done, with any hope of avoiding universal misery ; and in a state of equality, the necessary restraint could only be effected by some general law. But how is this law to be supported, and how are the violations of it to be punished ? is the man who marries early to be pointed at with the finger of scorn ? is he to be whipped at the cart's tail ? is he to be con- fined for years in a prison ? is he to have his children exposed ? Are not all direct punishments for an offence of this kind shocking and unnatural to the last degree? And yet, if it be absolutely necessary, in order to prevent the most overwhelming wretchedness, that there should be some restraint on the tendency to early marriages, when the resources of the country are only sufficient to support a slow rate of increase, can the most fertile imagination conceive * vol, in, e one 50 Of Systems of Equality, continued. Bk. iii. one at once so natural, so just, so consonant to the laws of God and to the best laws framed by the most enlightened men, as that each individual should be responsible for the maintenance of his own children ; that is, that he should be subjected to the natural inconveniences and difficulties arising from the indulgence of his inclina- tions, and to no other whatever ? That this natural check to early marriages arising from a view of the difficulty attending the support of a large family operates very widely throughout all classes of society in every civilized state, and may be expected to be still more effective, as the lower classes of people continue to improve in knowledge and prudence, cannot admit of the slightest doubt. But the operation of this natural check depends exclusively upon the ex- istence of the laws of property, and suc- cession ; and in a state of equality and community of property could only be re- placed by some artificial regulation of a very different stamp, and a much more un- natural character. Of this Mr. Owen is fully sensible, and has in consequence taxed Ch. iii. Of Systems of Equality, continued. 51 taxed his ingenuity to the utmost to invent some mode, by which the difficulties arising from the progress of population could be got rid of, in the state of society to which he looks forward. His absolute inability to suggest any mode of accomplishing this object that is not unnatural, immoral, or cruel in a high degree, together with the same want of success in every other person, ancient a or modern, who has made a similar attempt, seem to shew that the argument against systems of equality founded on the principle of population does not admit of a plausible answ r er, even in theory. The fact of the tendency of population to increase beyond the means of subsistence may be seen in almost every register of a country parish in the kingdom. The unavoidable effect of this tendency to depress the whole body of the people in want and misery, unless the progress of the population be somehow or other retarded, is equally ob- vious ; and the impossibility of checking The reader has already seen in ch. xhi. bk. i. the de- testable means of checking population proposed by some ancient lawgivers in order to support their systems of equality. e 2 the 52 Of Systems of Equality, continued. Bk. iii. the rate of increase in a state of equality, without resorting to regulations that are unnatural, immoral or cruel, forms an ar- gument at once conclusive against every such system. BOOK < 53 ) BOOK III. CONTINUATION OF CHAP. IV. [To follow Page 72, Vol. II. Edition 180".] In all countries the progress of wealth must depend mainly upon the industry, skill and success of individuals, and upon the state and demands of other countries. Consequently, in all countries, great varia- tions may take place at different times in the rate at which wealth increases, and in the demand for labour. But though the progress of population is mainly regulated by the effective demand for labour, it is obvious that the number of people cannot conform itself immediately to the state of this demand. Some time is required to bring more labour into the market when it is wanted ; and some time to check the supply when it is flowing in with too great rapidity. If these variations amount to no more than that natural sort of oscillation noticed in an early part of this work, winch seems almost always to accompany the pro- gress 54 Of Emigration. Bk. iii. gress of population and food, they should be submitted to as a part of the usual course of things. But circumstances may occasionally give them great force, and then, during the period that the supply of labour is increasing faster than the de- mand, the labouring classes are subject to the most severe distress. If, for instance, from a combination of external and inter- nal causes, a very great stimulus should be given to the population of a country for ten or twelve years together, and it should then com- paratively cease, it is clear that labour will continue flowing into the market, with al- most undiminished rapidity, while the means of employing and paying it have been essentially contracted. It is precisely under these circumstances that emigration is most useful as a temporary relief; and it is in these circumstances that Great Britain finds herself placed at present*. Though no emigration should take place, the population will by degrees conform itself to the state of the demand for labour ; but the interval must be marked by the most severe distress, 1 1816 and 1817. the Ch. iv. Of Emigration. 55 the amount of which can scarcely be re- duced by any human efforts ; because* though it may be mitigated at particular periods, and as it affects particular classes, it will be proportion ably extended over a larger space of time and a greater number of people. The only real relief in such a case is emigration ; and the subject at the present moment is well worthy the atten- tion of the government, both as a matter of humanity and policy. BOOK ( 56 ) BOOK III. CHAP. VII. [To follow Page 112, Vol. II. Edition 1807-] Of Poor- Lazes, continued. 1 HE remarks made in the last chapter on the nature and effects of the poor-laws have been in the most striking manner confirmed by the experience of the years 1815, 1816 and 1817- During these years, two points of the very highest importance have been established, so as no longer to admit of a doubt in the mind of any rational man. The first is, that the country does not in point of fact fulfil the promise which it makes to the poor in the poor-laws, to maintain and find in employment, by means of parish assessmc; 's, those who are unable to sup- port tht i&elves or their families, either from wan' uf work or any other cause. And so iidly, that with a very great in- crease of legal parish assessments, aided by the most liberal and praiseworthy contri- butions Ch. vii. Of Poor-Laws, continued. 57 butions of voluntary charity, the country has been wholly unable to find adequate employment for the numerous labourers and artificers who were able as well as willing to work. It can no longer surely be contended that the poor-laws really perform what they promise, when it is known that many almost starving families have been found in London and other great towns, who are deterred from going on the parish by the crowded, unhealthy and horrible state of the workhouses into which they would be received, if indeed they could be received at all ; when it is known that many parishes have been absolutely unable to raise the ne- cessary assessments, the increase of which, according to the existing laws, have tended only to bring more and more persons upon the parish, and to make what was collected less and less effectual ; and when it is known that there has been an almost uni- versal cry from one end of the kingdom to the other for voluntary charity to come in aid of the parochial assessments. These strong indications of the ineffi- ciency 58 Of Poor-Laws, continued. Bk. iii. ciency of the poor-laws, may merely be considered, not only as incontrovertible proofs of the fact that they do not perform what they promise, but as affording the strongest presumption that they cannot do it. The best of all reasons for the breach of a promise, is, the absolute impossibility of executing it ; indeed it is the only plea that can ever be considered as valid. But though it may be fairly pardonable not to execute an impossibilit} r , it is unpardonable knowingly to promise one. And if it be still thought advisable to act upon these statutes as far as is practicable, it would surely be wise so to alter the terms in which they are expressed, and the general inter- pretation given to them, as not to convey to the poor a false notion of what really is within the range of practicability. It has appeared further as a matter of fact, that very large voluntary contribu- tions, combined with greatly increased parochial assessments, and aided by the most able and incessant exertions of indi- viduals, have failed to give the necessary employment to those who have been thrown out Ch. vii. Of Poor-Laws, continued. 59 out of work by the sudden falling off of demand which lias occurred during the last two or three years. It might perhaps have been foreseen that, as the great movements of society, the great causes which render a nation pro- gressive, stationary or declining, for longer or shorter periods, cannot be supposed to depend much upon parochial assessments or the contributions of charity, it could not be expected that any efforts of this kind should have power to create in a stationary or declining state of things that effective demand for labour which only belongs to a progressive state. But to those who did not see this truth before, the melancholy experience of the last two years must have brought it home with an overpowering con- viction. It does not however by any means follow that the exertions which have been made to relieve the present distresses have been ill directed. On the contrary, they have not only been prompted by the most praise- worthy motives; they have not only ful- filled the great moral duty of assisting our fellow- 60 Of Poor- Lazvs f continued. Bk. iii. fellow-creatures in distress ; but they have in point of fact done great good, or at least prevented great evil. Their partial failure does not necessarily indicate either a want of energy or a want of skill in those who have taken the lead in these efforts, but merely that a part only of what has been attempted is practicable. It is practicable to mitigate the violence and relieve the severe pressure of the present distress, so as to carry the sufferers through to better times, though even this can only be done at the expense of some sacrifices, not merely of the rich, but of other classes of the poor. But it is impracticable by any exertions, either individual or national, to restore at once that brisk demand for commodities and labour which has been lost by events, that, however they may have originated, are now beyond the power of control. The whole subject is surrounded on all sides by the most formidable difficulties, and in no state of things is it so necessary to recollect the saying of Daniel de Foe quoted in the last chapter. The manufac- turers Ch. vii. Of Poor-Laws, continued. 61 turers all over the country, and the Spital- fields weavers in particular, are in a state of the deepest distress, occasioned imme- diately and directly by the want of demand for the produce of their industry, and the consequent necessity felt by the masters of turning off many of their workmen, in order to proportion the supply to the con- tracted demand. It is proposed however, by some well-meaning people, to raise by subscription a fund for the express purpose of setting to work again those who have been turned off by their masters, the effect of which can only be to continue glutting a market, already much too fully supplied. This is most naturally and justly objected to by the masters, as it prevents them from withdrawing the supply, and taking the only course which can prevent the total destruction of their capitals, and the neces- sity of turning off all their men instead of a part. On the other hand, some classes of mer- chants and manufacturers clamour very loudly for the prohibition of all foreign commodities which may enter into compe- tition 62 Of Poor-Laws, continued. Bk.iii. tition with domestic products, and interfere, as they intimate, with the employment of British industry. But tins is most naturally and most justly deprecated by other classes of British subjects, who are employed to a very great extent in preparing and manu- facturing those commodities which are to purchase our imports from foreign coun- tries. And it must be allowed to be per- fectly true that a court-ball, at which only British stuffs are admitted, may be the means of throwing out of employment in one quarter of the country just as many persons as it furnishes with employment in another. Still, it would be desirable if possible to employ those that are out of work, if it were merely to avoid the bad moral effects of idleness, and of the evil habits which might be generated by depending for a considerable time on mere alms. But the difficulties just stated will shew, that we ought to proceed in this part of the attempt with great caution, and that the kinds of employment which ought to be chosen are those, the results of which will not Ch. vii. Of Poor-Laws, continued. 63 not interfere with existing capitals. Such are public works of all descriptions, the making and repairing of roads, bridges, railways, canals, &c. ; and now perhaps, since the great loss of agricultural capital, almost every sort of labour upon the land, which could be carried on by public sub- scription. Yet even in this way of employing la- bour, the benefit to some must bring with it disadvantages to others. That portion of each person's revenue which might go in subscriptions of this kind, must of course be lost to the various sorts of labour which its expenditure in the usual channels would have supported; and the want of demand thus occasioned in these channels must cause the pressure of distress to be felt in quarters which might otherwise have es- caped it. But this is an effect which, in such cases, it is impossible to avoid ; and, as a temporary measure, it is not only chari- table but just, to spread the evil over a larger surface, in order that its violence on particular parts may be so mitigated as to be made bearable by all. The 64 Of Poor- Laws, continued. Bk. iii. The great object to be kept in view, is to support the people through their present distresses, in the hope (and I trust a just one) of better times. The difficulty is without doubt considerably aggravated by the prodigious stimulus which has been given to the population of the country of late years, the effects of which cannot sud- denly subside. But it will be seen pro- bably, when the next returns of the popula- tion are made, that the marriages and births have diminished, and the deaths increased in a still greater degree than in 1800 and 1801 ; and the continuance of this effect to a certain degree for a few years will retard the progress of the population, and com- bined with the increasing wants of Europe and America from their increasing riches, and the adaptation of the supply of com- modities at home to the new distribution of wealth occasioned by the alteration of the circulating medium, will again give life and energy to all our mercantile and agri- cultural transactions, and restore the la- bouring classes to full employment and good wages. On Ch. vii. Of Poor- Laws, continued. 65 On the subject of the distresses of the poor, and particularly the increase of pau- perism of late years, the most erroneous opinions have been circulated. During the progress of the war, the increase in the pro- portion of persons requiring parish assist- ance was attributed chiefly to the high price of the necessaries of life. We have seen these necessaries of life experience a great and sudden fall, and yet at the same time a still larger proportion of the popu- lation requiring parish assistance. It is now said that taxation is the sole cause of their distresses, and of the extraor- dinary stagnation in the demand for labour; yet I feel the firmest conviction, that if the whole of the taxes were removed to-morrow, this stagnation, instead of being at an end, would be considerably aggravated. Such an event would cause another great and general rise in the value of the circulating medium, and bring with it that discourage- ment to industry with which such a convul- sion in society must ever be attended. If, as has been represented, the labouring classes now pay more than half of what * vol. in. f they 66 Of Poor-Larvs, continued. Bk. iii. they receive in taxes, he must know very little indeed of the principles on which the wages of labour are regulated, who can for a moment suppose that, when the commo- dities on which they are expended have fallen one half by the removal of taxes, these wa^es themselves would still continue of the same nominal value. Were they to remain but for a short time the same, while all commodities had fallen, and the circu- lating medium had been reduced in pro- portion, it would be quickly seen that mul- titudes of them would be at once thrown out of employment. The effects of taxation are no doubt in many cases pernicious in a very high de- gree ; but it may be laid down as a rule which has few exceptions, that the relief obtained by taking off a tax, is in no respect equal to the injury inflicted in laying it on ; and generally it may be said that the spe- cific evil of taxation consists in the check which it gives to production, rather than the diminution which it occasions in de- mand. With regard to all commodities indeed of home production and home de- mand, Ch. vii. Of Poor- Laws, continued, 67 mand, it is quite certain that the conver- sion of capital into revenue, which is the effect of loans, must necessarily increase the proportion of demand to the supply ; and the conversion of the revenue of individuals into the revenue of the government, which is the effect of taxes properly imposed, however hard upon the individuals so taxed, can have no tendency to diminish the ge- neral amount of demand. It will of course diminish the demands of the persons taxed by diminishing their powers of purchasing ; but to the exact amount that the powers of these persons are diminished, will the powers of the government and of those employed by it be increased. If an estate of five thousand a year has a mortgage upon it of two thousand, two families, both in very good circumstances, may be living upon the rents of it, and both have consi- derable demands for houses, furniture, car- riages, broad cloth, silks, cottons, &c. The man who owns the estate is certainly much worse off than if the mortgage-deed was burnt, but the manufacturers and labourers who supply the silks, broad cloth, cot- F 2 tons, 68 Of Poor-Laws, continued. Bk. iii. tons, &c, are so far from being likely to be benefited by such burning, that it would be a considerable time before the new wants and tastes of the enriched owner had re- stored the former demand ; and if he were to take a fancy to spend his additional in- come in horses, hounds and menial ser- vants, which is probable, not only would the manufacturers and labourers who had before supplied their silks, cloths and cot- tons, be thrown out of employment, but the substituted demand would be very much less favourable to the increase of the ca- pital and general resources of the country. The foregoing illustration represents more nearly than may generally be imagined the effects of a national debt on the labouring classes of society, and the very great mistake of supposing that, because the demands of a considerable portion of the community would be increased by the extinction of the debt, these increased demands would not be balanced, and often more than ba- lanced, by the loss of the demand from the fundholders and government. It is by no means intended by these ob- servations Ch. vii. Of Poor-Laws, continued. 69 servations to intimate that a national debt may not be so heavy as to be extremely prejudicial to a state. The division and distribution of property, which is so bene- ficial when carried only to a certain extent, is fatal to production when pushed to ex- tremity. The division of an estate of five thousand a year will generally tend to in- crease demand, stimulate production and improve the structure of society ; but the division of an estate of eighty pounds a year will generally be attended with effects directly the reverse. But, besides the probability that the di- vision of property occasioned by a national debt may in many cases be pushed too far, the process of the division is effected by means which sometimes greatly embarrass production. This embarrassment must ne- cessarily take place to a certain extent in almost every species of taxation; but under favourable circumstances it is overcome by the stimulus given to demand. During the late war, from the prodigious increase of produce and population, it may fairly be presumed that the power of production was 70 Of Poot*-Laws, continue^. Bk. iii, was not essentially impeded, notwithstand- ing the enormous amount of taxation ; but in the state of things which has occurred since the peace, and under a most extra- ordinary fall of the exchangeable value of the raw produce of the land, and a great consequent diminution of the circulating medium, the very sudden increase of the weight and pressure of taxation must greatly aggravate the other causes which discourage production. This effect has been felt to a considerable extent on the land ; but the distress in this quarter is al- ready much mitigated ; and among the mercantile and manufacturing classes, where the greatest numbers are without employ- ment, the evil obviously arises, not so much from the want of capital and the means of production, as the want of a market for the commodity when produced a want, for which the removal of taxes, however proper, and indeed absolutely necessary as a per- manent measure, is certainly not the im- mediate and specific remedy. The principal causes of the increase of pauperism, independently of the present crisis, Ch. vii. Of Poor-Laws, continued. 71 crisis, are, first, the general increase of the manufacturing system and the unavoidable variations of manufacturing labour ; and se- condly, and more particularly, the practice which has been adopted in some counties, and is now spreading pretty generally all over the kingdom, of paying a considerable portion of what ought to be the wages of labour out of the parish rates. During the war, when the demand for labour was great and increasing, it is quite certain that no- thing but a practice of this kind could for any time have prevented the wages of la- bour from rising fully in proportion to the necessaries of life, in whatever degree these necessaries might have been raised by tax- ation. It was seen, consequently, that in those parts of Great Britain where this practice prevailed the least, the wages of labour rose the most. This was the case in Scotland, and some parts of the North of England, where the improvement in the condition of the labouring classes, and their increased command over the necessaries and conveniences of life, were particularly remarkable. And if, in some other parts of 72 Of Poor- Laws, continued. Bk.iii. of the country, where the practice did not greatly prevail, and especially in the towns, wages did not rise in the same de- gree, it was owing to the influx and com- petition of the cheaply raised population of the surrounding counties. It is a just remark of Adam Smith, that the attempts of the legislature to raise the pay of curates had always been ineffectual, on account of the cheap and abundant supply of them, occasioned by the bounties given to young persons educated for the church at the universities. And it is equally true that no human efforts can keep up the price of day-labour so as to enable a man to support on his earnings a family of a moderate size, so long as those who have more than two children are considered as having a valid claim to parish assistance. If this system were to become universal, and I own it appears to me that the poor- laws naturally lead to it, there is no reason whatever why parish assistance should not by degrees begin earlier and earlier ; and I do not hesitate to assert that, if the govern- ment and constitution of the country were in Ch. vii. Of Poor-Laws, continued. 73 in all other respects as perfect as the wildest visionary thinks he could make them ; if parliaments were annual, suffrage uni- versal, wars, taxes and pensions unknown, and the civil list fifteen hundred a year, the great body of the community might still be a collection of paupers. I have been accused of proposing a law to prohibit the poor from marrying. This is not true. So far from proposing such a law, I have distinctly said that, if any person chooses to marry without having a prospect of being able to maintain a family, he ought to have the most perfect liberty so to do ; and whenever any pro- hibitory propositions have been suggested to me as advisable by persons who have drawn wrong inferences from what I have said, I have steadily and uniformly repro- bated them. I am indeed most decidedly of opinion that any positive law to limit the age of marriage would be both unjust and immoral ; and my greatest objection to a system of equality and the system of the poor-laws (two systems which, however different in their outset, are of a nature calculated 74 Of Poor-Laws, continued. Bk. iii. calculated to produce the same results) is, that the society in which they are effectively carried into execution, will ultimately be reduced to the miserable alternative of choosing between universal want and the enactment of direct laws against marriage. What I have really proposed is a very different measure. It is the gradual and very gradual abolition of the poor-laws \ And the reason why I have ventured to suggest a proposition of this kind for consideration is my firm conviction, that they have lowered very decidedly the wages of the labouring classes, and made their general condition essentially worse than it would have been if these laws had never existed. Their opera- tion is every where depressing ; but it falls peculiarly hard upon the labouring classes in great towns. In country parishes the poor do really receive some compensation for their low wages ; their children, beyond a certain number, are really supported by the parish; and though it must be a most grating reflection to a labouring man, that So gradual as not to affect any individuals at present alive, or who will be born within the next two years. it Ch. vii. Of Poor-Laws, continued. 75 it is scarcely possible for him to marry with- out becoming the father of paupers ; yet if he can reconcile himself to this prospect, the compensation, such as it is, is no doubt made to him. But in London and all the great towns of the kingdom, the evil is suf- fered without the compensation. The po- pulation raised by bounties in the country naturally and necessarily flows into the towns, and as naturally and necessarily tends to lower wages in them ; while in point of fact, those who marry in towns, and have large families, receive no assistance from their parishes, unless they are actually starv- ing; and altogether the assistance which the manufacturing classes obtain for the sup- port of their families, in aid of their lowered wages, is perfectly inconsiderable. To remedy the effects of this competition from the country, the artificers and manu- facturers in towns have been aptto combine, with a view to keep up the price of labour and to prevent persons from working below a certain rate. But such combinations are not only illegal, but irrational and ineffec- tual ; and if the supply of workmen in any particular 76 Of Poor-Laws, continued. Bk. iii. particular branch of trade be such as would naturally lower wages, the keeping them up forcibly must have the effect of throwing so many out of employment, as to make the expense of their support fully equal to the gain acquired by the higher wages, and thus render these higher wages in reference to the .whole body perfectly futile. It may be distinctly stated to be an abso- lute impossibility that all the different classes of society should be both well paid and fully employed, if the supply of labour on the whole exceed the demand ; and as the poor-laws tend in the most marked manner to make the supply of labour exceed the demand for it, their effect must be, either to lower universally all wages, or, if some are kept up artificially, to throw great num- bers of workmen out of employment, and thus constantly to increase the poverty and distress of the labouring classes of society. If these things be so (and I am firmly convinced that they are) it cannot but be a subject of the deepest regret to those who are anxious for the happiness of the great mass of the community, that the writers which Ch. vii. Of Poor -Laws, continued. 77 which are now most extensively read among the common people should have selected for the subject of reprobation exactly that line of conduct which can alone gene- rally improve their condition, and for the subject of approbation that system which must inevitably depress them in poverty and wretchedness. They are taught that there is no occasion whatever for them to put any sort of re- straint upon their inclinations, or exercise any degree of prudence in the affair of mar- riage; because the parish is bound to pro- vide for all that are born. They are taught that there is as little occasion to cultivate habits of economy, and make use of the means afforded them by saving banks, to lay by their earnings while they are single, in order to furnish a cottage when they marry, and enable them to set out in life with decency and comfort; because, I sup- pose, the parish is bound to cover their nakedness, and to find them a bed and a chair in a work-house. They are taught that any endeavour on the part of the higher classes of society to inculcate 78 Of Poor-Laws, continued. Bk. iii. inculcate the duties of prudence and eco- nomy can only arise from a desire to save the money which they pay in poor-rates ; although it is absolutely certain that the only mode consistent with the laws of mora- lity and religion of giving to the poor the largest share of the property of the rich, without sinking the whole community in misery, is the exercise on the part of the poor of prudence in marriage, and of eco- nomy both before and after it. They are taught that the command of the Creator to increase and multiply is meant to contradict those laws which he has him- self appointed for the increase and multipli- cation of the human race ; and that it is equally the duty of a person to marry early, when, from the impossibility of adding to the food of the country in which he lives, the greater part of his offspring must die prematurely, and consequently no multi- plication follow from it, as when the children of such marriages can all be well maintain- ed, and there is room and food for a great and rapid increase of population. They are taught that, in relation to the condition Ch. vii. Of Poor-Laws, continued. 79 condition of the labouring classes, there is no other difference between such a country as England, which has been long well peo- pled, and where the land, which is not yet taken into cultivation, is comparatively bar- ren, and such a country as America, where millions and millions of acres of fine land are yet to be had for a trifle, except what arises from taxation. And they are taught, O monstrous ab- surdity ! that the only reason why the Ame- rican labourer earns a dollar a day, and the English labourer earns two shillings, is that the English labourer pays a great part of these two shillings in taxes. Some of these doctrines are so grossly absurd that I have no doubt they are re- jected at once by the common sense of many of the labouring classes. It cannot but strike them that, if their main depend- ence for the support of their children is to be on the parish, they can only expect pa- rish fare, parish clothing, parish furniture, a parish house and parish government, and they must know that persons living in this way cannot possibly be in a happy and prosperous state. It 80 Of Poor- Laws, continued. Bk. iii- It can scarcely escape the notice of the com- mon mechanic, that the scarcer workmen are upon any occasion, the greater share do they retain of the value of what they produce for their masters; and it is a most natural infer- ence, that prudence in marriage, which is the only moral means of preventing an ex- cess of workmen above the demand, can be the only mode of giving to the poor perma- nently a large share of all that is produced in the country. A common man, who has read his Bible, must be convinced that a command given to a rational being by a merciful God cannot be intended so to be interpreted as to produce only disease and death instead of multiplication ; and a plain sound under- standing would make him to see that, if, in a country in which little or no increase of food is to be obtained, every man were to marry at eighteen or twenty, when he ge- nerally feels most inclined to it, the conse- quence must be increased poverty, increased disease and increased mortality, and not increased numbers, as long at least as it continues to be true (which he will hardly be Ch. vii. Of Poor-Laws, continued. 81 be disposed to doubt) that additional num- bers cannot live without additional food. A moderately shrewd judgment would prompt any labourer acquainted with the nature of land to suspect that there must be some great difference, quite independent of taxation, between a country such as America, which might easily be made to support fifty times as many inhabitants as it contains at present, and a country such as England, which could not without ex- traordinary exertions be made to support two or three times as many. He would at least see that there would be a prodigious difference in the power of maintaining an additional number of cattle, between a small farm already well stocked, and a very large one which had not the fiftieth part of what it might be made to maintain ; and as he would know that both rich and poor must live upon the produce of the earth as well as all other animals, he would be disposed to conclude that what was so obviously true in one case, could not be false in the other. These considerations might make him think it natural and probable that in * vol. in. g those 82 Of Poor- Laws j continued. Bk.iii. those countries where there was a great want of people, the wages of labour would be such as to encourage early marriages and large families, for the best of all pos- sible reasons, because all that are born may be very easily and comfortably supported ; but that in those countries which were already nearly full, the wages of labour cannot be such as to give the same encou- ragement to early marriages, for a reason surely not much worse, because the persons so brought into the world cannot be pro- perly supported. There are few of our mechanics and la- bourers who have not heard of the high prices of bread, meat and labour in this country compared with the nations of the continent, and they have generally heard at the same time that these high prices were chiefly occasioned by taxation, which, though it had raised among other things the money wages of labour, had done harm rathcT than good to the labourer, because it had before raised the price of the bread and beer and other articles in which he spent his earnings. With this amount of information, Ch. vii. Of Poor-Laws, continued. 83 information, the meanest understanding would revolt at the idea that the very same cause which had kept the money price of labour in all the nations of Europe much lower than in England, namely, the absence of taxation, had been the means of raising it to more than double in America. He would feel quite convinced that, whatever might be the cause of the high money wages of labour in America, which he might not perhaps readily understand, it must be something very different indeed from the mere absence of taxation, which could only have an effect exactly opposite. With regard to the improved condition of the lower classes of people in France since the revolution, which has also been much insisted upon ; if the circumstances accompanying it were told at the same time, it would afford the strongest pre- sumption against the doctrines which have been lately promulgated. The improved condition of the labouring classes in France since the revolution has been accompa- nied by a greatly diminished proportion of births, which has had its natural and ne- g 2 cessary 84 Of Poor-Laws, continued. Bk. iii. cessary effect in giving to these classes a greater share of the produce of the country, and has kept up the advantage arising from the sale of the church lands and other national domains, which would otherwise have been lost in a short time. The effect of the revolution in France has been, to make every person depend more upon himself and less upon others. The la- bouring classes are therefore become more industrious, more saving and more pru- dent in marriage than formerly ; and it is quite certain that without these effects the revolution would have done nothing for them. An improved government has, no doubt, a natural tendency to produce these effects, and thus to improve the condition of the poo . But if an extensive system of parochial relief, and such doctrines as have lately been inculcated, counteract them, and prevent the labouring classes from de- pending upon their own prudence and in- dustry, then any change for the better in other respects becomes comparatively a matter of very little importance; and, under the best form of government imaginable, there Ch. vii. Of Poor-Lazvs, continued. 85 there may be thousands on thousands out of employment and half starved. If it be taught that all who are born have a right to support on the land, what- ever be their number, and that there is no occasion to exercise any prudence in the affair of marriage so as to check this num- ber, the temptations, according to all the known principles of human nature, will in- evitably be yielded to, and more and more will gradually become dependent on parish assistance. There cannot therefore be a greater inconsistency and contradiction than that those who maintain these doctrines re- specting the poor, should still complain of the number of paupers. Such doctrines and a crowd of paupers are unavoidably united ; and it is utterly beyond the power of any revolution or change of government to separate them. CHAP, ( 86 ) CHAP. VIII. Of the Agricultural System. AS it is the nature of agriculture to pro- duce subsistence for a greater number of families than can be employed in the bu- siness of cultivation, it might perhaps be supposed that a nation which strictly pur- sued an agricultural system would always have more food than was necessary for its inhabitants, and that its population could never be checked from the want of the means of subsistence. It is indeed obviously true that the in- crease of such a country is not immediately checked, either by the want of power to produce, or even by the deficiency of the actual produce of the soil compared with the population. Yet if we examine the condition of its labouring classes, we shall find that the real wages of their labour are such as essentially to check and regulate their Ch. viii. Oj the Agricultural System. 87 their increase, by checking and regu- lating their command over the means of subsistence. A country under certain circumstances of soil and situation, and with a deficient capital, may find it advantageous to pur- chase foreign commodities with its raw produce rather than manufacture them at home : and in this case it will necessarily grow more raw produce than it consumes. But this state of things is very little con- nected either with the permanent condition of the lower classes of the society or the rate of their increase ; and in a country where the agricultural system entirely predo- minates, and the great mass of its industry is directed towards the land, the condition of the people is subject to almost every degree of variation. Under the agricultural system perhaps are to be found the two extremes in the condition of the poor ; instances where they are in the best state, and instances where they are in the worst state of any of which we have accounts. In a country where there is an abun- dance 88 Of the Agricultural System. Bk. iii. dance of good land, where there are no difficulties in the way of its purchase and distribution, and where there is an easy foreign vent for raw produce, both the profits of stock and the wages of labour will be high. These high profits and high wages, if habits of economy pretty gene- rally prevail, will furnish the means of a rapid accumulation of capital and a great and continued demand for labour, while the rapid increase of population which will ensue will maintain undiminished the demand for produce, and check the fall of profits. If the extent of territory be considerable, and the population comparatively inconsider- able, the land may remain understocked both with capital and people for some length of time, notwithstanding a rapid increase of both ; and it is under these cir- cumstances of the agricultural system that labour is able to command the greatest portion of the necessaries of life, and that the condition of the labouring classes of society is the best. The only drawback to the wealth of the labouring classes under these circumstances is Ch. viii. Of the Agricultural System. 89 is the relatively low value of the raw produce. If a considerable part of the manufac- tured commodities used in such a country be purchased by the export of its raw pro- duce, it follows as a necessary consequence that the relative value of its raw produce will be lower, and of its manufactured produce higher, than in the countries with which such a trade is carried on. But where a given portion of raw produce will not command so much of manufactured and foreign commodities as in other coun- tries, the condition of the labourer cannot be exactly measured by the quantity of raw produce which falls to his share. If, for instance, in one country the yearly earnings of a labourer amount in money value to fifteen quarters of wheat, and in another to nine, it would be incorrect to in- fer that their relative condition, and the comforts which they enjoy, were in the same proportion, because the whole of a la- bourer's earnings are not spent in food; and if that part which is not so spent will, in the country where the value of fifteen quarters 90 Of the Agricultural System. Bk. iii. quarters is earned, not go near so far in the purchase of clothes and other conve- niences as in the countries where the value of nine quarters is earned, it is clear that altogether the situation of the labourer in the latter country may approach nearer to that of the labourer in the former than might at first be supposed. At the same time it should be recollected that quantity always tends powerfully to counterbalance any deficiency of value; and the labourer who earns the greatest number of quarters may still command the greatest quantity of necessaries and con- veniences combined, though not to the ex- tent implied by the proportions of the raw produce. America affords a practical instance of the agricultural system in a state the most favourable to the condition of the labouring classes. The nature of the country has been such as to make it answer to employ a very large proportion of its capital in agriculture ; and the consequence has been a very rapid increase of stock. This rapid increase of stock has kept up a steady and continued Ch. viii. Of the Agricultural System. 91 continued demand for labour. The la- bouring classes have in consequence been peculiarly well paid. They have been able to command an unusual quantity of the necessaries of life, and the progress of po- pulation has been unusually rapid. Yet even here, some little drawback has been felt from the relative cheapness of corn. As America till the late war imported the greatest part of its manufactures from England, and as England imported flour and wheat from America, the value of food in America compared with manufactures must have been decidedly less than in England. Nor would this effect take place merely with relation to the foreign com- modities imported into America, but also to those of its home manufactures, in which it has no particular advantage. In agri- culture, the abundance of good land would counterbalance the high wages of labour and high profits of stock, and keep the price of corn moderate, notwith- standing the great expense of these two elements of price. But in the production of manufactured commodities they must necessarily 92 Of the Agricultural System. Bk. iii. necessarily tell, without any particular ad- vantage to counterbalance them, and must in general occasion in home goods, as well as foreign, a high price compared with food. Under these circumstances, the condition of the labouring classes of society cannot in point of conveniences and comforts be so much better than that of the labourers of other countries as the relative quantity of food which they earn might seem to in- dicate ; and this conclusion is sufficiently confirmed by experience. In some very intelligent Travels through a great part of England, written in 1810 and 1811 by Mr. Simond, a French gentleman, who had resided above twenty years in America, the author seems to have been evidently much struck with the air of convenience and comfort in the houses of our peasantry, and the neatness and cleanliness of their dress. In some parts of his tour he saw so many neat cottages, so much good clothing, and so little appearance of poverty and distress, that he could not help wondering where the poor of England and their dwell- ings were concealed. These observations coming Ch. viii. Of the Agricultural System* 93 coming from an able, accurate and ap- parently most impartial observer, just landed from America and visiting England for the first time, are curious and in- structive ; and the facts which they notice, though they may arise in part from the different habits and modes of life prevailing in the two countries, must be occasioned in a considerable degree by the causes above mentioned. A very striking instance of the disad- vantageous effect of a low relative price of food on the condition of the poor may be observed in Ireland. In Ireland the funds for the maintenance of labour have increased so rapidly during the last century, and so large a portion of that sort of food which forms the principal support of the lower classes of society has been awarded to them, that the increase of population has been more rapid than in almost any known coun- try, except America. The Irish labourer paid in potatoes has earned perhaps the means of subsistence for double the num- ber of persons that could be supported by the earnings of an English labourer paid in wheat ; 94 Of the Agricultural System. Bk. iii. wheat; and the increase of population in the two countries during the last century has been nearly in proportion to the re- lative quantity of the customary food awarded to the labourers in each. But their general condition with respect to con- veniences and comforts are very far indeed from being in a similar proportion. The great quantity of food which land will bear when planted with potatoes, and the con- sequent cheapness of the labour supported by them, tends rather to raise than to lower the rents of land, and as far as rent goes, to keep up the price of the materials of manufactures and all other sorts of raw produce, except potatoes. In the raw ma- terials of home manufactures, therefore, a great relative disadvantage will be suf- fered, and a still greater both in the raw and manufactured produce of foreign coun- tries. The exchangeable value of the food which the Irish labourer earns above what he and his family consume will go but a very little way in the purchase of clothing, lodging and other conveniences ; and the consequence is that his condition in these respects Ch. viii. Of the Agricultural System. 95 respects is extremely miserable, at the same time that his means of subsistence, such as they are, may be comparatively abundant. In Ireland the money price of labour is not much more than the half of what it is in England. The quantity of food earned by no means makes up for its deficient va- lue. A certain portion therefore of the Irish labourer's wages (a fourth or a fifth for instance) will go but a very little way in the purchase of manufactures and foreign produce. In America, on the other hand, even the money wages of labour are nearly double those of England. Though the American labourer therefore cannot pur- chase manufactures and foreign produce with the food that he earns so cheap as the English labourer, yet the greater quantity of this food makes up for its deficiency of relative value. His condition compared with the labouring classes of England, though it may not be so much superior as their relative means of subsistence might indicate, must still on the whole have de- cidedly the advantage; and altogether, per- haps. 96 Of the Agricultural System. Bk.iii, haps, America may be produced as an instance of the agricultural system in which the condition of the labouring classes is the best of any that we know. The instances where, under the agricultu- ral system, the condition of the lower classes of society is very wretched, are more fre- quent. When the accumulation of capital stops, whatever may be the cause, the population, before it comes to a stand, will always be pressed on as near to the limits of the actual means of subsistence, as the habits of the lower classes of the society will allow; that is, the real wages of labour will sink, till they are only just sufficient to maintain a stationary population. Should this happen, as it frequently does, while land is still in abundance and capital scarce, the profits of stock will naturally be high ; but corn will be very cheap, ow- ing to the goodness and plenty of the land, and the stationary demand for it, notwith- standing the high profits of stock; while these high profits, together with the usual want of skill and proper division of labour, which attend a scanty capital, will render all Ch. viii. Of the Agricultural System. 97 all domestic manufactured commodities comparatively very dear. This state of things will naturally be unfavourable to the generation of those habits of prudential re- straint which most frequently arise from the custom of enjoying conveniences and com- forts, and it is to be expected that the popu- lation will not stop till the wages of labour, estimated even in food, are very low. But in a country where the wages of labour es- timated in food are low, and that food is relatively of a very low value, both with regard to domestic and foreign manufac- tures, the condition of the labouring classes of society must be the worst possible. Poland, and some parts of Russia, Sibe- ria and European Turkey, afford instances of this kind. In Poland the population seems to be almost stationary or very slowly progressive; and as both the population and produce are scanty, compared with the extent of territory, we may infer with cer- tainty that its capital is scanty, and yet slowly progressive. It follows, therefore, that the demand for labour increases very slowly, and that the real wages of labour, or *vol. in. h the- Of the Agricultural System. Bk. iii. the command of the labouring classes over the necessaries and conveniences of life, are such as to keep the population down to the level of the slowly increasing quantity that is awarded to them. And as from the state of the country the peasantry cannot have been much accustomed to conveniences and comforts, the checks to its population are more likely to be of the positive than of the preventive kind. Yet here corn is in abundance, and great quantities of it are yearly exported. But it appears clearly that it is not either the power of the country to produce food, or even what it actually produces, that limits and regulates the progress of population, but the quantity which in the actual state of things is awarded to the labourer, and the rate at which the funds so appropriated increase. In the present case the demand for la- bour is very 'small ; and though the popula- tion is inconsiderable, it is greater than the scanty capital of the country can fully employ ; the condition of the labourer therefore is depressed by his being able to command Ch. viii. Of the Agricultural System. 99 command only such a quantity of food as will maintain a stationary or very slowly increasing population. It is further de- pressed by the low relative value of the food that he earns, which gives to any surplus he may possess a very small power in the pur- chase of manufactured commodities or fo- reign produce. Under these circumstances, we cannot be surprised that all accounts of Poland should represent the condition of the lower classes of society as extremely miserable ; and the other parts of Europe, which resemble Po- land in the state of their land and capital, resemble it in the condition of their people In justice however to the agricultural system, it should be observed that the pre- mature check to the capital and the de- mand for labour, which occurs in some of the countries of Europe, while land conti- nues in considerable plenty, is not occa- sioned by the particular direction of their industry, but by the vices of the govern- ment and the structure of the society, which prevent its full and fair development in that direction. h 2 Poland 100 Of the Agricultural System. Bk. iii. Poland is continually brought forward as an example of the miserable effects of the agricultural system. But nothing surely can be less fair. The misery of Poland does not arise from its directing its industry chiefly to agriculture, but from the little encou- ragement given to industry of any kind, owing. to the state of property and the servile condition of the people. While the land is cultivated by boors, the produce of whose exertions belongs entirely to their masters, and the whole society consists mainly of these degraded beings and the lords and owners of great tracts of territory, there will evidently be no class of persons possessed of the means either of furnishing an adequate demand at home for the surplus produce of the soil, or of accumulating fresh capital and increasing the demand for labour. In this miserable state of things, the best remedy would unquestion- ably be the introduction of manufactures and commerce; because the introduction of manufactures and commerce could alone li- berate themassof the people from slavery and give the necessary stimulus to industry and accumulation. But were the people already free and industrious, and landed property easily Ch. viii. Of the Agricultural System. 101 easily divisible and alienable, it might still answer to such a country as Poland to pur- chase its finer manufactures from foreign countries by means of its raw products, and thus to continue essentially agricultural, for many years. Under these new circum- stances however, it would present a totally different picture from that which it exhibits at present; and the condition of the people would more resemble that of the inhabitants of the United States of America than of the inhabitants of the unimproved countries of Europe. Indeed America is perhaps the only modern instance of the fair operation of the agricultural system. In every coun- try of Europe, and in most of its colonies in other parts of the world, formidable ob- stacles still exist to the employment of capital upon the land, arising from the remains of the feudal system. But these obstacles which have essentially impeded cultivation have been very far indeed from proportionably en- couraging other branches of industry. Com- merce and manufactures are necessary to agriculture ; but agriculture is still more ne- cessary to commerce and manufactures. It must 102 Of the Agricultural System. Bk. iii. must ever be true that the surplus produce of the cultivators, taken in its most enlarged sense, measures and limits the growth of that part of the society which is not em- ployed upon the land. Throughout the whole world the number of manufacturers, of merchants, of proprietors and of per- sons engaged in the various civil and mili- tary professions, must be exactly propor- tioned to this surplus produce, and cannot in the nature of things increase beyond it. If the earth had been so niggardly of her produce as to oblige all her inhabitants to labour for it, no manufacturers or idle per- sons could ever have existed. But her first intercourse with man was a voluntary pre- sent, not very large indeed, but sufficient as a fund for his subsistence till he could pro- cure a greater. And the power to procure a greater was given to him in that quality of the earth by which it may be made to yield a much larger quantity of food, and of the materials of clothing and lodging, than is necessary to feed, clothe and lodge the persons employed in the cultivation of the Boil. This quality is the foundation of that surplus Ch. viii. Of the Agricultural System. 103 surplus produce which peculiarly distin- guishes the industry employed upon the land. In proportion as the labour and in- genuity of man exercised upon the land have increased this surplus produce, leisure has been given to a greater number of per- sons to employ themselves in all the inven- tions which embellish civilized life ; while the desire to profit by these inventions has continued to stimulate the cultivators to in- crease their surplus produce. This desire indeed may be considered as almost abso- lutely necessary to give it its proper value, and to encourage its further extension ; but still the order of precedence is, strictly speaking, the surplus produce ; because the funds for the subsistence of the manufacturer must be advanced to him before he can complete his work ; and no step can be taken in any other sort of industry unless the cultivators obtain from the soil more than they themselves consume. If in asserting the peculiar productive- ness of the labour employed upon the land, we look only to the clear monied rent yielded to a certain number of proprietors, we un- doubtedly 104 Of the Agricultural System. Bk. iii. doubtedly consider the subject in a very con- tracted point of view. In the advanced stages of society, this rent forms indeed the most prominent portion of the surplus pro- duce here meant ; but it may exist equally in the shape of high wages and profits during the earlier periods of cultivation, when there is little or no rent. The la- bourer who earns a value equal to fifteen quarters of corn in the year may have only a family of three or four children, and not consume in kind above five or six quarters; and the owner of the farming stock, which yields high profits, may consume but a very moderate proportion of them in food and raw materials. All the rest, whether in the shape of wages and profits, or of rents, may be considered as a surplus produce from the soil, which affords the means of subsistence and the materials of clothing and lodging to a certain number of people according to its extent, some of whom may live without manual exertions, and others employ themselves in modifying the raw materials obtained from the earth into the Ch. ix. Of the Agricultural System. 105 the forms best suited to the gratification of man. It will depend of course entirely upon its answering to a country to exchange a part of the surplus produce for foreign commodities, instead of consuming it at home, whether it is to be considered as mainly agricultural or otherwise. And such an exchange of raw produce for ma- nufactures, or peculiar foreign products, may foi a period of some extent suit a state, which might resemble Poland in scarcely any other feature but that of ex- porting corn. It appears then, that countries in which the industry of the inhabitants is princi- pally directed towards the land, and in which corn continues to be exported, may enjoy great abundance or experience great want, according to the particular cir- cumstances in which they are placed. They will in general not be much exposed to the temporary evils of scarcity arising from the variations of the seasons ; but the quantity of food permanently awarded to the la- bourer 106 Of the Agricultural System- BJ*. iii. bourer may be such as not to allow of an increase of population ; and their state, in respect to their being progressive, station- ary or declining, will depend upon other causes than that of directing their attention principally to agriculture. CHAP. ( 107 ) CHAP. IX. Of the Commercial System. A COUNTRY which excels in commerce and manufactures, may purchase corn from a great variety of others; and it may be sup- posed, perhaps, that, proceeding upon this system, it may continue to purchase an in- creasing quantity, and to maintain a rapidly increasing population, till the lands of all the nations with which it trades are fully cul- tivated. As this is an event necessarily at a great distance, it may appear that the population of such a country will not be checked from the difficulty of procuring subsistence till after the lapse of a great number of ages. There are, however, causes constantly in operation, which will occasion the pressure of this difficulty, long before the event here contemplated has taken place, and while the means of raising food in the surrounding countries 108 Of the Commercial System. Bk. iii. countries may still be comparatively abun- dant. In the first place, advantages which de- pend exclusively upon capital and skill, and the present possession of particular channels of commerce, cannot in their na- ture be permanent. We know how diffi- cult it is to confine improvements in ma- chinery to a single spot ; we know that it is the constant object, both of individuals and countries, to increase their capital ; and we know, from the past history of com- mercial states, that the channels of trade are not unfrequently taking a different di- rection. It is unreasonable therefore to expect that any one country, merely by the force of skill and capital, should remain in possession of markets uninterrupted by foreign competition. But, when a power- ful foreign competition takes place, the exportable commodities of the country in question must soon fall to prices which will essentially reduce profits ; and the fall of profits will diminish both the power and the will to save. Under these circum- stances the accumulation of capital will be slow Ch. ix. Of the Commercial System. 109 slow, and the demand for labour propor- tionally slow, till it comes nearly to a stand ; while, perhaps, the new competitors, either by raising their own raw materials or by some other advantages, may still be increasing their capitals and population with some degree of rapidity. But, secondly, even if it were possible for a considerable time to exclude any formidable foreign competition, it is found that domestic competition produces almost unavoidably the same effects. If a machine be invented in a particular coun- try, by the aid of which one man can do the work of ten, the possessors of it will of course at first make very unusual profits ; but, as soon as the invention is generally known, so much capital and industry will be brought into this new and profitable employment, as to make its products greatly exceed both the foreign and domestic de- mand at the old prices. These prices, therefore, will continue to fall, till the stock and labour employed in this direction cease to yield unusual profits. In this case it is evident that ; though in an early period of 110 Of the Commercial System. Bk. iii. of such a manufacture, the product of the industry of one man for a day might have been exchanged for such a portion of food as would support forty or fifty persons ; yet, at a subsequent period, the product of the same industry might not purchase the sup- port of ten. In the cotton trade of this country, which has extended itself so wonderfully during the last twenty-five years, very little effect has hitherto been produced by foreign com- petition*. The very great fall which has taken place in the prices of cotton goods has been almost exclusively owing to do- mestic competition; and this competition has so glutted both the home and foreign markets, that the present capitals employed in the trade, notwithstanding the very pecu- liar advantages which they possess from the saving of labour, have ceased to possess any advantage whatever in the general rate of their profits. Although, by means of the admirable machinery used in the spin- ning of cotton, one boy or girl can now do as much as many grown persons could do * 1816. formerly ; Ch. ix. Of the Commercial System. 1 11 formerly ; yet neither the wages of the la- bourer, nor the profits of his master, arc higher than in those employments where no machinery is used, and no saving of labour accomplished. The country has, however, in the mean time, been very greatly benefitted. Not only have all its inhabitants been enabled to ob- tain a superior fabric for clothing, at a less expense of labour and property, which must be considered as a great and perma- nent advantage ; but the high temporary profits of the trade have occasioned a great accumulation of capital, and consequently a great demand for labour ; while the ex- tending markets abroad and the new values thrown into the market at home, have created such a demand for the products of every species of industry, agricultural and colonial, as well as commercial and manu- facturing, as to prevent a fall of profits. This country, from the extent of its lands, and its rich colonial possessions, has a large arena for the employment of an increasing capital; and the general rate of its profits are not, as it appears, very easily and rapidly reduced 112 Of the Commercial System. Bk. iii. reduced by accumulation. But a country, such as we are considering, engaged prin- cipally in manufactures, and unable to direct its industry to the same variety of pursuits, would sooner find its rate of pro- fits diminished by an increase of capital, and no ingenuity in machinery could save it, after a certain period, from low profits and low wages, and their natural conse- quences, a check to population. Thirdly, a country which is obliged to purchase both the raw materials of its ma- nufactures and the means of subsistence for its population from foreign countries, is almost entirely dependent for the increase of its wealth and population on the in- creasing wealth and demands of the coun- tries with which it trades. It has been sometimes said that a ma- nufacturing country is no more dependent upon the country which supplies it with food and raw materials, than the agricul- tural country is on that which manufactures for it ; but this is really an abuse of terms. A country with great resources in land may find it decidedly for its advantage to em- ploy Ch. ix. Of the Commercial System. 113 ploy the main part of its capital in cultiva- tion and to import its manufactures. In so doing, it will often employ the whole of its industry most productively, and most ra- pidly increase its stock. But, if the slackness of its neighbours in manufacturing, or any other cause, should either considerably check or altogether prevent the importation of manufactures, a country with food and raw materials provided at home cannot be long at a loss. For a time it would not cer- tainly be so well supplied ; but manufac- turers and artisans would soon be found, and would soon acquire tolerable skill 3 ; and though the capital and population of the country might not, under the new cir- cumstances in which it was placed, increase so rapidly as before, it would still have the power of increasing in both to a great and almost undefinable extent. On the other hand, it food and raw ma- terials were denied to do the work of ten, it is quite obvious that before the same advantages are extended to other countries, a rise in the price of la- bour will but very litde interfere with the power of selling those sorts of commodities, in the production of which the capital and machine^ are so effectively appliedi Ltisi quite true that an advance in the necessary wages of labour, which increases the ex- * A rise in the price of labour in China would certainly increase the returns which it receives for its teas. pense Ch. xi. Bounties upon Exportation. 151 pense of raising corn, may have the same effect upon many commodities besides com ; and if there were no Others, no encourage- ment would be given to the importation of foreign grain, as there might be no means' by which it could be purchased cheaper abroad. But a large class of the exportable commodities of a commercial country are of a different description. They are either articles in a considerable degree peculiar to the country and its dependencies, or such as have been produced by superior Capital and machinery, the prices of which are determined rather by domestic than foreign competition. All commodities of this kind will evidently be able to support without essential injury an advance in the price of labour, some permanently, and others for a considerable time. The rise in the price of the commodity so occasioned, or rather the prevention of that fall which would otherwise have taken place, may always indeed have the effect of decreasing in sortie" degree the quantity of the commodity ex- ported ; but it by no means follows that it will diminish the whole of its bullion value in the foreign country, which is precisely 152 Of Corn-Laws, and Bk. ill precisely what determines the bullion value, and generally the quantity of the returns. If cottons in this country were now to fall to half their present price, we should undoubtedly export a greater quan- tity than we do at present ; but I very much doubt whether we should export double the quantity, and yet we must do this to enable us to command as much foreign produce as before. In this case, as in numerous others of the same kind, quantity and value go together to a certain point, though not at an equal pace ; but, beyond this point, a further increase of quantity only diminishes the whole value produced, and the amount of the returns that can be obtained for it. It is obvious then that a country, not- withstanding a high comparative price of labour and of materials, may easily stand a competition with foreigners in those com- modities to which it can apply a superior capital and machinery with great effect; although such a price of labour and mate- rials might give an undisputed advantage to foreigners in agriculture and some other sorts of produce, where the same saving of labour Cfa. xi. Bounties upon Expottdtion. 153 labour cannot take place. Consequently such a country may find it cheaper to pur- chase a considerable part of its supplies of grain from abroad with its manufactures and peculiar products, than to grow the whole at home. If, from all or any of these causes, a nation becomes habitually dependent on foreign countries for the support of a consi- derable portion of its population; it must evidently be subjected, while such depen- dence lasts, to some of those evils which belong to a nation purely manufacturing and commercial. In one respect, indeed, it will still continue to have a great supe- riority. It will possess resources in land, which may be resorted to when its manu- factures and commerce, either from foreign competition, or any other causes, begin to fail. But, to balance this advantage, it will be subjected, during the time that large importations are necessary, to much greater fluctuations in its supplies of corn, than countries wholly manufacturing and commercial. The demands of Holland and Hamburgh may be known with considerable accuracv 1M Of CorfaLaxvs, and Bk. ffi. accuracy by the merchants who supply them. If they increase, they increase gra- dually ; and, not being subject from year to year to any great and sudden variations, it might be safe and practicable to make regular contracts for the average quantity wanted . But it is otherwise with such coun- tries as England and Spain. Their wants are necessarily very variable, from the vari- ableness of the seasons; and if the merchants were to contract with exporting countries for the quantity required in average years', two or three abundant seasons might ruin them. They must necessarily wait to see the state of the crops in each year, in order safely to regulate their proceedings ; and though it is certainly true that it is only the deficiency from the average crop, and not the whole deficiency, which may be considered altogether in the light of a new demand in Europe; yet the largeness and previous uncertainty of this whole defi- ciency, the danger of making contracts for a stated quantity annually, and the greater chance of hostile combinations against large and warlike states, must greatly aggravate the Ch. xi. Bounties upon Exportation. 155 the difficulties of procuring a steady supply ; and if it be true that unfavourable seasons are not unfrequently general, it is impossi- ble to conceive that they should not ocean sionally be subject to great variations of price. It has been sometimes stated that scarci- ties are partial, not general, and that a de- ficiency in one country is always compen- sated by a plentiful supply in others. But this seems to be quite an unfounded sup- position. In the evidence brought before the Committee of the House of Commons in 1814, relating to the corn-laws, one of the corn merchants being asked whether it frequently happened that crops in the coun- tries bordering upon the Baltic failed, when they failed here, replied, " When crops " are unfavourable in one part of Europe, " it generally happens that they are more " or less so in another 8 /' If any person will take the trouble to examine the con- temporaneous prices of corn in the different countries of Europe for some length of time, l*e will be convinced that the answer Report, p. 93. here 166 Of Com Laws, and Bk. iii. here given is perfectly just. In the last hundred and fifty years, above twenty will be found in which the rise of prices is com- mon to France and England, although there was seldom much intercourse between them in the trade of corn : and Spain and the Baltic nations, as far as their prices have been collected, appear frequently to have shared in the same general deficiency. Even within the last five years, two have occurred, the years 1811-12, and 1816-17, in which, with extraordinary high prices in this coun- try, the imports have been comparatively inconsiderable; which can only have arisen from those scarcities having been general over the greatest part of Europe. Under these circumstances let us suppose that two million quarters of foreign grain were the average quantity annually wanted in this country, and suppose, at the same time, that a million quarters were deficient from a bad season ; the whole deficiency to be supplied would then be three millions. If the scarcity were general in Europe, it may fairly be concluded, that some states would prohibit the export of their corn entirely. Ch. xi. Bounties upon Exportation. 157 entirely, and others tax it very highly ; and if we could obtain a million or fifteen hundred thousand quarters, it is probably as much as we could reasonably expect. We should then, however, be two millions or fifteen hun- dred thousand quarters deficient. On the other hand, if we had habitually grown our own consumption, and were deficient a mil- lion of quarters from a bad season, it is scarce- ly probable that, notwithstanding a general scarcity, we should not be able to obtain three or four hundred thousand quarters in consequence of our advanced prices; particularly if the usual prices of our corn and labour were higher than in the rest of Europe. And in this case the sum of our whole deficiency would only be six or seven hundred thousand quarters, instead of fifteen hundred thousand or two millions of quar- ters. If the present year (1816-17) had found us in a state in which our growth of corn had been habitually far short of our consumption, the distresses of the country would have been dreadfully aggravated. To provide against accidents of this kind, and to secure a more abundant and, at the time, 158 Of Corn-Laws, and Bk. Si. time, a more steady supply of grain, a system of corn-laws has been recommended the object of which is to discourage by du- ties or prohibitions the importation of fo- reign corn, and encourage by bounties the exportation of com of home growth. A system of this kind was completed in our own country in 1688% the policy of which has been treated of at some length by Adam Smith. In whatever way the general question may be finally decided, it must be allowed by all those who acknowledge the efficacy of the great principle of supply and de- mand that the line of argument taken by the author of the Wealth of Nations against the system is essentially erroneous. He first states that, whatever extension of the foreign market can be occasioned by the bounty, must in every particular year be altogether at the expense of the home * Though the object here stated may not have been the specific object of the law of 1688, it is certainly the ob- ject for which the system has been subsequently recom- mended. market, Ch. xi. Bounties upon Exportation. 159 market, as every bushel of corn which it exported by means of the bounty, and which would not haye been exported with- out the bounty, would have remained in the home market to increase the consumption, and to lower the price of that commodity . In this observation he evidently misap- plies the term market. Because, by selling a commodity lower, it is easy to get rid of a greater quantity of it, in any particular market, than would have gone off other- wise, it cannot justly be said that by this process such a market is proportionally extended. Though the removal of the two faxes mentioned by Adam Smith as paid on account of the bounty would certainly increase the power of the lower classes to purchase, yet in each particular year the consumption must ultimately be limited by the population, and the increase of con- sumption from the removal of these taxes would by no means be sufficient to give the same encouragement to cultivation as the addition of the foreign demand. If * Vol.ii. b. iv. c.5. the 160 Of Corn-Laws, and Bk. iii. the price of British corn in the home market rise in consequence of the bounty, before the price of production is increased (and an immediate rise is distinctly acknow- ledged by Adam Smith), it is an unanswer- able proof that the effectual demand for British corn is extended by it; and that the diminution of demand at home, whatever it may be, is more than counterbalanced by the extension of demand abroad. Adam Smith goes on to say that the two taxes paid by the people on account of the bounty, namely, the one to the government to pay this bounty, and the other paid in the advanced price of the commodity, must either reduce the subsistence of the la- bouring poor, or occasion an augmen- tation in their pecuniary wages propor- tioned to that in the pecuniary price of their subsistence. So far as it operates in the one way it must reduce the ability of the labouring poor to educate and bring up their children, and must so far tend to restrain the population of the country. So far as it operates in the other, it must reduce the ability of the employers of the poor to employ Ch. xi. Bounties upon Exportation. 161 employ so great a number as they otherwise might do, and must so far tend to restrain the industry of the country. It will be readily allowed that the tax occasioned by the bounty will have the one or the other of the effects here contem- plated; but it cannot be allowed that it will have both. Yet it is observed, that though the tax, which that institution im- poses upon the whole body of the people, be very burdensome to those who pay it, it is of very little advantage to those who receive it. This is surely a contradiction. If the price of labour rise in proportion to the price of wheat, as is subsequently as- serted, how is the labourer rendered less competent to support a family ? If the price of labour do not rise in proportion to the price of wheat, how is it possible to main- tain that the landlords and farmers are not able to employ more labourers on their land ? Yet in this contradiction the author of the Wealth of Nations has had respect- able followers ; and some of those who have agreed with him in his opinion that corn regulates the prices of labour, and of all *vol. in. m other 162 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iii. other commodities, still insist on the injury done to the labouring classes of society by a rise in the price of corn, and the benefit they would derive from a fall. The main argument however which Adam Smith adduces against the bounty is, that as the money price of corn regulates that of all other home-made commodities, the ad- vantage to the proprietor from the increase of money price is merely apparent, and not real ; since what he gains in his sales he must lose in his purchases. This position, though true to a certain extent, is by no means true to the extent of preventing the movement of capital to or from the land, which is the precise point in question. The money price of corn in a particular country is undoubtedly by far the most powerful ingredient in regulating the price of labour, and of all other com- modities; but it is not enough for .Adam Smith's position that it should be the most powerful ingredient ; it must be shewn that, other causes remaining the same, the price of every article will rise and fall exactly in proportion to the price of corn, and this is very Ch. xi. Bounties upon Exportation. 163 very far from being the case. Adam Smith himself excepts all foreign commodities; but when we reflect upon the vast amount of our imports, and the quantity of foreign articles used in our manufactures, this ex- ception alone is of the greatest importance. Wool and raw hides, two most important materials of home growth, do not, according to Adam Smith's own reasonings, (Book I. c. xi. p. 363, et seq.) depend much upon the price of corn and the rent of land ; and the prices of flax, tallow, and leather, are of course greatly influenced by the quantity we import. But woollen cloths, cotton and linen goods, leather, soap, candles, tea, sugar &c, which are comprehended in the above-named articles, form almost the whole of the clothing and luxuries of the indus- trious classes of society. It should be further observed that in all countries, the industry of which is greatly assisted by fixed capital, the part of the price of the wrought commodity which pays the profits of such capital will not necessarily rise in consequence of an ad- vance in the price of corn, except as it re- m 2 quires 164 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iii. quires gradual renovation ; and the advan- tage derived from machinery which has been constructed before the advance in the price of labour will naturally last for some years. In the case also of great and numerous taxes on consumption, a rise or fall in the price of corn, though it would increase or decrease that part of the wages of labour which resolves itself into food, evidently would not increase or decrease that part which is destined for the payment of taxes. It cannot then be admitted as a gene- ral position that the money price of corn in any country is a just measure of the real value of silver in that country. But all these considerations, though of great weight to the owners of land, will not influ- ence the farmers beyond the present leases. At the expiration of a lease, any particular advantage which a farmer had received from a favourable proportion between the price of corn and of labour would be taken from him, and any disadvantage from an unfavourable proportion be made up to him. The sole cause which would deter- mine Ch. xi. Bounties upon Exportation. 16fc mine the proportion of capital employed in agriculture, would be the extent of the effectual demand for corn; and if the bounty had really enlarged this demand, which it certainly would have done, it is impossible to suppose that more capital would not be employed upon the land. When Adam Smith says that the nature of things has stamped upon corn a real value, which cannot be altered by merely altering the money price, and that no bounty upon exportation, no monopoly of the home market, can raise that value, nor the freest competition lower it, it is obvious that he changes the question from the pro- fits of the growers of corn, or of the pro- prietors of the land, to the physical and absolute value of corn itself. I certainly do not mean to say that the bounty alters the physical value of corn, and makes a bushel of it support equally well a greater number of labourers than it did before ; but I certainly do mean to say that the bounty to the British cultivator does, in the actual state of things, really increase the demand for British corn, and thus encou- rage 166 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iii. rage him to sow more than he otherwise would do, and enables him in consequence to employ more bushels of corn in the maintenance of a greater number of la- bourers. If Adam Smith's theory were true, and the real price of corn were unchangeable, or not capable of experiencing a relative increase or decrease of value compared with labour and other commodities, agri- culture would indeed be in an unfortunate situation. It would be at once excluded from the operation of that principle so beau- tifully explained in the Wealth of Nations, by which capital flows from one employ- ment to another, according to the various and necessarily fluctuating wants of society. But surely we cannot doubt that the real price of corn varies, though it may not vary so much as the real price of other commodities ; and that there are periods when all wrought commodities are cheaper, and periods when they are dearer, in pro- portion to the price of corn ; and in the one case capital flows from manufactures to agriculture, and in the other from agri- culture Ch. xi. Bowities upon Exportation. 167 culture to manufactures. To overlook these periods, or consider them of slight import- ance, is not allowable ; because in every branch of trade these periods form the grand encouragement to an increase of supply. Undoubtedly the profits of trade in any particular branch of industry can never long remain higher than in others ; but how are they lowered except by the influx of capital occasioned by these high profits ? It never can be a national object permanently to increase the profits of any particular set of dealers. The national object is the increase of supply ; but this object cannot be attained except by previ- ously increasing the profits of these dealers, and thus determining a greater quantity of capital to this particular employment. The ship-owners and sailors of Great Britain do not make greater profits now than they did before the Navigation Act ; but the object of the nation was not to increase the profits of ship-owners and sailors, but the quantity of shipping and seamen ; and this could not be done but by a law, which, by increasing the demand for them, raised the profits 168 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iii. profits of the capital before employed in this way, and determined a greater quan- tity to flow into the same channel. The object of a nation in the establishment of a bounty is, not to increase the profits of the farmers or the rents of the landlords, but to determine a greater quantity of the na- tional capital to the land, and consequently to increase supply ; and though, in the case of an advance in the price of corn from an increased demand, the rise of wages, the rise of rents and the fall of silver tend, in some degree, to obscure our view of the subject ; yet we cannot refuse to acknow- ledge that the real price of corn varies during periods sufficiently long to affect the determination of capital, or we shall be reduced to the dilemma of owning that no possible degree of demand can encourage the growth of corn. It must be allowed then that the peculiar argument relating to the nature of corn brought forward by Adam Smith upon this occasion cannot be maintained ; and that a bounty upon the exportation of corn must enlarge the demand for it and encourage its Ch. xi. Bounties upon Exportation. 169 its production in the same manner, if not in the same degree, as a bounty upon the exportation of any other commodity. But it has been urged further that this increased production of corn must neces- sarily occasion permanent cheapness; and a period of considerable length, during the first 64 years of the last century, while a bounty was in full operation in this country, has been advanced as a proof of it. In this conclusion, however, it may be reason- ably suspected that an effect, in its nature temporary, though it may be of some du- ration, has been mistaken for one which is necessarily permanent. According to the theory of demand and supply, the bounty might be expected to operate in the following manner : It is frequently stated in the Wealth of Nations that a great demand is followed by a great supply ; a great scarcity by a great plenty ; an unusual dearness by an unusual cheapness. A great and indefinite demand is indeed generally found to produce a supply more than proportioned to it. This supply as naturally occasions unusual cheapness ; 170 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iii. cheapness ; but this cheapness, when it comes, must in its turn check the produc- tion of the commodity ; and this check, upon the same principle, is apt to continue longer than necessary, and again to occasion a return to high prices. This appears to be the manner in which a bounty upon the exportation of corn, if granted under circumstances favourable to its efficiency, might be expected to operate, and this seems to have been the manner in which it really did operate in the only in- stance where it has been fairly tried. Without meaning to deny the concur- rence of other causes, or attempting to estimate the relative efficiency of the bounty, it is impossible not to acknowledge that when the growing price of corn was, according to Adam Smith, only 28 shillings a quarter, and the corn-markets of England were as low as those of the continent, a pre- mium of five shillings a quarter upon ex- portation must have occasioned an increase of real price, and given encouragement to the cultivation of grain. But the changes produced in the direction of capital to or from Ch. xi. Bounties upon Exportation. 171 from the land will always be slow. Those who have been in the habit of employing their stock in mercantile concerns do not readily turn it into the channel of agri- culture ; and it is a still more difficult and slower operation to withdraw capital from the soil, to employ it in commerce. For the first 25 years after the establishment of the bounty in this country the price of corn rose 2 or 3 shillings in the quarter ; but owing probably to the wars of William and Anne, to bad seasons, and a scarcity of money, capital seems to have accumu- lated slowly on the land, and no great sur- plus growth was effected. It was not till after the peace of Utrecht that the capital of the country began in a marked manner to increase ; and it is impossible that the bounty should not gradually have directed a larger portion of this accumulation to the land than would otherwise have gone to it. A surplus growth, and a fall of price for thirty or forty years, followed. It will be said that this period of low prices was too long to be occasioned by a bounty, even according to the theory just 172 Of Corn-Laws. Bk.iii. just laid down. This is perhaps true, and in all probability the period would have been shorter if the bounty alone had ope- rated ; but in this case other causes power- fully combined with it. The fall in the price of British corn was accompanied by a fall of prices on the continent. Whatever were the general causes which produced this effect in fo- reign countries, it is probable that they were not wholly inoperative in England. At all events nothing could be so power- fully calculated to produce cheapness, and to occasion a slow return to high prices, as a considerable surplus growth, which was unwillingly received, and only at low prices, by other nations. When such a surplus growth had been obtained, some time would necessarily be required to de- stroy it by cheapness, particularly as the moral stimulus of the bounty would pro- bably continue to act long after the fall of prices had commenced. If to these causes we add that a marked fall in the rate of interest, about the same time, evinced an abundance of capital, and a consequent difficulty Ch. xi. Bounties upon Exportation. 173 difficulty of finding a profitable employ- ment for it ; and consider further the na- tural obstacles to the moving of capital from the land ; we shall see sufficient reason why even a long period might elapse with- out any essential alteration in the compa- rative abundance and cheapness of corn. Adam Smith attributes this cheapness to a rise in the value of silver. The fall in the price of corn which took place in France and some other countries about the same time might give some countenance to the conjecture. But the accounts we have lately had of the produce of the mines during the period in question does not sufficiently support it ; and it is much more probable that it arose from the com- parative state of peace in which Europe was placed after the termination of the wars of Louis XIV., which facilitated the accumulation of capital on the land, and encouraged agricultural improvements. With regard to this country, indeed, it is observed by Adam Smith himself, that labour and other articles were rising; a fact very unfavourable to the supposition of an increased 174 Of Corn-Laws . Bk. hi. increased value of the precious metals. Not only the money price of corn fell, but its value relative to other articles was lowered, and this fall of relative value, to- gether with great exportations, clearly pointed to a relative abundance of corn, in whatever way it might be occasioned, as the main cause of the facts observed, rather than a scarcity of silver. This great fall in the British corn-market, particularly during the ten years from 1740 to 1750, accompanied by a great fall in the con- tinental markets, owing in some degree perhaps to the great exportations of British corn, especially during the years 1748, 174$, and 1750, must necessarily have given some check to its cultivation, while the increase of the real price of labour must at the same time have given a sti- mulus to the increase of population. The united operation of these two causes is ex- actly calculated first to diminish and ulti- mately to destroy a surplus of corn ; and as* after 1764, the wealth and manufac- turing population of Great Britain in- creased more rapidly than those of her neighbours, Ch. xi. Bounties upon Exportation. 175 neighbours, the returning stimulus to agri- culture, considerable as it was, arising al- most exclusively from a home demand, was incapable of producing a surplus ; and not being confined as before to British cultiva- tion, owing to the alteration in the corn- laws, was inadequate even to effect an inde- pendent supply. Had the old corn-laws remained in full force, we should still pro- bably have lost our surplus growth, owing to the causes above mentioned, although from their restrictive clauses we should certainly have been nearer the growth of an independent supply immediately pre- vious to the scarcity of 1800. It is not therefore necessary, in order to object to the bounty, to say with Adam Smith that the fall in the price of corn which took place during the first half of the last century must have happened in spite of the bounty, and could not possibly have happened in consequence of it. We may allow, on the contrary, what I think we ought to allow according to all general principles, that the bounty, when granted under favourable circumstances, is really calculated, 176 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. 111. calculated, after going through a period of dearness, to produce the surplus and the cheapness which its advocates promise * ; but according to the same general prin- ciples we must allow that this surplus and cheapness, from their operating at once as a check to produce and an encouragement to population, cannot be for any great length of time maintained. The objection then to a bounty on corn, independently of the objections to bounties in general, is, that when im- posed under the most favourable cir- cumstances it cannot produce permanent cheapness : and if it be imposed under un- favourable circumstances ; that is, if an at- tempt be made to force exportation by an adequate bounty at a time when the coun- try does not fully grow its own consump- tion ; it is obvious not only that the * As far as the bounty might tend to force the cultiva- tion of poorer land, so far no doubt it would have a tend- ency to raise the price of corn ; but we know from expe- rience that the rise of price naturally occasioned in this way is continually counteracted by improvements in agri- culture. As a matter of fact it must be allowed, that, during the period of the last century when corn was falling, more land must have been taken into cultivation. tax Ch. xi. Bounties upon Exportation. 177 tax necessary for the purpose must be a very heavy one, but that the effect will be absolutely prejudicial to the population, and the surplus growth will be purchased by a sacrifice very far beyond its worth. But notwithstanding the strong objec- tions to bounties on general grounds, and their inapplicability in cases which are not unfrequent, it must be acknowledged that while they are operative ; that is, while they produce an exportation which would not otherwise have taken place, they un- questionably encourage an increased growth of corn in the countries in which they are established, or maintain it at a point to which it would not otherwise have attained. Under peculiar and favourable circum- stances a country might maintain a consi- derable surplus growth for a great length of time, with an inconsiderable increase of the growing price of corn ; and perhaps little or no increase of the average price, including years of scarcity a . If from any period during * The average price is different from the growing price. Years of scarcity, which must occasionally occur, essen- tially affect the average price ; and the growth of a sur- plus quantity of corn, which tends to prevent scarcity, will tend to lower this average, and make it approach nearer to the growing price. *vol. ill. N the 178 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iii. the last century, when an average excess of growth for exportation had been ob- tained by the stimulus of a bounty, the foreign demand for our corn had increased at the same rate as the domestic demand, our surplus growth might have become permanent. After the bounty had ceased to stimulate to fresh exertions, its influence would by no means be lost. For some years it would have given the British grower an absolute advantage over the fo- reign grower. This advantage would of course gradually diminish ; because it is the nature of all effectual demand to be ultimately supplied, and oblige the pro- ducers to sell at the lowest price they can afford consistently with the general rate of profits. But, after having experienced a period of decided encouragement, the Bri- tish grower would find himself in the habit of supplying a larger market than his own upon equal terms with his competitors. And if the foreign and British markets con- tinued to extend themselves equally, he would continue to proportion his supplies to both ; because, unless a particular in- crease Ch. xi. Bounties upon Exportation. 179 crease of demand were to take place at home, he could never withdraw his foreign supply without lowering the price of his whole crop ; and the nation would thus be in possession of a constant store for years of scarcity. But even supposing that by a bounty, combined with the most favourable state of prices in other countries, a particular state could maintain permanently an average excess of growth for exportation, it must not of course be imagined that its popula- tion would not still be checked by the dif- ficulty of procuring subsistence. It would indeed be less exposed to the particular pressure arising from years of scarcity ; but in other respects it would be subject to the same checks as those already described in the preceding chapters; and whether there was an habitual exportation or not, the population would be regulated by the real wages of labour, and would come to a stand when the necessaries which these wages could command were not sufficient, under the actual habits of the people, to encourage an increase of numbers. n 2 CHAP, ( 180 ) CHAP. XH. Of Corn-Laws. Restrictions upon Importation. I HE laws which prohibit the importation of foreign grain, though by no means un- objectionable, are not open to the same objections as bounties, and must be allowed to be adequate to the object they have in view, the maintenance of an independent supply. A country, with landed resources, which determines never to import corn but when the price indicates an approach to- wards a scarcity, will necessarily, in average years, supply its own wants. Though we may reasonably therefore object to restric- tions upon the importation of foreign corn, on the grounds of their tending to prevent the most profitable employment of the na- tional capital and industry, to check popu- lation, and to discourage the export of our manufactures ; yet we cannot deny their tendency to encourage the growth of corn at Ch. xii. Restrictions upon Importation. 181 at home, and to procure and maintain an independent supply. A bounty, it has ap- peared, sufficient to make it answer its purpose in forcing a surplus growth, would, in many cases, require so very heavy a di- rect tax, and would bear so large a propor- tion to the whole price of the corn, as to make it in some countries next to imprac- ticable. Restrictions upon importation im- pose no direct tax upon the people. On the contrary, they might be made, if it were thought adviseable, sources of revenue to the government, and they can always, without difficulty, be put in execution, and be made infallibly to answer their express purpose of securing, in average years, a sufficient growth of corn for the actual population. We have considered, in the preceding chapters, the peculiar disadvantages which attend a system either almost exclusively agricultural or exclusively commercial, and the peculiar advantages which attend a system in which they are united, and flou- rish together. It has further appeared that, in a country with great landed resources, the 182 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iii. the commercial population may, from par- ticular causes, so far predominate, as to subject it to some of the evils which belong to a state purely commercial and manufac- turing, and to a degree of fluctuation in the price of corn greater than is found to take place in such a state. It is obviously pos- sible, by restrictions upon the importation of foreign corn, to maintain a balance be- tween the agricultural and commercial classes. The question is not a question of the efficiency or inefficiency of the measure proposed, but of its policy or impolicy. The object can certainly be accomplished, but it may be purchased too dear ; and to those who do not at once reject all inquiries on points of this kind, as impeaching a principle which they hold sacred, the question, whether a balance between the agricultural and commercial classes of so- ciety, which would not take place naturally, ought, under certain circumstances, to be maintained artificially, must appear to be the most important practical question in the whole compass of political economy. One of the objections to the admission of the Ch. xii. Restrictions upon Importation. 183 the doctrine that restrictions upon importa- tion are advantageous is, that it cannot possibly be laid down as a general rule that every state ought to raise its own corn. There are some states so circumstanced that the rule is clearly and obviously in- applicable to them. In the first place there are many states which have made some figure in history, the territories of which have been perfectly inconsiderable compared with their main town or towns, and utterly incompetent to supply the actual population with food. In such communities, what is called the principal internal trade of a large state, the trade which is carried on between the towns and the country, must necessarily be a foreign trade, and the importation of fo- reign corn is absolutely necessary to their existence. They may be said to be bora without the advantage of land, and, to what- ever risks and disadvantages a system merely commercial and manufacturing may be exposed, they have no power of choosing any other. All that they can do is to make the most of their own situation, compared witb 184 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iii. with the situation of their neighbours, and to endeavour by superior industry, skill, and capital, to make up for so important a deficiency. In these efforts some states of which we have accounts have been wonder- fully successful ; but the reverses to which they have been subject have been almost as conspicuous as the degree of their prosperity compared with the scantiness of their na- tural resources. Secondly, restrictions upon the importa- tion of foreign corn are evidently not ap- plicable to a country which, from its soil and climate, is subject to very great and sudden variations in its home supplies, from the variations of the seasons. A country so circumstanced will unquestion- ably increase its chance of a steady supply of grain by opening as many markets for importation and exportation as possible, and this will probably be true, even though other countries occasionally prohibit or tax the exports of their grain. The peculiar evil to which such a country is subject can only be mitigated by encouraging the freest possible foreign trade in corn. Thirdly, Ch. xii. Restrictions upon Importation. 185 Thirdly, restrictions upon importation are not applicable to a country which has a very barren territory, although it may be of some extent. An attempt fully to cul- tivate and improve such a territory by forcibly directing capital to it would pro- bably, under any circumstances, fail ; and the actual produce obtained in this way might be purchased by sacrifices which the capital and industry of the nation could not possibly continue to support. Whatever advantages those countries may enjoy, which possess the means of supporting a considerable population from their own soil, such advantages are not within the reach of a state so circumstanced. It must either consent to be a poor and inconsider- able community, or it must place its chief dependence on other resources than those of land. It resembles in many respects those states which have a very small terri- tory ; and its policy, with regard to the im- portation of corn, must of course be nearly the same. In all these cases there can be no doubt of the impolicy of attempting to maintain a balance 186 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iii. a balance between the agricultural and commercial classes of society which would not take place naturally. Under other and opposite circumstances, however, this impolicy is by no means so clear. If a nation possesses a large territory consisting of land of an average quality, it may without difficulty support from its own soil a population fully sufficient to main- tain its rank in wealth and power among the countries with which it has relations either of commerce or of war. Territories of a certain extent must ultimately in the main support their own population. As each exporting country approaches towards that complement of wealth and population to which it is naturally tending, it will gradually withdraw the corn which for a time it had spared to its more manu- facturing and commercial neighbours, and leave them to subsist on their own re* sources. The peculiar products of each soil and climate are objects of foreign trade, which can never, under any circumstances, fail. But food is not a peculiar product ; and Ch. xii. Restrictions upon Importation. 187 and the country which produces it in the greatest abundance may, accord- ing to the laws which govern the pro- gress of population, have nothing to spare for others. An extensive foreign trade in corn beyond what arises from the va- riableness of the seasons in different countries is rather a temporary and in- cidental trade, depending chiefly upon the different stages of improvement which different countries may have reached, and on other accidental circumstances, than a trade which is in its nature permanent, and the stimulus to which will remain in the progress of society unabated. In the wildness of speculation it has been sug- gested (of course more in jest than in earnest), that Europe ought to grow its corn in America, and devote itself solely to manufactures and commerce,as thebestsort of division of the labour of the globe. But even on the extravagant supposition that the natural course of things might lead to such a division of labour for a time, and that by such means Europe could raise a population greater than its lands could possibly 188 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iii. possibly support, the consequences ought justly to be dreaded. It is an unquestion- able truth that it must answer to every ter- ritorial state, in its natural progress to wealth, to manufacture for itself, unless the countries from which it had purchased its manufactures possess some advantages pe- culiar to them besides capital and skill. But when upon this principle America be- gan to withdraw its corn from Europe, and the agricultural exertions of Europe were inadequate to make up for the deficiency, it would certainly be felt that the tempo- rary advantages of a greater degree of wealth and population (supposing them to have been really attained) had been very dearly purchased by a long period of re- trograde movements and misery. If then a country be of such a size that it may fairly be expected finally to supply its own population with food ; if the popu- lation which it can thus support from its own resources in land be such as to en- able it to maintain its rank and power among other nations ; and further, if there be reason to fear not only the final with- drawing Ch. xii. Restrictions upsn Importation. 189 drawing of foreign corn used for a certain time, which might be a distant event, but the immediate effects that attend a great predominance of a manufacturing popu- lation, such as increased unhealthiness, in- creased turbulence, increased fluctuations in the price of corn, and increased variableness in the wages of labour ; it may not appear impolitic artificially to maintain a more equal balance between the agricultural and commercial classes by restricting the im- portation of foreign corn, and making agriculture keep pace with manufac- tures. Thirdly, if a country be possessed of such a soil and climate, that the variations in its annual growth of corn are less than in most other countries, this may be an addi- tional reason for admitting the policy of restricting the importation of foreign corn. Countries are very different in the degree of variableness to which their annual supplies are subject; and though it is unquestionably true that if all were nearly equal in this respect, and the trade in corn really free, the steadiness of price in a particular state would 190 Of Corn-Lcrrvs. Bk. iii. would increase with an increase in the number of the nations connected with it by the commerce of grain ; yet it by no means follows that the same conclusion will hold good when the premises are essentially dif- ferent ; that is, when some of the countries taken into the circle of trade are subject to very great comparative variations in their supplies of grain, and when this defect is aggravated by the acknowledged want of real freedom in the foreign trade of corn. Suppose, for instance, that the extreme variations above and below the average quantity of corn grown, were in England \ and in France i, a free intercourse be- tween the two countries would probably increase the variableness of the English markets. And if, in addition to England and France, such a country as Eengal could be brought near, and admitted into the circle a country in which, according to Sir George Colebrook, rice is sometimes sold four times as cheap in one year as in the succeeding without famine or scarcity ; a Husbandry of Bengal, p. 108. Note. He observes in the text of the same page that the price of corn fluc- tuates much more than in Europe. and Ch. xii. Restrictions upon Importation. 191 and where, notwithstanding the frequency of abundant harvests, deficiencies some- times occur of such extent as necessarily to destroy a considerable portion of the po- pulation ; it is quite certain that the sup- plies both of England and France would become very much more variable than be- fore the accession. In point of fact, there is reason to believe that the British isles, owing to the nature of their soil and climate, are peculiarly free from great variations in their annual pro- duce of grain. If we compare the prices of corn in England and France from the period of the commencement of the Eaton tables to the beginning of the revolutionary war, we shall find that in England the highest price of the quarter of wheat of 8 bushels during the whole of that time was SI. 15s. 6di. (in 16*48), and the lowest price 1/. 2s. Id. (in 1743), while in France the highest price of the septier was 62 francs 78 centimes (in 1662), and the lowest price 8 francs 89 centimes (in 1718)*, a Garnier's Edition of the Wealth of Nations vol. ii. Table, p. 188. In 192 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. Hi In the one case the difference is a little above 3-i times, and in the other very nearly 7 times. In the English tables, during periods of ten or twelve years, only two instances occur of a variation amount- ing to as much as 3 times ; in the French tables, during periods of the same length, one instance occurs of a variation of above 6 times, and three instances besides of a variation of 4 times or above. These variations may, perhaps, have been aggravated by a want of freedom in the internal trade of corn, but they are strongly confirmed by the calculations of Turgot, which relate solely to variations of produce, without reference to any difficul- ties or obstructions in its free transport from one part of the country to another. On land of an average quality he esti- mates the produce at seven septiers the ar- pent in years of great abundance, and three septiers the arpentin years of great scarcity ; while the medium produce he values at five septiers the arpent \ These calculations he conceives are not far removed from the CEuvres dc Turgot, torn. vi. p. 143. Edit. 1808. truth ; Ch. xii. Restrictions upon Importation. 193 truth; and proceeding on these grounds he observes that, in a very abundant year, the produce will be five months above its ordi- nary consumption, and in a very scarce year as much below. These variations are, I should think, much greater than those which take place in this country, at least if we may judge from prices, particularly as in a given degree of scarcity in the two countries there is little doubt that, from the superior riches of England, and the exten- sive parish relief which it affords to the poorer classes in times of dearth, its prices would rise more above the usual average than those of France. If we look to the prices of wheat in Spain during the same period, we shall find, in like manner, much greater variations than in England. In a table of the prices of the fanega of wheat in the market of Seville from 1675 to 1764 inclusive, published in the Appendix to the Bullion Report*, the highest price is 48 reals vellon (in 1677), and the lowest price 7 reals vellon (in 1720), a difference of nearly seven times; a Appendix, p. 182. *vol. in-. o and 194 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iiL and in periods of ten or twelve years the difference is, in two or three instances, as much as four times. In another table, from 1788 to 1792 inclusive, relating to the towns of Old Castille, the highest price in 1790 was 109 reals vellon the fanega, and in 1792 the lowest price was only 16 reals vellon the fanega. In the market of Medi- na del Rio Seco, a town of the kingdom of Leon, surrounded by a very fine corn country, the price of the load of four fane- gas of wheat was, in May, 1800, 100 reals vellon, and in May, 1804, 600 reals vellon, and these were both what are called low prices, as compared with the highest prices of the year. The difference would be greater if the high prices were compared with the low prices. Thus, in 1799, the low price of the four fanegas was 88 reals vellon, and in 1804 the high price of the four fanegas was 640 reals vellon, a dif- ference of above seven times in so short a period as six years \ In Spain, foreign corn is freely admit- ted ; yet the variation of price, in the towns * Bullion Report. Appendix, p. 185. of Ch. xii. Restrictions upon Importation. 195 of Andalusia, a province adjoining the sea, and penetrated by the river Guadalquiver, though not so great as those just mentioned, seem to shew that the coasts of the Medi- terranean by no means furnish very steady supplies. It is known, indeed, that Spain is the principal competitor of England in the purchase of grain in the Baltic ', and as it is quite certain that what may be called the growing or usual price of corn in Spain is much lower than in England, it follows, that the difference between the prices of plentiful and scarce years must be very considerable. I have not the means of ascertaining the variations in the supplies and prices of the northern nations. They are, however, oc- casionally great, as it is well known that some of these countries are at times subject to very severe scarcities. But the instances already produced are sufficient to shew, that a country which is advantageously circum- stanced with regard to the steadiness of its home supplies may rather diminish than increase this steadiness by uniting its inte- rests with a country less favourably circum- o 2 s lanced 196 Of Corn Laws. Bk. iii. stanced in this respect ; and this steadiness will unquestionably be still further dimi- nished, if the country which is the most va- riable in its supplies is allowed to inun- date the other with its crops when they are abundant, while it reserves to itself the pri- vilege of retaining them in a period of slight scarcity, when its commercial neighbour happens to be in the greatest want\ 3dly, if a nation be possessed of a terri- tory, not only of sufficient extent to main- tain under its actual cultivation a population adequate to a state of the first rank, but of sufficient unexhausted fertility to allow of a very great increase of population, such a circumstance would of course make the measure of restricting the importation of fercign corn more applicable to it. A country which, though fertile and po- pulous, had been cultivated nearly to tine utmost, would have no other means of in- creasing its population than by the admis- sion of foreign corn. But the British isles These two circumstaaces essentially change the pre- mises on which the question of a free importation, as ap- plicable to a particular state, must rest. shew Ch. xii. Restrictions upon Importation. 197 shew at present no symptoms whatever of this species of exhaustion. The necessary accompaniments of a territory worked to the utmost are very low profits and extent, a very slack demand for labour, low wages, and a stationary population. Some of these symptoms may indeed take place without an exhausted territory ; but an exhausted territory cannot take place without all these symptoms. Instead, however, of such symp- toms, we have seen in this country, during the twenty years previous to 1814, a high rate of profits and interest, a very great de- mand for labour, good wages, and an in- crease of population more rapid, perhaps, than during any period of our history. The capitals which have been laid out in bring- ing new land into cultivation, or improving the old, must necessarily have yielded good returns, or, under the actual rate of general profits, they would not have been so em- ployed : and although it is strictly true that, as capital accumulates upon the land, its profits must ultimately diminish; yet owing to the increase of agricultural skill, and other causes noticed in a former chapter, these 198 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iii these two effects of progressive cultivation do not by any means always keep pace with each other. Though they must finally unite and terminate the career of their progress together, they are often, during the course of their progress, separated for a consider- able time, and at a considerable distance. In some countries, and some soils, the quan- tity of capital which can be absorbed before any essential diminution of profits necessa- rily takes plaee is so great, that its limit is not easily calculated ; and certainly, when we consider what has actually been done in some districts of England and Scotland, and compare it with what remains to be done in other districts, we must allow that no near approach to this limit has yet been made. On account of the high money price of labour, and of the materials of agricultural capital, occasioned partly by direct and indirect taxation, and partly, or perhaps chiefly, by the great prosperity of our foreign commerce, new lands cannot be brought into cultivation, nor great im- provements made on the old, without a high money price of grain; but these lands, when Ch. xii. Restrictio7is upon Importation. 199 when they have been so brought into culti- vation or improved, have by no means turned out unproductive. The quantity and value of their produce have borne a full and fair proportion to the quantity of capital and labour employed upon them ; and they were cultivated with great advantage both to individuals and the state, as long as the same, or nearly the same, relations between the value of produce and the cost of pro- duction, which prompted this cultivation, continued to exist. In such a state of the soil, the British empire might unquestionably be able, not only to support from its own agricultural re- sources its present population, but double, and in time, perhaps, even treble the number ; and consequently a restriction upon the im- portation of foreign corn, which might be thought greatly objectionable in a country which had reached nearly the end of its re- sources, might appear in a very different light in a, country capable of supporting from its own lands a very great increase of population. But it will be said, that although a coun- try 200 Of Corn-Lazvs. Bk. iff. try may be allowed to be capable of main- taining from its own soil not only a great, but an increasing population, yet, if it be acknowledged that, by opening its ports for the free admission of foreign corn, it may be made tosupport a greater and more rapidly increasing population, it is unjusti- fiable to go out of our way to check this tendency, and to prevent that degree of wealth and population which would natu- rally take place. This is unquestionably a powerful argu- ment; and granting fully the premises, (which however may admit of some doubt,) it cannot be answered upon the principles of political economy solely. I should say, however, that if it could be clearly ascer- tained that the addition of wealth and po- pulation so acquired would subject the so- ciety to a greater degree of uncertainty in its supplies of corn, greater fluctuations in the wages of labour, greater unhealthiness and immorality owing to a larger propor- tion of the population being employed in manufactories, and a greater chance of long and depressing retrograde movements occa- sioned Ch. xii. Restrictions upon Importation. 201 sioned by the natural progress of those countries from which corn had been im- ported ; I should have no hesitation in con- sidering such wealth and population as much too dearly purchased. The happiness of a society is, after all, the legitimate end even of its wealth, power, and population. It is certainly true that with a view to the structure of society most favourable to this happiness, and an adequate stimulus to the production of wealth from the soil, a very considerable admixture of commercial and manufacturing population with the agricul- tural is absolutely necessary; but there is no argument so frequently and obviously fallacious as that which infers that what is good to a certain extent is good to any ex- tent; and though it will be most readily ad- mitted that, in a large landed nation, the evils which belong to the manufacturing and commercial system are much more than counterbalanced by its advantages, as long as it is supported by agriculture ; yet, in reference to the effect of the excess which is not so supported, it may fairly be doubted whether the evils do not decidedly predo- minate. It 202 Of Corn-Lazes. Bk. iii. It is observed by Adam Smith, that the " capital which is acquired to any country by commerce and manufactures is all a very uncertain and precarious possession,till some part of it has been secured and realized in the cultivation and improvement of its lands \ It is remarked in another place, that the monopoly of the colony trade, by raising the rate of mercantile profit, discourages the improvement of the soil, and retards the natural increase of that great original source of revenue the rent of land b . Now it is certain that, at no period, have the manufactures, commerce and colony trade of the country been in a state to absorb so much capital as during the twenty years ending with 1814. From the year 1764 to the peace of Amiens, it is generally allowed that the commerce and manufactures of the country increased faster than its agriculture, and that it became gradually more and more dependent on foreign corn for its sup- port. Since the peace of Amiens the state of its colonial monopoly and of its manu- Vol. ii. b. iii. c.4. p. 137- k Id. b.iv. c. 8. p. 495. factures Ch. xii. Restrictions upon Importation. 203 factures lias been such as to demand an unusual quantity of capital; and if the pe- culiar circumstances of the subsequent war, the high freights and insurance, and the de~ crees of Buonaparte, had not rendered the importation of foreign corn extremely diffi- cult and expensive, Ave should at this mo- ment, according to all general principles, have been in the habit of supporting a much larger portion of our population upon it, than at any former period of our history. The cultivation of the country would be in a very different state from what it is at pre- sent. Very few or none of those great im- provements would have taken place which may be said to have purchased fresh land for the state that no fall of price can de- stroy. And the peace, or accidents of dif- ferent kinds, might have curtailed essen- tially both our colonial and manufacturing advantages, and destroyed or driven away our capital before it had spread itself on the soil, and become national property. As it is, the practical restrictions thrown in the way of importing foreign corn during the war have forced our steam-engines and our 204 Of Corn-Laws. Bk iii. our colonial monopoly to cultivate our lands ; and those very causes which, ac- cording to Adam Smith, tend to draw ca- pital from agriculture, and would certainly have so drawn it if we could have continued to purchase foreign corn at the market prices of France and Holland, have been the means of giving such a spur to our agriculture, that it has not only kept pace with a very rapid increase of commerce and manufactures, but has recovered the distance at which it had for many years been left behind, and now marches with them abreast. But restrictions upon the importation of foreign corn in a country which has great landed resources, not only tend to spread every commercial and manufacturing ad- vantage possessed, whether permanent or temporary, on the soil, and thus, in the lan- guage of Adam Smith, secure and realize it; but also tend to prevent those great oscillations in the progress of agriculture and commerce, which are seldom unat- tended with evil. It is to be recollected, and it is a point of great importance to keep constantly in our minds, Ch. xii. Restrictions upon Importation. 205 minds, that the distress which has been experienced among almost all classes of society from the sudden fall of prices, ex- cept as far as it has been aggravated by the state of the currency, has been occasioned by natural, not artificial, causes. There is a tendency to an alternation in the rate of the progress of agriculture and ma- nufactures in the same manner as there is a tendency to an alternation in the rate of the progress of food and population. In pe- riods of peace and uninterrupted trade, these alternations, though not favourable to the happiness and quiet of society, may take place without producing material evil ; but the intervention of war is always liable to give them a force and rapidity that must unavoidably produce a convulsion in the state of property. The war that succeeded to the peace of Amiens found us dependent upon foreign countries for a very considerable portion of our supplies of corn ; and we now grow our own consumption, notwithstanding an unusual increase of population in the in- terval. This great and sudden change in the 206 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iii. the state of our agriculture could only have been effected by very high prices occa- sioned by an inadequate home supply and the great expense and difficulty of import- ing foreign corn. But the rapidity with which this change has been effected must necessarily create a glut in the market as soon as the home, growth of corn became fully equal or a little in excess above the home consumption ; and, aided only by a small foreign importation, must inevitably oc- casion a very sudden fall of prices. If the ports had continued open for the free import- ation of foreign corn, there can be little doubt that the price of corn in 18 15 would have been still considerably lower. This low price of corn, even if by means of lowered rents our present state of cultivation could be in a great degree preserved, must give such a check to future improvement, that if the ports were to continue open, we should certainly not grow a sufficiency at home to keep pace with our increasing population ; and at the end of ten or twelve years we might be found by a new war in the same state that we were at the commencement of the present. Ch. xii. Restrictions upon Importation. 207 present. We should then have the same career of high prices to pass through, the same excessive stimulus to agriculture a followed by the same sudden and depres- sing check to it, and the same enormous loans borrowed with the price of wheat at 90 or 100 shillings a quarter, and the mo- nied incomes of the landholders and in- dustrious classes of society nearly in pro- portion, to be paid when wheat is at 50 or 60 shillings a quarter, and the incomes of the landlords and industrious classes of society greatly reduced a state of things which cannot take place without an ex- cessive aggravation of the difficulty of paying taxes, and particularly that inva- riable monied amount which pays the in- terest of the national debt. On the other hand a country which so restricts the importations of foreign corn as on an average to grow its own supplies, * According to the evidence before the House of Lords (Reports, p. 49), the freight and insurance alone on a quarter of corn were greater by 48 shillings in 1811 than in 1814. Without any artificial interference then, it appears that war alone may occasion unavoidably a pro- digious increase of price. and 208 Of Corn-Laws. Bk. iii. and to import merely in periods of scarcity, is not only certain of spreading every in- vention in manufactures and every peculiar advantage it may possess from its colonies or general commerce on the land, and thus of fixing them to the spot and rescuing them from accidents ; but is necessarily exempt from those violent and distressing convulsions of property which almost un- avoidably arise from the coincidence of a general war and an insufficient home supply of corn. If the late war had found us independent of foreigners for our average consumption, not even our paper currency could have made the prices of our corn approach to the prices which were at one time experienced 8 . And if we had continued, "during the course of the contest, independent of fo- reign supplies, except in an occasional scarcity, it is impossible that the growth of a It will be found upon examination, that the prices of our com led the way to the excess and diminution of our paper currency, rather than followed, although the prices of corn could never have been either so high or so low if thjs excess and diminution had not taken place. our Ch. xii. Resfrictions upon Importation. 209 our own consumption, or a little above it, should have produced at the end of the war so universal a feeling of distress. The chief practical objection to which re- strictions on the importation of corn are ex- posed is a glut from an abundant harvest, which cannot be relieved by exportation. And in the consideration of that part of the question which relates to the fluctuations of prices this objection ought to have its full and fair weight. But the fluctuation of prices arising from this cause has sometimes been very greatly exaggerated. A glut which might essentially distress the farmers of a poor country, might be comparatively little felt by the farmers of a rich one ; and it is difficult to conceive that a nation with an ample capital, and not under the in- fluence of a great shock to commercial con- fidence, as this country was in 1815, would find much difficulty in reserving the surplus of one year to supply the wants of the next or some future year. It may fairly indeed be doubted whether, in such a country as our own, the fall of price arising from this cause would be so great as that which *vol. in. p would 210 OfCorn-Laxm. Bk. iii. would be occasioned by the sudden pour- ing in of the supplies from an abundant crop in Europe, particularly from those states which do not regularly export corn. If our ports were always open, the existing laws of France would still prevent such a supply as would equalize prices; and French corn would only come in to us in considerable quantities in years of great abundance, when we were the least likely to want it, and when it was most likely to occasion a glut*. But if the fall of price occasioned in these two ways would not be essentially different, as it is quite certain that the rise of price in years of general scarcity would be less in those countries which habitually grow their own supplies; it must be al- lowed that the range of variation will be the least under such a system of restric- tions as, without preventing importation * Almost all the corn merchants who gave their evi- dence before the committees of the two houses in 1814 seemed fully aware of the low prices likely to be occa- sioned by au abundant crop in Europe, if our ports were open to receive it. when Ch. xii. Restrictions upon Importation. 211 when prices are high, will secure in ordinary years a growth equal to the consumption. One objection however to systems of restriction must always remain. They are essentially unsocial. I certainly think that, in reference to the interests of a particular state, a restriction upon the importation of foreign corn may sometimes be advan- tageous ; but I feel still more certain that in reference to the interests of Europe in general the most perfect freedom of trade in corn, as well as in every other commo- dity, would be the most advantageous. Such a perfect freedom, however, could hardly fail to be followed by a more free and equal distribution of capital, which, though it would greatly advance the riches and happiness of Europe, would unques- tionably render some parts of it poorer and less populous than they are at present ; and there is little reason to expect that in- dividual states will ever consent to sacrifice the wealth within their own confines to the wealth of the world. It is further to be observed, that inde- pendently of more direct regulations, tax- p 2 ation 212 Of Corn-Laws, $c. Bk. in. ation alone produces a system of discou- ragements and encouragements which es- sentially interferes with the natural relations of commodities to each other ; and as there is no hope of abolishing taxation, it may sometimes be only by a further interference that these natural relations can be restored. A perfect freedom of trade therefore is a vision which it is to be feared can never be realized. But still it should be our object to make as near approaches to it as we can. It should always be considered as the great general rule. And when any de- viations from it are proposed, those who propose them are bound clearly to make out the exception. CHAP. < 213 ) CHAP. XIII. Of increasing Wealth, as it affects the Condition of the Poor. I HE professed object of Adam Smith's Inquiry is the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. There is another, how- ever, still more interesting, which he occa- sionally mixes with it the causes which affect the happiness and comfort of the lower orders of society, which in every nation form the most numerous class. These two subjects are, no doubt, nearly connected ; but the nature and extent of this connexion, and the mode in which in- creasing wealth operates on the condition of the poor, have not been stated with suf- ficient correctness and precision. Adam Smith, in his chapter on the wages of labour, considers every increase in the stock or revenue of the society as an in- crease 214 Of increasing Wealth, as it Bk. iii. crease in the funds for the maintenance of labour ; and having before laid down the position that the demand for those who live by wages can only increase in proportion to the increase of the funds for the payment of wages, the conclusion naturally follows, that every increase of wealth tends to in- crease the demand for labour and to im- prove the condition of the lower classes of society a . Upon a nearer examination, however, it will be found that the funds for the mainte- nance of labour do not necessarily increase with the increase of wealth, and very rarely increase in proportion to it; and that the condition of the lower classes of society does not depend exclusively upon the in- crease of the funds for the -maintenance of labour, or the power of supporting a greater number of labourers. Adam Smith defines the wealth of a state to be the annual produce of its land and labour. This definition evidently includes Vol. i. book i. c. 8. manufactured Ch. xiii. affects the Condition of the Poor. 215 manufactured produce as well as the pro- duce of the land. Now, upon the supposi- tion that a nation, from peculiar situation and circumstances, was unable to procure an additional quantity of food, it is obvious that the produce of its labour would not necessarily come to a stand, although the produce of its land or its power of import- ing corn were incapable of further increase. If the materials of manufactures could be obtained either at home or from abroad, improved skill and machinery might work them up to a greatly increased amount with the same number of hands, and even the number of hands might be considerably increased by an increased taste for manu- factures, compared with war and menial service, and by the employment conse- quently of a greater proportion of the whole population in manufacturing and commer- cial labour That such a case does not frequently oc- cur will be most readily allowed. It is not only however possible, but forms the spe- cific limit to the increase of population in the 216 Of increasing Wealth, as it Bk. iii. the natural progress of cultivation, with which limit, the limit to the further pro- gress of wealth is obviously not contempo- rary. But though cases of this kind do not often occur, because these limits are seldom reached ; yet approximations to them are constantly taking place, and in the usual progress of improvement the inr crease of wealth and capital is rarely ac- companied with a proportionately increased power of supporting an additional number of labourers. Some ancient nations, which, according to the accounts we have received of them, possessed but an inconsiderable quantity of manufacturing and commercial capital, appear to have cultivated their lands highly by means of an agrarian division of pro- perty, and were unquestionably very popu- lous. In such countries,though full of peo- ple already, there would evidently be room for a very great increase of capital and riches; but, allowing all the weight that is in any degree probable to the increased production or importation of food occasioned by the stimulus Ch. xiii. affects the Condition of the Poor. 2Y7 stimulus of additional capital, there would evidently not he room lor a proportionate increase of the means of subsistence. If we compare the early state of our most flourishing European kingdoms with their present state, we shall find this conclusion confirmed almost universally by experience. Adam Smith, in treating of the different progress of opulence in different nations, says, that England, since the time of Eli- zabeth, has been continually advancing in commerce and manufactures. He then adds, " The cultivation and improvement " of the country has no doubt been gra- " dually advancing. But it seems to have " followed slowly and at a distance the " more rapid progress of commerce and " manufactures. The greater part of the " country must probably have been culti- " vated before the reign of Elizabeth, and " a very great part of it still remains un- " cultivated, and the cultivation of the far " greater part is much inferior to what it " might be a ." The same observation is 3 Vol. ii. book iv. c. 4, p. 133. applicable 218 Of increasing Wealth, as it Bk. iii. applicable to most of the other countries of Europe. The best land would natu- rally be the first occupied. This land, even with that sort of indolent cultivation and great waste of labour which particularly marked the feudal times, would be capable of supporting a considerable population ; and on the increase of capital, the in- creasing taste for conveniences and luxuries, combined with the decreasing power of production in the new land to be taken into cultivation, would naturally and necessarily direct the greatest part of this new capital to commerce and manufactures, and oc- casion a more rapid increase of wealth than of population. The population of England accordingly in the reign of Elizabeth appears to have been nearly five millions, which would not be very far snort of the half of what it is at present; but when we consider the very great proportion which the products of commer- cial and manufacturing industry now bear to the quantity of food raised for human con- sumption, it is probably a very low estimate to Ch. xiii. affects the Condition of the Poor. 219 to say that the mass of wealth or the stock and revenue of the country must, inde- pendently of any change in the value of the circulating medium, have increased above four times. Few of the other coun- tries in Europe have increased to the same extent in commercial and manufacturing wealth as England ; but as far as they have proceeded in this career, all appearances clearly indicate that the progress of their general wealth has been greater than the progress of their means of supporting an additional population. That every increase of the stock or re- venue of a nation cannot be considered as an increase of the real funds for the main- tenance of labour will appear in a striking light in the case of China. Adam Smith observes, that China has probably long been as rich as the nature of her laws and institutions will admit; but intimates that with other laws and institu^ tions, and if foreign commerce were held in honour, she might still be much richer. If trade and foreign commerce were held in 220 Of increasing Wealth, as it Bk. iii. in great honour in China, it is evident that, from the great number of her labourers and the cheapness of her labour, she might work up manufactures for foreign sale to a great amount. It is equally evident that, from the great bulk of provisions and the prodigious extent of her inland territory, she could not in return import such a quantity as would be any sensible addition to her means of subsistence. Her immense amount of manufactures therefore she would either consume at home, or exchange for lux- uries collected from all parts of the world. At present the country appears to be over- peopled compared with what its stock can employ, and no labour is spared in the production of food. An immense capital could not be employed in China in pre- paring manufactures for foreign trade, without altering this state of things, and taking off some labourers from agriculture, which might have a tendency to diminish the produce of the country. Allowing, however, that this would be made up, and indeed more than made up, by the beneficial effects of improved skill and economy of labour Ch. xiii. affects the Condition of the Poor. 221 labour in the cultivation of the poorest lands, yet, as the quantity of subsistence could be but little increased, the demand for manufactures which would raise the price of labour, would necessarily be fol- lowed by a proportionate rise in the price of provisions, and the labourer would be able to command but little more food than before. The country would, however, ob- viously be advancing in wealth ; the ex- changeable value of the annual produce of its land and labour would be annually augmented ; yet the real funds for the maintenance of labour would be nearly stationary. The argument perhaps appears clearer when applied to China, because it is generally allowed that its wealth has been long stationary, and its soil cultivated nearly to the utmost 3 . In all these cases, it is not on account of a How far this latter opinion is to be depended upon it is not very easy to say. Improved skill and a saving of labour would certainly enable the Chinese to cultivate some lands with advantage which they cannot cultivate now, but the more general use of horses instead of men might prevent this extended cultivation from giving any encouragement to an increase of people. any 222 Of increasing Wealth, as it Bk. iii. any undue preference given to commerce and manufactures, compared with agri- culture, that the effect just described takes place, but merely because the powers of the earth in the production of food have narrower limits than the skill and tastes of mankind in giving value to raw materials, and consequently in the approach towards the limits of subsistence there is naturally more room, and consequently more encou- ragement, for the increase of the one species of wealth than of the other. It must be allowed then, that the funds for the maintenance of labour do not ne- cessarily increase with the increase of wealth, and very rarely increase in proportion to it. But the condition of the lower classes of society certainly does not depend exclu- sively upon the increase of the funds for the maintenance of labour, or the means of supporting more labourers. That these means form always a very powerful ingre- dient in the condition of the poor, and the main ingredient in the increase of popula- tion, is unquestionable. But, in the first place, the comforts of the lower classes of society Ch. xiii. affects the Condition of the Poor. 22$ society do not depend solely upon food, nor even upon strict necessaries ; and they cannot be considered as in a good state unless they have the command of some conveniences and even luxuries. Secondly, the tendency in population fully to keep pace with the means of subsistence must in general prevent the increase of these means from having a great and permanent effect in improving the condition of the poor. And, thirdly, the cause which has the most lasting effect in improving the situation of the lower classes of society depends chiefly upon the conduct and pru- dence of the individuals themselves, and is therefore not immediately and necessarily connected with an increase in the means of subsistence. With a view therefore to the other causes which affect the condition of the labouring classes, as well as the increase of the means of subsistence, it may be desira- ble to trace more particularly the mode in which increasing wealth operates, and to state both the disadvantages as well as the advantages with which it is accompanied* In 224 Of increasing Wealthy as it Bk. iii. In the natural and regular progress of a country to a state of great wealth and po- pulation, there are two disadvantages to which the lower classes of society seem necessarily to be subjected. The first is, a diminished power of supporting children under the existing habits of the society with respect to the necessaries of life. And the second the employment of a larger pro- portion of the population in occupations less favourable to health, and more exposed to fluctuations of demand and unsteadiness of wages. A diminished power of supporting children is an absolutely unavoidable con- sequence of the progress of a country towards the utmost limits of its population. If we allow that the power of a given quan- tity of territory to produce food has some limit, we must allow that as this limit is approached, and the increase of population becomes slower and slower, the power of supporting children will be less and less, till finally, when the increase of produce stops, it becomes only sufficient to maintain, on an average, families of such a size as will not Ch. xiii. affects the Condition of the Poor. 225 not allow of a further addition of num- bers. This state of things is generally accom- panied by a fall in the com price of labour; but should this effect be prevented by the prevalence of prudential habits among the lower classes of society, still the result just described musttake place; and though, from the powerful operation of the preventive check to increase, the wages of labour esti- mated even in corn might not be low, yet it is obvious that in this case the power of supporting children would rather be nomi- nal than real ; and the moment this power began to be exercised to its apparent extent, it would cease to exist. The second disadvantage to which the lower classes of society are subjected in the progressive increase of wealth is, that a larger portion of them is engaged in un- healthy occupations, and in employments in which the wages of labour are exposed to much greater fluctuations than in agricul- ture, and the simpler kinds of domestic trade. On the state of the poor employed in ma- nufactories with respect to health, and the * vol. in. q fluctuations 226 Of increasing Wealth, as it Bk. iii. fluctuations of wages, I will beg leave to quote a passage from Dr. Aikin's Descrip- tion of the Country round Manchester: " The invention and improvements of ma- " chines to shorten labour have had a sur- " prising influence to extend our trade, " and also to call in hands from all parts, " particularly children for the cotton-mills. " It is the wise plan of Providence, that in " this life there shall be no good without its " attendant inconvenience. There are w many which are too obvious in these cot- " ton-mills, and similar factories, which " counteract that increase of population " usually consequent on the improved faci- " lity of labour. In these, children of a " very tender age are employed, many of " them collected from the work-houses in " London and Westminster, and trans- " ported in crowds as apprentices to mas- " ters resident many hundred miles distant, " where they serve unknown, unprotected " and forgotten by those to whose care " nature or the laws had consigned them. u These children are usually too long con- " fined Ch, xiii. affects the Condition of the Poor. 227 " fined to work in close rooms, often during " the whole night. The air they breathe " from the oil, &c., employed in the ma- " chinery, and other circumstances, is in- " jurious; little attention is paid to their " cleanliness; and frequent changes from " a warm and dense to a cold and thin at- " mosphere are predisposing causes to " sickness and debility, and particularly to u the epidemic fever which is so generally " to be met with in these factories. It is " also much to be questioned if society does " not receive detriment from the manner " in which children are thus employed " during their early years. They are not " generally strong to labour, or capable of " pursuing any other branch of business " when the term of their apprenticeship " expires. The females are wholly unin- " structed in sewing, knitting, and other " domestic affairs requisite to make them " notable and frugal wives and mothers. " This is a very great misfortune to them " and to the public, as is sadly proved by " a comparison of the families of labourers " in husbandry and those of manufac- q 2 " turers 228 Of increasing Wealth, as it Bk. iii. " turers in general. In the former we meet " with neatness, cleanliness and comfort; " in the latter with filth, rags and poverty, " although their wages may be nearly " double to those of the husbandman. It " must be added that the want of early re- " ligious instruction and example, and the " numerous and indiscriminate association " in these buildings, are very unfavourable " to their future conduct in life V In the same work it appears that the re- gister for the collegiate church of Manches- ter, from Christmas, 1793, to Christmas, 1794, shewed a decrease of 168 marriages, 538 christenings, and 250 burials. In the parish of Rochdale, in the neighbourhood, a still more melancholy reduction in pro- portion to the number of people took place. In 1792 the births were 746, the burials * P. 219- Dr. Aikin says that endeavours have been made to remedy these evils, which in some factories have been attended with success. And it is very satisfactory to be able to add, that since this account was written, the situation of the children employed in the cotton-mills has been further very essentially improved, partly by the in- terference of the legislature, and partly by the humane and liberal exertions of individuals. 646, Ch. xiii. affects the Condition of the Poor. 229 646, and the marriages 339. In 1794 the births were 373, the burials 671, and the marriages 199- The cause of this sudden check to population was the failure of de- mand and of commercial credit which oc- curred at the commencement of the war, and such a check could not have taken place in so sudden a manner without the most severe distress, occasioned by the sud- den reduction of wages. In addition to the fluctuations arising from the changes from peace to war and from war to peace, it is well known how subject particular manufactures are to fail from the caprices of taste. The weavers of Spitalfields were plunged into the most se- vere distress by the fashion of muslins in- stead of silks ; and great numbers of work- men in Sheffield and Birmingham were for a time thrown out of employment owing to the adoption of shoe strings and covered buttons, instead of buckles and metal but- tons. Our manufactures, taken in the mass, have increased with prodigious rapidity, but in particular places they have failed ; and the parishes where this has happened are in- variably 230 Of increasing Wealth, as it Bk. iii. variably loaded with a crowd of poor in the most distressed and miserable condition. In the evidence brought before the House of Lords during the inquiries which pre- ceded the Corn-Bill of 1815, various ac- counts are produced from different manu- factories, intended to shew that the high price of corn has rather the effect of lowering than of raising the price of manufacturing labour a . Adam Smith has clearly and cor- rectly stated-that the money price of labour depends upon the money price of provisions, and the state of the demand and the supply of labour. And he shews how much he thinks it is occasionally affected by the latter cause, by explaining in what manner it may vary in an opposite direction from the price of provisions during the pressure of a scar- city. The accounts brought before the House of Lords are a striking illustration of this part of his proposition ; but they cer- tainly do not prove the incorrectness of the other part of it, as it is quite obvious that, whatever may take place for a few years, the supply of manufacturing labour cannot * Reports, p. 51. possibly Ch. xiii. affects the Condition of the Poor. 231 possibly be continued in the market unless the natural or necessary price, that is, the price necessary to continue it in the market, be paid, and this of course is not done un- less the money price be so proportioned to the price of provisions, that labourers are enabled to bring up families of such a size as will supply the number of hands re- quired. But though these accounts do not in any degree invalidate the usual doctrines re- specting labour, or the statements of Adam Smith, they shew very clearly the great fluctuations to which the condition of the manufacturing labourer is subjected. In looking over these accounts it will be found that in some cases the price of weav- ing has fallen a third, or nearly one-half, at the same time that the price of wheat has risen a third, or nearly one half; and yet these proportions do not always express the full amount of the fluctuations, as it sometimes happens that when the price is low, the state of the demand will not allow of the usual number of hours of working ; and when the price is high, it will admit of extra hours. That '232 Of increasing Wealth, as it Bk. iii. That from the same causes there are sometimes variations of a similar kind in the price of task- work in agriculture will be readily admitted; but, in the first place, they do not appear to be nearly so consi- derable; and secondly, the great mass of agricultural labourers is employed by the day, and a sudden and general fall in the money price of agricultural day-labour is an event of extremely rare occurrence \ It must be allowed then, that in the na- tural and usual progress of wealth, the means of marrying early and supporting a family are diminished, and a greater pro- portion of the population is engaged in em- ployments less favourable to health and mo- rals, and more subject to fluctuations in the price of labour, than the population em- ployed in agriculture. These are no doubt considerable disad- vantages, and they would be sufficient to * Almost the only instance on record in this country is that which has lately taken place (1815 and 1816), occa- sioned by an unparalleled fall in the exchangeable value of the raw produce, which has necessarily disabled the holders of it from employing the same quantity of labour at the same price. render Ch. xiii. affects the Condition of the Poor. 233 render the progress of riches decidedly un- favourable to the condition of the poor, if they were not counteracted by advantages which nearly, if not fully, counterbalance them. And, first, it is obvious that the profits of stock are that source of revenue from which the middle classes are chiefly main- tained ; and the increase of capital, which is both the cause and effect of increasing riches, may be said to be the efficient cause of the emancipation of the great body of society from a dependence on the land- lords. In a country of limited extent, con- sisting of fertile land divided into large properties, as long as the capital remains inconsiderable, the structure of society is most unfavourable to liberty and good go- vernment. This was exactly the state of Europe in the feudal times. The landlords could in no other way spend their incomes than by maintaining a great number of idle followers ; and it was by the growth of capital in all the employments to w T hich it is directed that the pernicious power of the landlords was destroyed, and their de- pendent 234 Of increasing Wealthy as it Bk. iii. pendent followers were turned into mer- chants, manufacturers, tradesmen, farmers, and independent labourers ; a change of prodigious advantage to the great body of society, including the labouring classes. Secondly ; in the natural progress of cul- tivation and wealth, the production of an additional quantity of corn will require more labour, while, at the same time, from the accumulation and better distribution of capital, the continual improvements made in machinery, and the facilities opened to foreign commerce, manufactures and fo- reign commodities will be produced or purchased with less labour; and conse- quently a given quantity of corn will com- mand a much greater quantity of manu- factures and foreign commodities than while the country was poor. Although, there- fore, the labourer may earn less corn than before, the superior value which every portion which he does not consume in kind will have in the purchase of con- veniences, may more than counterba- lance this diminution. He will not in- deed have the same power of maintaining a large Ch. xiii. affects the Condition of the Poor. 235 a large family ; but with a small family he may be better lodged and clothed, and better able to command the decencies and comforts of lite. Thirdly ; it seems to be proved by expe- rience, that the lower classes of society seldom acquire a decided taste for conve- niences and comforts till they become plentiful compared with food, which they never do till food has become in some de- gree scarce. If the labourer can obtain the full support of himself and family by two or three days' labour ; and if, to furnish himself with conveniences and comforts, he must work three or four days more, he will generally think the sacrifice too great com- pared with the objects to be obtained, which are not strictly necessary to him, and will therefore often prefer the luxury of idleness to the luxury of improved lodging and clothing. This is said by Humboldt to be particularly the case in some parts of South America, and to a certain extent prevails in Ireland, India, and all countries where food is plentiful compared with capital and manufactured commodities. On the other hand. 236 Of increasing Wealth, as it Bk. iii. hand, if the main part of the labourer's time be occupied in procuring food, habits of industry are necessarily generated, and the remaining time, which is but inconsi- derable compared with the commodities it will purchase, is seldom grudged. It is under these circumstances, particularly when combined with a good government, that the lower classes of society are most likely to acquire a decided taste for the conveniences and comforts of life ; and this taste may be such as even to prevent, after a certain period, a further fall in the corn price of labour. But if the corn price of labour continues tolerably high while the relative value of commodities compared with corn falls very considerably, the la- bourer is placed in a most favourable situ- ation. Owing to his decided taste for con- veniences and comforts, the good corn wages of labour will not generally lead to early marriages; yet in individual cases, where large families occur, there will be the means of supporting them independently, by the sacrifice of the accustomed conve- niences and comforts ; and thus the poorest of Ch. xiii. affects the Condition of the Poor. 237 of the lower classes will rarely be stinted in food, while the great mass of them will not only have sufficient means of subsistence, but be able to command no inconsiderable quantity of those conveniences and com- forts, which, at the same time that they gratify a natural or acquired want, tend unquestionably to improve the mind and elevate the character. On an attentive review then of the effects of increasing wealth on the condition of the poor, it appears that, although such an in- crease does not imply a proportionate in- crease of the funds for the maintenance of mere labour, yet it brings with it advantages to the lower classes of society which may fully counterbalance the disad- vantages with which it is attended ; and, strictly speaking, the good or bad condition of the poor is not necessarily connected with any particular stage in the progress of so- ciety to its full complement of wealth. A rapid increase of wealth indeed, whether it consists principally in additions to the means of subsistence or to the stock of conve- niences and comforts, will always, cceteris paribus, 238 Of increasing Wealth, <*c. Bk. Hi. paribus, have a favourable effect on the poor ; but the influence even of this cause is greatly modified and altered by other circumstances, and nothing but the union of individual prudence with the skill and industry which produce wealth can per- manently secure to the lower classes of so- ciety that share of it which it is on every account so desirable that they should possess. ADDITION 239 ) ADDITION TO CHAP. XIV. [Insertion in p. 204, vol. II. Edition 1807.] In stating that in this, and all the other cases and systems which have been consi- dered, the progress of population will be mainly regulated and limited by the real wages of labour, it is necessary to remark that practically the current wages of labour estimated in the necessaries of life do not always correctly represent the quantity of these necessaries which it is in the power of the lower classes to consume; and that sometimes the error is in excess and some- times in defect. In a state of tilings when the prices of corn and of all sorts of commodities are rising, the money wages of labour do not always rise in proportion ; but this appa- rent disadvantage to the labouring classes is sometimes more than counterbalanced by 240 General Observations. Bk. iii. by the plenty of employment, the quantity of task- work that can be obtained, and the opportunity given to women and children to add considerably to the earnings of the family. In this case, the power of the la- bouring classes to command the necessaries of life is much greater than is implied by the current rate of their wages, and will of course have a proportionably greater effect on the population. On the other hand, when prices are ge- nerally falling, it often happens that the current rate of wages does not fall in pro- portion ; but this apparent advantage is in the same manner often more than counter- balanced by the scarcity of work, and the impossibility of finding employment for all the members of a labourer's family who are able and willing to be industrious. In this case, the powers of the labouring classes to command the necessaries of life will evi- dently be less than is implied by the cur- rent rate of their wages. In the same manner parish allowances distributed to families, the habitual prac- tice Ch. xiv. General Observations. 241 tice of task-work, and the frequent emplo} r - ment of women and children, will affect population like a rise in the real wages of labour. And, on the other hand, the paying of every sort of labour by the day, the ab- sence of employment for women and chil- dren, and the practice among labourers of not working more than three or four days in the week, either from inveterate indolence, or any other cause, will affect population liKe a low price of labour. In all these cases the real earnings of the labouring; classes throughout the year, es- timated in food, are different from the ap- parent wages ; but it will evidently be the average earnings of the families of the labouring classes throughout the 3'ear on which the encouragement to marriage, and the power of supporting children, will depend, and not merely the wages of day- labour estimated in food. An attention to this very essential point will explain the reason why, in many in- stances, the progress of population does not appear to be regulated by what are *vol. in. R usually 242 General Observations. Bk. iii. usually called the real wages of labour ; and why this progress may occasionally be greater, when the price of a day's labour will purchase rather less than the medium quantity of corn, than when it will pur- chase rather more. In our own country, for instance, about the middle of the last century, the price of corn was very low ; and, for twenty years together, from 1735 to 1755, a day's labour would, on an average, purchase a peck of wheat. During this period, population in- creased at a moderate rate ; but not by any means with the same rapidity as from 1790 to 1811, when the average wages of day-labour would not in general purchase quite so much as a peck of wheat. In the lat- ter case, however, there was a more rapid ac- cumulation of capital, and a greater demand for labour ; and though the continued rise of provisions still kept them rather ahead of wages, yet the fuller employment for every body that would work, the greater quantity of task-work done, the higher re- lative value of corn compared with manu- factures Ch. xiv. General Observations. 243 factures, the increased use of potatoes, and the greater sums distributed in parish allowances, unquestionably gave to the lower classes of society the power of com- manding a greater quantity of food, and will account for the more rapid increase of population in the latter period, in perfect consistency with the general principle. On similar grounds, if, in some warm climates and rich soils, where corn is cheap, the quantity of food earned by a day's la- bour be such as to promise a more rapid progress in population than is really known to take place, the fact will be fully ac- counted for, if it be found that inveterate habits of indolence, fostered by a vicious government, and a slack demand for la- bour, prevent any thing like constant em- ployment a . It would of course require high corn wages of day-labour even to keep up the supply of a stationary population, where a This observation is exemplified in the slow progress of population in some parts of the Spanish dominions in America, compared with its progress in the Uuited States. it 2 the 244 General Observations. Bk. iii. the days of working would only amount to half of the year. In the case also of the prevalence of pru- dential habits, and a decided taste for the con- veniences and comforts of life, as, according to the supposition, these habits and tastes do not operate as an encouragement to early marriages, and are not in fact spent almost entirely in the purchase of corn, it is quite consistent with the general principles laid down, that the population should not pro- ceed at the same rate as is usual, cateris paribus, in other countries, where the corn wages of labour are equally high. ADDITION ( 245 ) ADDITION TO CHAP. XIV. [Insertion in p. 214, vol. II. Edition 1807-] What is here said of the order of prece- dence with respect to agriculture and po- pulation, does not invalidate what was said in an earlier part of this work on the ten- dency to an oscillation or alternation in the increase of population and food in the na- tural course of their progress. In this pro- gress nothing is more usual than for the population to increase at certain periods faster than food ; indeed it is a part of the general principle that it should do so ; and when the money wages of labour are pre- vented from falling by the employment of the increasing population in manufac- tures, the rise in the price of corn which the increased competition for it occasions is practically the most natural and frequent stimulus to agriculture. But then it must be recollected that the great relative in- crease of population absolutely implies a previous 246 General Observations. Bk. iii. previous increase of food at some time or other greater than the lowest wants of the people. Without this, the population could not possibly have gone forward V Universally, when the population of a country is for a longer or shorter time sta- tionary, owing to the low corn wages of labour, a case which is not unfrequent, it is obvious that nothing but a previous in- crease of food, or at least an increase of the portion awarded to the labourer, can enable the population again to proceed forwards. And, in the same manner, with a view to any essential improvement in the con- dition of the labourer, which is to give him a greater effective command over the means of comfortable subsistence, it is absolutely necessary that, setting out from the lowest " According to the principle of population, the human race has a tendency to increase faster than food. It has therefore a constant tendency to people a country fully up to the limits of subsistence, but by the laws of nature it can never go beyond them, meaning, of course, by these limits, the lowest quantity of food which will main- tain a stationary population. Population, therefore, can never, strictly speaking, precede food. point. Ch. xiv. General Observations. 247 point, the increase of food must precede and be greater than the increase of popu- lation. Strictly speaking then, as man cannot live without food, there can be no doubt that in the order of precedence food must take the lead ; although when, from the state of cultivation and other causes, the average quantity of food awarded to the labourer is considerably more than sufficient to maintain a stationary population, it is quite natural that the diminution of this quantity, from the tendency of population to increase, should be one of the most powerful and constant stimulants to agri- culture. It is worthy also of remark that on this account a stimulus to the increase of agri- culture is much more easy when, from the prevalence of prudential restraint, or any other cause, the labourer is well paid; as in this case a rise in the price of corn, oc- casioned either by the increase of popula- tion or a foreign demand, will increase for a time the profits of the farmer, and often enable him to make permanent improve- ments : 248 General Observations. Bk.iii, ments ; whereas, when the labourer is paid so scantily that his wages will not allow even of any temporary diminution without a diminution of population, the increase of cultivation aud population must from the first be accompanied with a fall of profits. The prevalence of the preventive check to population and the good average wages of the labourer will rather promote than pre- vent that occasional increase and decrease of them, which as a stimulus seems to be favourable to the increase both of food and population. ADDITION ( 249 ) ADDITION TO CHAP. XIV. [Insertion in p. 222, vol. II. Edition 180/ .] It may be thought that the effects here referred to as resulting from greatly in- creased resources, could not take place in a country where there were towns and ma- nufactories ; and that they are not quite con- sistent with what was said in a former part of this work, namely, that the ultimate check to population (the want of food) is never the immediate check, except in cases of actual famine. If the expressions are unguardedly strong, they will certainly allow of considerable mitigation, without an v sensible diminution in the practical force and application of the argument. But I am inclined to think that, though they are unquestionably strong, they are not very far from the truth. The great cause which fills towns and manufac- tories is an insufficiency of employment, and consequently of the means of support in 250 General Observations. Bk. iii. in the country ; and if each labourer, in the parish where he was born, could command food, clothing, and lodging for ten children, the population of the towns would soon bear but a small proportion to the population in the country. And if to this consideration we add that, in the case supposed, the pro- portion of births and marriages in towns would be greatly increased, and all the mor- tality arising from poverty almost entirely removed, I should by no means be sur- prised (after a short interval for the change of habits) at an increase of population, even in China, equal to that which is re- ferred to in the text. With regard to this country, as it is posi- tively known that the rate of increase has changed from that which would double the population in 120 years, or more, to that which would double it in 55 years, under a great increase of towns and manufactures, I feel very little doubt that, if the resources of the country were so augmented and dis- tributed, as that every man could marry at 18 or 20, with a certainty of being able to support the largest family, the population of Ch. xiv. General Observations. 251 of the British Isles would go on increasing at a rate which would double the population in 25 years. It appears, from our registers, that England is a healthier country than America. At the time that America was increasing with extraordinary rapidity, in some of her towns the deaths exceeded the births. In the English towns, with their present improvements, I do not think this would ever be the case, if all the lower classes could marry as soon as they pleased, and there was little or no premature morta- lity from the consequences of poverty. But whether the habits and customs of an old state could be so changed by an abundance of food, as to make it increase nearly like a new colony, is a question of mere curiosity. The argument only re- quires that a change from scanty to abun- dant means of supporting a family should occasion, in old states, a marked increase of population ; and this, it is conceived, cannot possibly be denied. BOOK ( 252 ) BOOK IV. CHAP. VII. (To follow p. 316, vol II. Edition 1807.] Effects of the Knowledge of the principal Cause of Poverty on Civil Liberty, (continued) \ I HE reasonings of the foregoing chapter have been strikingly confirmed by the events of the last two or three years. Per- haps there never was a period when more erroneous views were formed by the lower classes of society of the effects to be expected from reforms in the government, when these erroneous views were more imme- diately founded on a total misapprehension of the principal cause of poverty, and when they more directly led to results unfavour- able to liberty. One of the main causes of complaint against the government has been, that a considerable number of labourers, who are both able and willing to work, are wholly out of employment, and unable conse- quently to command the necessaries of life. * Written in 1817. That Ch. vii. Effects of the Knowledge ', fyc. 253 That this state of things is one of the most afflicting events that can occur in civilized life, that it is a natural and par- donable cause of discontent among the lower classes of society, and that every effort should be made by the higher classes to mitigate it, consistently with a proper care not to render it permanent, no man of humanity can doubt. But that such a state of things may occur in the best-con- ducted and most economical government that ever existed is as certain, as that go- vernments have not the power of com- manding with effect the resources of a country to be progressive, when they are naturally stationary or declining. It will be allowed that periods of pro- sperity may occur in any well-governed state, during which an extraordinary sti- mulus may be given to its wealth and po- pulation, which cannot in its nature be permanent. If, for instance, new channels of trade are opened, new colonies are pos- sessed, new inventions take place in machi- nery, and new and great improvements are made in agriculture, it is quite obvious that while 254 Effects of the Knowledge of Bk. iv. -while the markets at home and abroad will readily take off at advantageous prices the increasing produce, there must be a rapid increase of capital, and an unusual stimulus given to the population. On the other hand, if subsequently these channels of trade are either closed by accident or con- tracted by foreign competition ; if colonies are lost, or the same produce is supplied from other quarters ; if the markets, either from glut or competition, cease to extend with the extension of the new machinery ; and if the improvements in agriculture from any cause whatever cease to be progressive, it is as obvious that, just at the time when the stimulus to population has produced its greatest effect, the means of employing and supporting this population may, in the natural course of things, and without any fault whatever in the government, become deficient. This failure must unavoidably produce great distress among the labouring classes of society ; but it is quite clear that no inference can be drawn from this distress that a radical change is required in the go- vernment ; and the attempt to accomplish such Ch. vii. the principal Cause of Poverty, Sfc. 255 such a change might only aggravate the evil. It has been supposed in this case, that the government has in no respect by its conduct contributed to the pressure in question, a supposition which in practice perhaps will rarely be borne out by the fact. It is unquestionably in the power of a go- vernment to produce great distress by war and taxation, and it requires some skill to distinguish the distress which is the natural result of these causes, from that which is occasioned in the way just described. In our own case unquestionably both descrip- tions of causes have combined, but the former in a greater degree than the latter. War and taxation, as far as they operate directly and simply, tend to destroy or retard the progress of capital, produce and population ; but during the late war these checks to prosperity have been much more than overbalanced by a combination of circumstances which has given an extraor- dinary stimulus to production. That for this overbalance of advantages the country cannot be considered as much indebted to the 256 Effects of the Knowledge of Bk. iv the government, is most certain. The go- vernment during the last twenty-five years has shewn no very great love either of peace or liberty ; and no particular eco- nomy in the use of the national resources. It has proceeded in a very straight-forward manner to spend great sums in war, and to raise them by very heavy taxes. It has no doubt done its part towards the dilapida- tion of the national resources. But still the broad fact must stare every impartial observer in the face, that at the end of the war in 1814 the national resources were not dilapidated ; and that not only were the wealth and population of the country considerably greater than they were at the commencement of the war, but that thtey had increased in the interval at a more rapid rate than was ever experienced before. Perhaps this may justly be considered as one of the most extraordinary facts in history ; and it certainly follows from it, that the sufferings of the country since the peace have not been occasioned so much by the usual and most natural effects to be expected Ch. vii. the principal Cause of * Poverty ,8$c. 257 expected from \vaf and taxation, as by the sudden ceasing of an extraordinary sti- mulus to production, the distresses conse- quent upon which, though increased no doubt by the weight of taxation, do not essentially arise from it, and are not di- rectly therefore, and immediately, to be relieved by its removal. That the labouring classes of society should not be fully aware that the main causes of their distress are to a certain ex- tent and for a certain time, irremediable, is natural enough ; and that they should listen much more readily and willingly to those who confidently promise immediate relief, rather than to those who can only tell them unpalatable truths, is by no means surprising. But it must be allowed that full advantage has been taken by the po- pular orators and writers of a crisis which has given them so much power. Partly from ignorance, and partly from design, every thing that could tend to enlighten the labouring: classes as to the real nature of their situation, and encourage them to *vol. hi. s bear 258 Effects of the Knowledge, of Bk. iv. bear an unavoidable pressure with patience, has been either sedulously kept out of their view, or clamorously reprobated; and every thing that could tend to deceive them, to aggravate and encourage their discontents, and to raise unreasonable and extravagant expectations as to the relief to be expected from reform, has been as sedulously brought forward. Jf under these circumstances the reforms proposed had been accomplished, it is impossible that the people should not have been most cruelly disappointed ; and under a system of universal suffrage and annual parliaments, a general disappoint- ment of the people would probably lead to every sort of experiment in government, till the career of change was stopped by a military despotism. The warmest friends of genuine liberty might justly feel alarmed at such a prospect. To a cause conducted upon such principles, and likely to be at- tended with such results, they could not of course, consistently with their duty, lend any assistance. And, if with great diffi- culty, and against the, sense of the great mass Cli. vii. the principal Cause of Poverty, 8$c. 259 mass of petitioners, they were to effect a more moderate and more really useful re- form, they could not but feel certain that the unavoidable disappointment of the peo- ple would be attributed to the half-mea- sures which had been pursued ; and that they would be either forced to proceed to more radical changes, or submit to a total loss of their influence and popularity by stopping short while the distresses of the people were unrelieved, their discontents unallayed, and the great panacea on which they had built their sanguine expectations untried. These considerations have naturally pa- ralyzed the exertions of the best friends of liberty ; and those salutary reforms which are acknowledged to be necessary in order to repair the breaches of time, and improve the fabric of our constitution, are thus ren- dered much more difficult, and conse- quently much less probable. But not only have the false expectations and extravagant demands suggested by the leaders of the people given an easy victory to government over every proposition for s 2 reform, 260 Effects of the Knowledge, 8$c. Bk. iv. reform, whether violent or moderate, but they have furnished the most fatal instru- ments of offensive attack against the con- stitution itself. They are naturally calcu- lated to excite some alarm, and to check moderate reform ; but alarm, when once excited, seldom knows where to stop, and the causes of it are particularly liable to be exaggerated. There is reason to believe that it has been under the influence of ex- aggerated statements, and of inferences drawn by exaggerated fears from these statements, that acts unfavourable to liberty have been passed without an adequate ne- cessity. But the power of creating these exaggerated fears, and of passing these acts, has been unquestionably furnished by the extravagant expectations of the people. And it must be allowed that the present times furnish a very striking illustration of the doctrine, that an ignorance of the prin- cipal cause of poverty is peculiarly unfa- vourable, and that a knowledge of it must be peculiarly favourable, to the cause of civil liberty. CHAP. ( 261 ) CHAP. XII a . [To follow p. 387, vol. II. Edition 1807.] Different Plans of improving the Condition of the Poor considered (continued). 1 HE increasing portion of the society which has of late years become either wholly or partially dependent upon parish assistance, together with the increasing burden of the poor's rates on the landed property, has for some time been working a gradual change in the public opinion respecting the benefits resulting to the la- bouring classes of society, and to society in general, from a legal provision for the poor. But the distress which has followed the peace of 1814, and the great and sudden pressure which it has occasioned on the parish rates, have accelerated this change in a very marked manner. More just and enlightened views on the subject are daily gaining ground ; the difficulties attending a legal provision for the poor are better un- a Written in 1817. derstood, 262 Different Plans of improving the Bk. iv. derstood, and more generally acknow- ledged ; and opinions are now seen in print, and heard in conversation, which twenty years ago would almost have been considered as treason to the interests of the state. This change of public opinion, stimu- lated by the severe pressure of the mo- ment, has directed an unusual portion of attention to the subject of the poor-laws ; and as it is acknowledged that the present system has essentially failed, various plans have been proposed either as substitutes or improvements. It may be useful to inquire shortly how far the plans which have already been published are calculated to accom- plish the ends which they propose. It is generally thought that some measure of importance will be the result of the present state of public opinion. To the permanent success of any such measure, it is abso- lutely necessary that it should apply itself in some degree to the real source of the difficulty. Yet there is reason to fear, that notwithstanding the present improved knowledge Ch. xii. Condition of the Poor, considered. 2(i3 knowledge on the subject, this point may be too much overlooked. Among the plans which appear to have excited a considerable degree of the public attention, is one of Mr. Owen. I have already adverted to some views of Mr. Owen in a chapter on Systems of Equality, and spoken of his experience with the respect which is justly due to it. If the question were merely how to accommodate, support and train, in the best manner, societies of 1200 people, there are perhaps few persons more entitled to attention than Mr. Owen : but in the plan which he has proposed, he seems totally to have overlooked the nature of the problem to be solved. This pro- blem is, How to provide for those who are in want, in such a manner as to prevent a conti- nual increase of their numbers, and of the proportion which then bear to the whole society. And it must be allowed that Mr. Owen's plan not only does not make the slightest approach towards accomplishing this ob- ject, but seems to be peculiarly calculated to effect an object exactly the reverse of it, that 264 Different Plans of improving the Bk. iv. that is, to increase and multiply the number of paupers. If the establishments which he recom- mends could really be conducted according to his apparent intentions, the order of na- ture and the lessons of providence would indeed be in the most marked manner re- versed ; and the idle and profligate would be placed in a situation which might justly be the envy of the industrious and virtuous. The labourer or manufacturer who is now ill lodged and ill clothed, and obliged to work twelve hours a day to maintain his family, could have no motive to continue his exertions, if the reward for slackening them, and seeking parish assistance, was good lodging, good clothing, the mainte- nance and education of all his children, and the exchange of twelve hours hard work in an unwholesome manufactory for four or five hours of easy agricultural labour on a pleasant farm. Under these temptations, the numbers yearly falling into the new esta- blishments from the labouring and manu- facturing classes, together with the rapid increase by procreation of the societies themselves, Ch. xii. Condition of the Poor j considered. 265 themselves, would very soon render the first purchases of land utterly incompetent to their support More land must then be purchased, and fresh settlements made; and if the higher classes of society were bound to proceed in the system according to its apparent spirit and intention, there cannot be a doubt that the whole nation would shortly become a nation of paupers with a community of goods. Such a result might not perhaps be alarming to Mr. Owen. It is just possible indeed that he may have had this result in contemplation when he proposed his plan, and have thought that it was the best mode of quietly introducing that community of goods which he believes is necessary to complete the virtue and happiness of so- ciety. But to those who totally dissent from him as to the effects to be expected from a community of goods ; to those who are convinced that even his favourite doc- trine, that a man can be trained to produce more than he consumes, which is no doubt true at present, may easily cease to be true, when cultivation is pushed beyond the bounds prescribed to it by private pro- perty; 266 Different Plans of improving the Bk.iv. perty ; a the approaches towards a system of this kind will be considered as approaches towards a system of universal indolence, poverty and wretchedness. Upon the supposition then,thatMr.O wen's plan could be effectively executed, and that the various pauper societies scattered over the country could at first be made to realize his most sanguine wishes, such might be expected to be their termination in a moderately short time, from the natural and necessary action of the principle of population. But it is probable that the other grand objection to all systems of common pro- perty would even at the very outset con- found the experience of Mr. Owen, and destroy the happiness to which he looks forward. In the society at the Lanerk Mills, two powerful stimulants to industry and good conduct are in action, which would be totally wanting in the societies proposed. At Lanerk, the whole of every man's earnings is his own ; and his powei of maintaining himself, his wife and chil- dren, in decency and comfort, will be in See C. x. B. iii. p. 1S6. exact Ch. xii. Condition of the Poor, considered. 267 exact proportion to his industry, sobriety and economy. At Lanerk, also, if any workman be perseveringly indolent and negligent, if he get drunk and spoil his work, or if in any way he conduct himself essentially ill, he not only naturally suffers by the diminution of his earnings, but may at any time be turned off,. and the society be relieved from the influence and example of a profligate and dangerous member. On the other hand, in the pauper establish- ments proposed in the present plan, the industry, sobriety and good conduct of each individual, would be very feebly in- deed connected with his power of main- taining himself and family comfortably ; and in the case of persevering idleness and misconduct, instead of the simple and ef- fective remedy of dismission, recourse must be had to a system of direct punishment of some kind or other, determined, and enforced by authority, which is always painful and distressing, and generally in- efficient. I confess it appears to me that the most successful experience, in such an establish- ment 268 Different Plans of improving the Bk. iv. ment as that of Lanerk, furnishes no ground whatever to say what could be done towards the improvement of society in an establish- ment where the produce of all the labour em- ployed would go to a common stock, and dismissal from the very nature and object of the institution, would be impossible. If un- der such disadvantages the proper manage- ment of these establishments were within the limits of possibility, what judgment, what firmness, what patience, would be required for the purpose ! But where are such quali- ties to be found in sufficient abundance to manage one or two millions of people ? Oh the whole then it may be concluded, that Mr. Owen's plan would have to en- counter obstacles that really appear to be insuperable, even at its first outset; and that if these could by any possible means be overcome, and the most complete success attained, the system would, without some most unnatural and unjust laws to prevent the progress of population, lead to a state of universal poverty and distress, in which, though all the rich might be made poor, none of the poor could be made rich, not even Ch. xii. Condition of the Poor, considered. 269 even so rich as a common labourer at present. The plan for bettering the condition of the labouring classes of the community, published by Mr. Curwen, is professedly a slight sketch ; but principles, not details, are what it is our present object to con- sider; and the principles on which he would proceed are declared with sufficient dis- tinctness, when he states the great objects of his design to be, 1. Meliorating the present wretched con- dition of the lower orders of the people. 2. Equalizing by a new tax the present poor's rates, which must be raised for their relief. 3. And giving to all those, who may think proper to place themselves under its protection, a voice in the local manage- ment and distribution of the fund destined for their support. The first proposition is, of course, or ought to be, the object of every plan pro- posed. And the two last may be considered as the modes by which it is intended to ac- complish it. But 270 Different Plans of improving the Bk. iv. But it is obvious that these two propo- sitions, though they may be both desirable on other accounts, not only do not really touch, but do not even propose to touch, the great problem. We wish to check the increase and diminish the proportion of paupers, in order to give greater wealth, happiness and independence to the mass of the labouring classes. But the equalization of the poor's rates, simply considered, would have a very strong tendency to increase rather than to diminish the number of the dependent poor. At present the pa- rochial rates fall so very heavily upon one particular species of property, that the persons, whose business it is to allow them, have in general a very strong interest in- deed to keep them low ; but if they fell equally on all sorts of property, and parti- cularly if they were collected from large districts, or from counties, the local distri- butors would have comparatively but very feeble motives to reduce them, and they might be expected to increase with great rapidity. It may be readily allowed, however, that the Ch. xii. Condition of the Poor, considered. 271 the peculiar weight with which the poor's rates press upon land is essentially unfair. It is particularly hard upon some country parishes, where the births greatly exceed the deaths, owing to the constant emigra- tions which are taking place to towns and manufactories, that, under any circum- stances, a great portion of these emigrants should be returned upon them, when old, disabled, or out of work. Such parishes may be totally without the power of fur- nishing either work or support for all the persons born within their precincts. In fact, the same number would not have been born in them, unless these emigrations had taken place. And it is certainly hard therefore that parishes so circumstanced should be obliged to receive and maintain all who may return to them in distress. Yet, in the present state of the country, the most pressing evil is not the weight upon the land, but the increasing proportion of paupers. And, as the equalization of the rates would certainly have a tendency to increase this proportion, I should be sorry to see such a measure introduced, even if it 272 Different Plans of improving the Bk. iv. it were easily practicable, unless acccompa- nied by some very strong and decisive li- mitations to the continued increase of the rates so equalized. The other proposition of Mr. Curwen will, in like manner, be found to afford no security against the increase of pauperism. We know perfectly well that the funds of the friendly societies, as they are at present constituted, though managed by the con- tributors themselves, are seldom distributed with the economy necessary to their per- manent efficiency ; and in the national societies proposed, as a considerable part of the fund would be derived from the poor's rates, there is certainly reason to expect that every question which could be in- fluenced by the contributors would be de- termined on principles still more indulgent and less economical. On this account it may well be doubted, whether it would ever be advisable to mix any public money, derived from assess- ments, with the subscriptions of the la- bouring classes. The probable result would be, that in the case of any failure in the funds Ch. xii. Condition of the Poor, considered. 273 funds of such societies,arising from erroneous calculations and too liberal allowances, it would be expected that the whole of the deficiency should be made up by the as- sessments. And any rules which might have been made to limit the amount applied in this way would probably be but a feeble barrier against claims founded on a plan brought forward by the higher classes of society. Another strong objection to this sort of union of parochial and private contribu- tions is, that from the first the members of such societies could not justly feel them- selves independent. If one half or one third of the fund were to be subscribed from the parish, they would stand upon a very different footing from the members of the present benefit-clubs. While so consi- derable a part of the allowances to which they might be entitled in sickness or in age would really come from the poor's rates, they would be apt to consider the plan as what, in many respects, it really would be, only a different mode of raisins the rates. If the system were to become ge- *vol. in. t neral, 274 Different Plans of improving the Bk. iv. neral, the contributions of the labouring classes would have nearly the effects of a tax on labour, and such a tax has been generally considered as more unfavourable to industry and production than most other taxes. The best part of Mr. Curwen's plan is that which proposes to give a credit to each contributor in proportion to the amount of his contributions, and to make his allow- ance in sickness, and his annuity in old age, dependent upon this amount ; but this object could easily be accomplished without the objectionable accompaniments. It is also very properly observed, that " want of employment must mrnish no " claims on the society ; for, if this excuse " were to be admitted, it would most proba- " bly be attended with the most pernicious " consequences/' Yet it is at the same time rather rashly intimated, that employ- ment must be found for all who are able to work ; and, in another place, it is observed, that timely assistance would be afforded by these societies, without degradation, on all temporary occasions of suspended labour. On Ch. xii. Condition of the Poor, considered. 275 On the whole, when it is considered that a large and probably increasing amount of poor's rates would be subscribed to these societies ; that on this account their mem- bers could hardly be considered as inde- pendent of parish assistance ; and that the usual poor's rates would still remain to be applied as they are now, without any pro- posed limitations, there is little hope that Mr. Curwen's plan would be successful in diminishing the whole amount of the rates and the proportion of dependent poor. There are two errors respecting the ma- nagement of the poor, into which the public seem inclined to fall at the present moment. The first is a disposition to attach too much importance to the effects of subscriptions from the poor themselves, without sufficient attention to the mode in which they are distributed. But the mode of distribution is much the more important point of the two; and if this be radically bad, it is of little consequence in what manner the sub- scriptions are raised, whether from the poor themselves or from any other quarter. If the labouring classes were universally to t 2 contribute 276 Different Plans of improving the Bk. iw contribute what might at first appear a very ample proportion of their earnings, for their own support in sickness and in old age, when out of work, and when the family consisted of more than two children ; it is quite certain that the funds would become deficient. Such a mode of distribution im- plies a power of supporting a rapidly in- creasing and unlimited population on a limited territory, and must therefore termi- nate in aggravated poverty. Our present friendly societies or benefit-clubs aim at only limited objects, which are susceptible of calculation ; yet many have failed, and many more it is understood are likely to fail from the insufficiency of their funds. If any society were to attempt to give much more extensive assistance to its members ; if it were to endeavour to imitate what is partially effected by the poor-laws, or to accomplish those objects which Condorcet thought were within the power of proper calculations ; the failure of its funds, however large at first, and from whatever sources de- rived, would be absolutely inevitable. In short, it cannot be too often or too strongly impressed Ch. xii. Condition of the Poor, considered. 277 impressed upon the public, especially when any question for the improvement of the condition of the poor is in agitation, that no application of knowledge and ingenuity to this subject, no efforts either of the poor or of the rich, or both, in the form of con- tributions, or in any other way, can possi- bly place the labouring classes of society in such a state as to enable them to marry ge- nerally at the same age in an old and fully- peopled country as they may do with per- fect safety and advantage in a new one. The other error towards which the public seems to incline at present is that of laying too much stress upon the employment of the poor. It seems to be thought that one of the principal causes of the failure of our present system is the not having properly executed that part of the 43d of Elizabeth which enjoins the purchase of materials to set the poor to work. It is certainly desi- rable, on many accounts, to employ the poor when it is practicable, though it will always be extremely difficult to make peo- ple work actively who are without the usual and most natural motives to such exertions; and 278 Different Plans of improving the Bk. iv. and a system of coercion involves the ne- cessity of placing great power in the hands of persons very likely to abuse it. Still however it is probable that the poor might be employed more than they have hitherto been, in a way to be advantageous to their habits and morals, without being prejudi- cial in other respects. But we should fall into the grossest error if we were to imagine that any essential part of the evils of the poor-laws, or of the difficulties under which we are at present labouring, has arisen from not employing the poor; or if we were to suppose that any possible scheme for giving work to all who are out of employment can ever in any degree apply to the source of these evils and difficulties, so as to prevent their recurrence. In no conceivable case can the forced employment of the poor, though managed in the most judicious manner, have any direct tendency to pro- portion more accurately the supply of la- bour to the natural demand for it. And without great care and caution it is obvious that it may have a pernicious effect of an opposite kind. When, for instance, from deficient Ch. xii. Condition of the Poor, considered. 279 deficient demand or deficient capital, la- bour has a strong tendency to fall, if we keep it up to its usual price by creating an artificial demand by public subscriptions or advances from the government, we evi- dently prevent the population of the coun- try from adjusting itself gradually to its di- minished resources, and act much in the same manner as those, who would prevent the price of corn from rising in a scarcity, which must necessarily terminate in in- creased distress. Without then meaning to object to all plans for employing the poor, some of which, at certain times and with proper re- strictions, may be useful as temporary mea- sures, it is of great importance, in order to prevent ineffectual efforts and continued disappointments, to be fully aware that the permanent remedy which we are seeking cannot possibly come from this quarter. It may indeed be affirmed with the most perfect confidence that there is only one class of causes from which any approaches towards a remedy can be rationally ex- pected ; and that consists of whatever has 280 Different Plans of improving the Bk. iv. has a tendency to increase the prudence and foresight of the labouring classes. This is the touchstone to which every plan proposed for the improvement of the condi- tion of the poor should be applied. If the plan be such as to co-operate with the lessons of Nature and Providence, and to encourage and promote habits of prudence and fore- sight, essential and permanent benefit may be expected from it: if it has no tendency of this kind, it may possibly still be good as a temporary measure, and on other ac- counts, but we may be quite certain that it does not apply to the source of the specific evil for which we are seeking a remedy. Of all the plans which have yet been pro- posed for the assistance of the labouring classes, the saving-banks, as far as they go, appear to me much the best, and the most likely, if they should become general, to effect a permanent improvement in the con- dition of the lower classes of society. By giving to each individual the full and entire benefit of his own industry and prudence, they are calculated greatly to strengthen the lessons of Nature and Providence ; and a young Ch. xii. Condition of the Poor, considered. 281 young man, who had been saving from four- teen or fifteen with a view to marriage at four or five and twenty, or perhaps much earlier, would probably be induced to wait two or three years longer if the times were unfavourable ; if corn were high ; if wages Avere low ; or if the sum he had saved had been found by experience not to be suffi- cient to furnish a tolerable security against want. A habit of saving a portion of pre- sent earnings for future contingencies can scarcely be supposed to exist without ge- neral habits of prudence and foresight ; and if the opportunity furnished by pro- vident banks to individuals, of reaping the full benefit of saving, should render the practice general, it might rationally be ex- pected that, under the varying resources of the country, the population would be ad- justed to the actual demand for labour, at the expense of less pain and less poverty ; and the remedy thus appears, so far as it goes, to apply to the very root of the evil. The great object of saving-banks, how- ever, is to prevent want and dependence by enabling the poor to provide against contingencies 282 Different Plans of improving the Bk. iv. contingencies themselves. And in a na- tural state of society, such institutions, with the aid of private charity well directed, would probably be all the means necessary to produce the best practicable effects. In the present state of things in this country the case is essentially different. With so very large a body of poor habitually de- pendent upon public funds, the institutions of saving-banks cannot be considered in the light of substitutes for the poor's rates. The problem how to support those who are in want in such a manner as not continu- ally to increase the proportion which they bear to the whole society will still remain to be solved. But if any plan should be adopted either of gradually abolishing or gradually reducing and fixing the amount of the poor's rates, saving-banks would es- sentially assist it ; at the same lime that they would receive a most powerful aid in return. In the actual state of things, they have been established at a period likely to be particularly unfavourable to them a pe- riod of very general distress, and of the most Ch. xii. Conditio)! of the Poor, considered. 283 most extensive parochial assistance ; and the success which has attended them, even under these disadvantages, seems clearly to shew, that in a period of prosperity and good wages, combined with a prospect of diminished parochial assistance, they might spread very extensively, and have a consi- derable effect on the general habits of the people. With a view to give them greater encou- ragement at the present moment, an act has been passed allowing persons to receive parish assistance at the discretion of the justices, although they may have funds of their own under a certain amount in a saving-bank. But this is probably a short- sighted policy. It is sacrificing the prin- ciple for which saving-banks are esta- blished, to obtain an advantage which, on this verv account, will be comparatively of little value. We wish to teach the la- bouring classes to rely more upon their own exertions and resources, as the only way of really improving their condition ; yet we reward their saving by making them still dependent upon that very species of 284 Different Plans of improving the Bk. iv. of assistance which it is our object that they should avoid . The progress of saving- banks under such a regulation will be but an equivocal and uncertain symptom of good ; whereas without such a iegulation every step would tell, every fresh deposition would prove, the growth of a desire to become independent of parish assistance; and both the great extension of the friendly societies, and the success of the saving-banks in pro- portion to the time they have been esta- blished, clearly shew that much progress might be expected in these institutions under favourable circumstances, without resorting to a measure which is evidently calculated to sacrifice the end to the means. With regard to the plans which have been talked of for reducing and limiting the poor's rates, they are certainly of a kind to apply to the root of the evil ; but they would be obviously unjust without a formal retraction of the right of the poor to sup- port ; and for many years they would un- questionably be much more harsh in their operation than the plan of abolition which I have ventured to propose in a preceding chapter. Ch. xii. Condition of the Poor, considered. 285 chapter. At the same time, if it be thought that tins country cannot entirely get rid of a system which has been so long interwoven in its frame, a limitation of the amount of the poor's rates, or rather of their propor- tion to the wealth and population of the country which would be more rational and just, accompanied with a very full and fair notice of the nature of the change to be made, might be productive of essential be- nefit, and do much towards improving the habits and happiness of the poor. APPENDIX. APPENDIX. 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 op- pose its principles and conclusions. These are the Principles of Population and Production, by Mr. Weyland; and an Inquiry into the Principle of Population, by Mr. James Grahame. I would willingly leave the question as it at pre- sent 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 conclu- sions, which were brought forward in a spirit of candour and truth ; and as one at least of the publications above mentioned may be so characterized, and the other is by no means de- ficient in personal respect; 1 am induced shortly to notice them. I should not however have thought it necessary to advert to Mr. Grahame's publication, which is a slight work without any very distinct ob- ject in view, if it did not afford some strange specimens 288 APPENDIX. specimens of misrepresentation, which it maybe useful to point out. Mr. Grahame in his second chapter, speaking of the tendency exhibited by the law of human increase to a redundance 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 products, " famine, disease and war, as benevolent re- " medies by which nature has enabled human " beings to correct the disorders that would " arise from that redundance of population " which the unrestrained operation of her laws " would create a ." These are the opinions imputed to me and the philosophers 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^z- mine is a benevolent remedy for want of food, as redundance of population admjts of no other in- terpretation than that of a people ill supplied with the means of subsistence, and consequently a P. 100. the APPENDIX. 289 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 man- kind willingly and purposely create diseases, with a view to prevent those diseases which are the necessary consequence of a redundant po- pulation, 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 man- kind 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, in- consistency, and unfounded assertion. The two first imputations may perhaps be pe- culiar 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 shewn to be an opinion no where to be found in the Essay, nor legitimately *vol. in. . u to 290 APPENDIX. to be inferred from any part of it, it has been continually repeated in various quarters for fourteen years, and now appears in the pages of Mr. Grahame. For the last time I will now no- tice 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 absolutely 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 remedies of these evils, instead of the very evils themselves. As well nearly might 1 be open to Mr. Grahame's imputations of considering the famine and dis- ease necessarily arising 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 redundant population as unavoid- able, and incapable of being diminished. On the contrary I have pointed out a mode by which these evils may be removed or mitigated by re- moving or mitigating their cause. I have en- deavoured APPENDIX. 291 deavoured to shew that this may be done con- sistently 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 re- straint as their rational and proper remedy; and whether the remedy be good or bad, ade- quate or inadequate, the proposal itself, and the stress which I have laid upon it, is an in- controvertible proof that I never can have con- sidered vice and misery as themselves re- medies. But not only does the general tenour of my work, and the specific object of the latter part of it, clearly shew that I do not consider vice and misery as remedies ; but particular passages in various parts of it are so distinct on the sub- ject, as not to admit of being misunderstood but by the most perverse blindness. It is therefore quite inconceivable that any writer with the slightest pretension to respect- ability should venture to bring forward such imputations ; and it must be allowed to shew 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 u 2 not 292 APPENDIX. 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. Wal- lace, I " recommend immediate recourse to human efforts, to the restraints prescribed by Condorcet, for the correction or mitigation of the evil a ." This is an assertion entirely with- out 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 tend- ency to remove a necessary stimulus to in- dustry. 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 en- P. 18. couragement APPENDIX. 293 eouragement to exertion and good conduct than the looking forward to marriage as a state peculiarly desirable ; but only to be enjoyed in comfort, by the acquisition of habits of industry, economy and prudence. And it is in this light that I have always wished to place it a . In speaking of the poor-laws in this country, and of their tendency (particularly as they have been lately administered) to eradicate all re- maining spirit of independence among our pea- santry, I observe that, " hard as it may appear " in individual instances, dependent poverty " ought to be held disgraceful;" by which of course I only mean that such a proper degree of pride as will induce a labouring man to make great exertions, as in Scotland, in order to prevent himself or his nearest relations from falling upon the parish, is very desirable, with a view to the happiness of the lower classes of society. The interpretation which Mr. Gra- hame gives to this passage is, that the rich " are " so to imbitter the pressure of indigence by " the stings of contumely, that men may be " driven by their pride to prefer even the re- " fuge of despair to the condition of depend- a See vol. ii., p. 241, of 4th. edit.; p. 493 of the quarto edit. ; and vol. ii., p. 241, edition of 1807. " ence ! ! 204 APPENDIX. " ence ! P a curious specimen of misrepre- sentation and exaggeration. I have written a chapter expressly on the practical direction of our charity ; and in de- tached passages elsewhere have paid a just tri- bute to the exalted virtue of benevolence. To those who have read these parts of my work, and have attended to the general tone and spirit of the whole, I willingly appeal, iftheyarebut tolerably candid, against these charges of Mr. Grahame, which intimate that I would root out the virtues of charity and benevolence, without regard to the exaltation which they bestow on the moral dignity of our nature ; and that in my view the " rich are required only to harden their hearts against calamity, and to prevent the charitable visitings of their nature from keep- ing alive in them that virtue which is often the only moral link between them and their fellow-mortals k ." It is not indeed easy to sup- pose that Mr. Grahame can have read the chap- ter to which I allude, as both the letter and spirit of it contradict, in the most express and remarkable manner, the imputations conveyed in the above passages. These are a few specimens of Mr. Grahame V * P. 2*j6. b Ibid. misrepresentations. APPENDIX. 296 misrepresentations, which might easily be multi- plied ; but on this subject I will only further remark that it shews no inconsiderable want of candour to continue attacking and dwelling upon passages, which have ceased to form a part of the work controverted. And this Mr. Grahame has done in more instances than one, although he could hardly fail toknowthat he was combating expressions and passages which 1 have seen reason to alter or expunge. I really should not have thought it worth while to notice these misrepresentations of Mr. Grahame, if, in spite of them, the style and tone of his publication had not appeared to me to be entitled to more respect than most of my opponents. With regard to the substance and aim of Mr. Grahame's work, it seems to be intended to shew 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 consequences 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 shewn to be a resource, which could not be of long duration. It cannot therefore under 296 APPENDIX. under any circumstances be considered as an adequate remedy. The latter position is a mat- ter of opinion, and may rationally be held by any person who sees reason to think it well founded. It appears to me, I con- fess, that experience most decidedly contradicts it; but to those who think otherwise, there is nothing more to be said, thanthat 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 redundant popu- lation, 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 distribu- tion and vary the pressure of human misery, can do absolutely nothing towards diminishing the general amount or checking the increasing weight of this pressure. Mr. Weyland's work is of a much more ela- borate description than that of Mr. Grahame. It has also a very definite object in view : and although, when he enters into the details of his subject, he is compelled entirely to agree with me APPENDIX. 297 me respecting the checks which practically keep down population to the level of the means of subsistence, and has not in fact given a single reason for the slow progress of population, in the advanced stages of society, that does not clearly and incontrovertibly come under the heads of moral restraint, vice or misery ; yet it must be allowed that he sets out with a bold and distinct denial of my premises, and finishes, as he ought to do from such a beginning, by drawing the most opposite conclusions. After stating fairly my main propositions, and adverting to the conclusion which I have drawn from them, Mr. Weyland says, " Grant- " ing the premises, it is indeed obvious that " this conclusion is undeniable 3 ." I desire no other concession than this ; and if my premises can be shewn to rest on unsolid foundations, I will most readily give up the inferences I have drawn from them. To determine the point here at issue it can- not be necessary for me to repeat the proofs of these premises derived both from theory and experience, which have already so fully been brought forwards. It has been allowed that they have been stated with tolerable clearness ; and it is known that many persons have con- a Principles of Population and Production, p. 15. sidered 298 APPENDIX. sidered them as unassailable, who still refuse to admit the consequences to which they appear to lead. All that can be required therefore on the present occasion is to examine the validity of the objections to these premises brought for- ward by Mr. Weyland. Mr. Weyland observes, " that the origin of " what are conceived to be the mistakes and " false reasonings, with respect to the principle " of population, appears to be the assumption " of a tendency to increase in the human spe- " cies, the quickest that can be proved pos- " sible in any particular state of society, as " that which is natural and theoretically possi- " ble in all ; and the characterizing of every " cause which tends to prevent such quickest " possible rate as checks to the natural and " spontaneous tendency of population to in- " crease ; but as checks evidently insufficient " to stem the progress of an overwhelming " torrent. This seems as eligible a mode of " reasoning, as if one were to assume the height " of the Irish giant as the natural standard of " the stature of man, and to call every reason, " which may be suggested as likely to pre- ' vent the generality of men from reaching " it, checks to their growth*." P. 17. Mr. Weyland APPENDIX. 299 Mr. Wetland has here most unhappily chosen his illustration, as it is in no respect applicable to the case. In order to illustrate the different rates at which population increases in different countries, by the different heights of men, the following* comparison and inference would be much more to the purpose. If in a particular country w r e observed that all the people had weights of different sizes upon their heads, and that invariably each individual was tall or short in proportion to the smallness or greatness of the pressure upon him; that every person was observed to grow when the weight he carried was either removed or diminished, and that the few among the whole people, whowere exempted from this burden, were very decidedly taller than the rest; would it not be quite justi- fiable to infer, that the weights which the people carried were the cause of their being in general so short; and that the height of those without weights might fairly be considered as the standard to which it might be expected that the great mass would arrive, if their growth were unrestricted ? For what is it in fact, which we really observe with regard to the different rates of increase in different countries ? Do we not see that, in almost every state to which we can direct our attention, the natural tendency to increase is repressed 300 APPENDIX. repressed by the difficulty which the mass of the people find in procuring an ample portion of the necessaries of life, which shews itself more immediately in some or other of the forms of moral restraint, vice and misery ? Do we not see that invariably the rates of increase are fast or slow, according as the pressure of these checks is light or heavy ; and that in consequence Spain increases at one rate, France at another, England at a third, Ireland at a fourth, parts of Russia at a fifth, parts of Spanish America at a sixth, and the United States of North America at a seventh ? Do we not see that, whenever the resources of any country increase, so as to create a great demand for labour and give the lower classes of society a greater command over the necessaries of life, the population of such country, though it might before have been stationary or proceeding very slowly, begins immediately to make a start forwards? And do we not see that in those few countries or districts of countries, where the pressure arising from the difficulty of pro- curing the necessaries and conveniencies of life is almost entirely removed, and where in con- sequence the checks to early marriages are very few, and large families are maintained with perfect facility, the rate at which the population increases is always the greatest! And APPENDIX. 301 And when to these broad and glaring facts we add, that neither theory nor experience will justify us in believing, either that the passion between the sexes, or the natural prolifick- ness of women, diminishes in the progress of society ; when we further consider that the climate of the United States of America is not particularly healthy, and that the qualities which mainly distinguish it from other coun- tries, are its rapid production and distribution of the means of subsistence ; is not the in- duction as legitimate and correct as possible, that the varying weight of the difficulties at- tending the maintenance of families, and the moral restraint, vice and misery which these difficulties necessarily generate, are the causes of the varying rates of increase observable in different countries; and that, so far from having any reason to consider the American rate of increase as peculiar, unnatural and gigantic, we are bound by every law of induction and ana- logy to conclude that there is scarcely a state in Europe where, if the marriages were as early, the means of maintaining large families as ample, and the employments of the labouring classes as healthy, the rate of increase would not be as rapid, and in some cases, I have no doubt, even more rapid, than in the United States of America ? Another 302 APPENDIX. Another of Mr. Weyland's curious illustra- tions is the following : He says that the physical tendency of a people in a commercial and manufacturing state to double their number in twenty-five years is " as absolutely gone as the " tendency of a bean to shoot up further into " the air, after it has arrived at its full growth;" and that to assume such a tendency is to build a theory upon a mere shadow, " which, when " brought to the test, is directly at variance " with experience of the fact; and as unsafe " to act upon, as would be that of a general " who should assume the force of a musket- " shot to be double its actual range, and then " should calculate upon the death of all his " enemies as soon as he had drawn up his " own men for battle within this line of as- " sumed efficiency 3 ." Now I am not in the least aware who it is that has assumed the actual range of the shot, or the actual progress of popula- tion in different countries, as very different from what it is observed to be; and there- fore cannot see how the illustration, as brought forward by Mr. Weyland, applies, or how I can be said to resemble his miscalculat- ing general. What I have really done is this (if he will allow me the use of his own me- P. 126. taphor) APPENDIX. 803 taphor) having observed that the range of musket-balls, projected from similar barrels and with the same quantity of powder of the same strength, was, under different circum- stances, very different, I applied myself to consider what these circumstances were ; and, having found that the range of each ball was greater or less in proportion to the smaller or greater number of the obstacles which it met with in its course, or the rarity or density of the medium through which it passed, I was led to infer that the variety of range observed was owing to these obstacles; and I consequently thought it a more correct and legitimate con- clusion, and one more consonant both to theory and experience, to say that the natural tendency to a range of a certain extent, or the force impressed upon the ball, was always the same, and the actual range, whether long or short, only altered by external resistance; than to conclude that the different distances to which the balls reached must proceed from some mysterious change in the natural tendency of each bullet at different times, although no observable difference could be noticed either in the barrel or the charge. I leave Mr. Weyland to determine which would be the conclusion of the natural philo- sopher, who was observing the different velo- cities. 304 APPENDIX. cities and ranges of projectiles passing through resisting media ; and I do not see why the moral and political philosopher should proceed upon principles so totally opposite. But the only arguments of Mr. Weyland against the natural tendency of the human race to increase faster than the means of subsistence, are a few of these illustrations which he has so unhappily applied, together with the acknow- ledged fact, that countries under different cir- cumstances and in different stages of their progress, do really increase at very different rates. Without dwelling therefore longer on such illustrations, it may be observed, with regard to the fact of the different rates of increase in different countries, that as long as it is a law of our nature that man cannot live without food, these different rates are as absolutely and strictly necessary as the differences in the power of producing food in countries more or less exhausted ; and that to infer from these dif- ferent rates of increase, as they are actually found to take place, that " population has a " natural tendency to keep within the powers " of the soil to afford it subsistence in every " gradation through which society passes," is just as rational as to infer that every man has a natural tendency to remain in prison who is necessarily APPEXDIX. 305 necessarily confined to it by four strong walls ; or that the pine of the crowded Norwegian forest has no natural tendency to shoot out lateral branches, because there is no room for their growth. And yet this is Mr. Weyland's first and grand proposition, on which the whole of his work turns ! ! ! But though Mr. Weyland has not proved, or approached towards proving, that the natural tendency of population to increase is not un- limited ; though he has not advanced a single reason to make it appear probable that a thou- sand millions would not be doubled in twenty- five years just as easily as a thousand, if moral restraint, vice and misery, were equally removed in both cases ; yet there is one part of his argument, which undoubtedly might under certain circumstances be true ; and if true, though it would in no respect impeach the premises of the Essay, it would essentially affect some of its conclusions; The argument may be stated shortly thus ; that the natural division of labour arising from a very advanced state of society, particularly in countries where the land is rich, and great improvements have taken place in agriculture, might throw so large a portion of the people into towns, and engage so many in unhealthy occupations, that the immediate checks to po- # vol. in. x pulation 306 APPENDIX. pulalion might be too powerful to be overcome even by an abundance of food. It is admitted that this is a possible case ; and, foreseeing this possibility, I provided for it in the terms in which the second proposition of the Essay was enunciated. The only practical question then worth at- tending to between me and Mr. Weyland is, whether cases of the kind above stated are to be considered in the light in which I have con- sidered them in the Essay, as exceptions of very rare occurrence, or in the light in which Mr. Weyland has considered them, as a state of things naturally accompanying every stage in the progress of improvement. On either supposition, population would still be repressed by some or other of the forms of moral restraint, vice or misery ; but the moral and political conclusions, in the actual state of almost all countries, would be essentially different. On the one supposition moral restraint would, ex- cept in a few cases of the rarest occurrence, be one of the most useful and necessary of virtues; and on the other, it would be one of the most useless and unnecessary. This question can only be determined by an appeal to experience. Mr. Weyland is always ready to refer to the state of this country ; and, in fact, may be said almost to have built his system APPEXDIX. 30; system upon the peculiar policy of a single state. But the reference in this case will en- tirely contradict his theory. lie has brought forward some elaborate calculations to shew the extreme difficulty with which the births of the country supply the demands of the towns and manufactories. In looking over them, the reader, without other information, would be dis- posed to feel considerable alarm at the prospect of depopulation impending over the country; or at least he would be convinced that we were within a hairs breadth of that formidable point of non-reproduction, at which, according to Mr. Weyland, the population naturally comes to a full stop before the means of subsistence cease to be progressive. These calculations were certainly as appli- cable twenty years ago as they are now ; and indeed they are chiefly founded on observations which were made at a greater distance of time than the period here noticed. But what has happened since ? In spite of the enlargement of all our towns; in spite of the most rapid increase of manufactories, and of the proportion of people employed in them ; in spite of the most extraordinary and unusual demands for the army and navy ; in short, in spite of a state of things which, according to Mr.Weyland's theory, ought to have brought us long since to the 2 x point 308 APPENDIX. point of non-reproduction, the population df the country has advanced at a rate more rapid than was ever known at any period of its history. During the ten years from 1800 to 1811, as I have mentioned in a former part of this work, the population of this country (even after making an allowance for the pre- sumed deficiency of the returns in the first enumeration) increased at a rate which would double its numbers in fifty-five years. This fact appears to me at once a full and complete refutation of the doctrine, that, as society advances, the increased indisposition to marriage and increased mortality in great towns and manufactories always overcome the prin- ciple of increase ; and that, in the language of Mr. Weyland, " population, so far from having ' an inconvenient tendency uniformly to press " against the means of subsistence, becomes " by degrees very slow in overtaking those " means." With this acknowledged and glaring fact before him, and with the most striking evi- dences staring him in the face, that even, dur- ing this period of rapid increase, thousands both in the country and in towns were pre- vented from marrying so early as they would have done, if they had possessed sufficient means of supporting a family independently of parish APPENDIX. 309 parish relief, it is quite inconceivable bow a man of sense could bewilder himself in such a maze of futile calculations, and come to a con- clusion so diametrically opposite to experience. The fact already noticed, as it applies to the most advanced stage of society known in Eu- rope, and proves incontrovertibly that the actual checks to population, even in the most improved countries, arise principally from an insufficiency of subsistence, and soon yield to increased resources, notwithstanding the increase of towns and manufactories, may I think fairly be consi- dered as quite decisive of the question at issue. But in treating of so general and exten- sive a subject as the Principle of Popu- lation, it would surely not be just to take our examples and illustrations only from a single state. And in looking at the other coun- tries Mr. Weyland's doctrine on population is, if possible, still more completely contradicted. Where, i would ask, are the great towns and manufactories in Switzerland, Norway and Sweden, which are to act as the graves of man- kind, and to prevent the possibility of a re- dundant population? In Sweden the propor- tion of the people living in the country is to those who live in town as 13 to 1 ; in England this proportion is about 2 to 1 ; and yet England increases much faster than Sweden. How is this 310 APPEXDIX. this to be reconciled with the doctrine that the progress of civilization and improvement is al- ways accompanied by a correspondent abate- ment in the natural tendency of population to increase ? Norway, Sweden and Switzerland have not on the whole been ill governed ; but where are the necessary " anticipating altera- " tions," which, according to Mr. Weyland, arise in every society as the powers of the soil diminish, and " render so many persons un- " willing to marry, and so many more, who do " marry, incapable ol reproducing their own M numbers, and of replacing the deficiency in " the remainder a V. What is it that in these countries indisposes people to marry, but the absolute hopelessness of being able to support their families ? What is it that renders many more who do marry incapable of reproducing their own numbers, but the diseases generated by excessive poverty by an insufficient supply of the necessaries of life ? Can any man of re- flection look at these and many of the other countries of Europe, and then venture to state that there is no moral reason for repressing the inclination to early marriages ; when it cannot be denied that the alternative of not repressing it must necessarily and unavoidably be pre- mature mortality from excessive poverty ? And P. 124. is APPENDIX. 311 is it possible to know that in few or none of the countries of Europe the wages of labour, determined in the common way by the supply and the demand, can support in health large families ; and yet assert that population does not press against the means of subsistence, and that " the evils of a redundant population can " never be necessarily felt by a country till it " is actually peopled up to the full capacity of " its resources a V\ Mr. Weyland really appears to have dictated his book with his eyes blindfolded and his ears stopped. I have a great respect, for his character and intentions; but I must say that it has never been my fortune to meet with a theory so uniformly contradicted by experience. The very slightest glance at the different coun- tries of Europe shews with a force amounting to demonstration, that to all practical pur- poses the natural tendency of population to increase may be considered as a given quan- tity ; and that the actual increase is regu- lated by the varying resources of each country for the employment and maintenance of labour in whatever stage of its progress it may be, whether it is agricultural or manufacturing, whether it has few or many towns. Of course this actual increase, or the actual limits of po- a P. 123. pulation 312 APPEXDIX. pulation, must always be far short of the lit* most powers of the earth to produce food ; first, because we can never rationally suppose that the human skill and industry actually exerted arc directed in the best possible manner towards the production of food ; and secondly, because as I have stated more particularly in a former part of this work, the greatest production of food which the powers of the earth would admit cannot possibly take place under a system of private property. But this acknowledged truth obviously affects only the actual quantity of food and the actual number of people, and has not the most distant relation to the question respecting the natural tendency of population to increase beyond the powers of the earth to produce food for it. The observations already made are sufficient to shew that the four main propositions of Mr. Weyland, which depend upon the first, are quite unsupported by any appearances in the state of human society, as it is known to us in the countries with which we are acquainted. The last of these four propositions is the follow- ing: "This tendency" (meaning the natural tendency of population to keep within the powers of the soil to aiford it subsistence) " will have " its complete operation so as constantly to " maintain the people in comfort and plenty in " proportion APPENDIX. 313 " proportion as religion/ morality, rational li- " berty and security of person and property ap- " proach the attainment of a perfect influence a ". In the morality here noticed, moral or prudential restraint from marriage is not in- cluded : and so understood, I have no hesi- tation in saying that this proposition appears to me more directly to contradict the observed laws of nature than to assert that Norway might easily grow food for a thousand millions of inhabitants. I trust that I am disposed to at- tach as much importance to the effects of mora- lity and religion on the happiness of society, even as Mr. Weyland ; but among the moral du- ties, I certainly include a restraint upon the in- clination to an early marriage when there is no reasonable prospect of maintenance for a family ; and unless this species of virtuous self-denial be included in morality, I am quite at issue with Mr. Weyland; and so distinctly deny his proposition as to say that no degree of religion and morality, no degree of rational liberty and security of person and property, can under the existing laws of nature place the lower classes of society in a state of comfort and plenty. "With regard to iMr. Weylands fifth and last proposition b , I have already answered it in a a C. iii. p. 21. b Id. 22. note 314 APPENDIX. note which I have added, in the present edition, to the last chapter of the third book a , and will only observe here that an illustration to shew the precedence of population to food, which I believe was first brought forward by an anonymous writer, and appears so to have pleased Mr. Grahame as to induce him to repeat it twice, is one which I would willingly take to prove the very opposite doctrine to that which it was meant to support. The appre- hension that an increasing population would starve 1 " unless a previous increase of food were procured for it, has been ridiculed by comparing it with the apprehension that increasing num- bers would be obliged to go naked unless a previous increase of clothes should precede their births. Now however well or ill-founded may be our apprehensions in the former case, they are certainly quite justifiable in the latter; at least society has always acted as 1 if it thought so. In the course of the next twenty-four hours there will be about 800 children born in England and Wales ; and I will venture to say that there are not ten out of the whole number that come at the expected time, for whom clothes are not prepared before their births. It is said to be dangerous to meddle with edged tools a P. 245, et seq. b This I have never said ; I have only said that their condition would be deteriorated, which is strictly true. which APPENDIX. 315 which we do not know how to handle ; and it is equally dangerous to meddle with illustra- tions which we do not know how to apply, and which may tend to prove exactly the reverse of what we wish. On Mr. Weyland's theory it will not be necessary further to enlarge. With regard to the practical conclusions which he has drawn from it in our own country, they are such as might be expected from the nature of the premises. If population, instead of having a tendency to press against the means of subsist- ence, becomes by degrees very slow in over- taking them, Mr. Weyland's inference that we ought to encourage the increase of the labouring classes by abundant parochial assistance to families, might perhaps be maintained. But if his premises be entirely wrong, while his con- clusions are still acted upon, the consequence must be, that universal system of unnecessary pauperism and dependence which we now so much deplore. Already above one-fourth of the population of England and Wales are regu- larly dependent upon parish relief; and if the system which Mr. Weyland recommends, and which has been so generally adopted in the midland counties, should extend itself over the whole kingdom, there is really no saying to what height the level of pauperism may rise. While the system of making an allowance from the 316 APPENDIX. the parish for every child above two is confined to the labourers in agriculture, whom Mr. Wey- land considers as the breeders of the country, it is essentially unjust, as it lowers without compensation the wages of the manufacturer and artificer : and when it shall become just by including the whole of the working classes, what a dreadful picture does it present ! what a scene of equality, indolence, rags and de- pendence, among one-half or three-fourths of the society! Under such a system to ex- pect any essential benefit from saving b inks or any other institutions to promote industry and economy is perfectly preposterous. When the wages of labour are reduced to the level to which this system tends, there will be neither power nor motive to save. Mr. Weyland strangely attributes much of the wealth and prosperity of England to the cheap population which it raises by means of the poor-laws ; and seems to think that, if la- bour had been allowed to settle at its natural rate, and all workmen had been paid in pro- portion to their skill and industry, whether with or without families, we should never have attained that commercial and manufacturing ascendancy by which we have been so emi- nently distinguished. A practical refutation of so ill-founded an opinion append!*. 317 opinion may be seen in the state of Scotland, which in proportion to its natural resources has certainly increased in agriculture, manufactures and commerce, during the last fifty years, still more rapidly than England, although it may fairly be said to have been essentially without poor-laws. It is not easy to determine what is the price of labour most favourable to the progress of wealth. It is certainly conceivable that it may be too high for the prosperity of foreign com- merce. But I believe it is much more fre- quently too low ; and I doubt if there has ever been an instance in any country of very great prosperity in foreign commerce, where the working classes have not had good money wages. It is impossible to sell very largely without being able to buy very largely ; and no country can buy very largely in which the working classes are not in such a state as to be able to purchase foreign commodities. But nothing tends to place the lower classes of society in this state so much as a demand for labour which is allowed to take its natural course, and which therefore pays the unmarried man and the man with a family at the same rate ; and consequently gives at once to a very large mass of the working classes the power of purchasing foreign articles of consumption, and of 318 APPENDIX. of paying taxes on luxuries to no inconsiderable extent. While, on the other hand, nothing would tend so effectually to destroy the power of the working classes of society to purchase ei- ther home manufactures or foreign articles of consumption, or to pay taxes on luxuries, as the practice of doling out to each member of a family an allowance, in the shape of wages and parish relief combined, just sufficient, or only a very little more than to furnish them with the mere food necessary for their mainte- nance. To shew that, in looking forward to such an increased operation of prudential restraint as would greatly improve the condition of the poor, it is not necessary to suppose extrava- gant and impossible wages, as Mr. Weyland seems to think, I will refer to the proposition of a practical man on the subject of the price of labour ; and certainly much would be done, if this proposition could be realized, though it must be effected in a very different way from that wluch he has proposed. It has been recommended by Mr. Arthur Young so to adjust the wages of day-labour as to make them at all times equivalent to the pur- chase of a peck of wheat. This quantity, he says, was earned by country labourers during a considerable period of the last century, when the APPENDIX. 319 the poor-rates were low, and not granted to as- sist in the maintenance of those who were able to work. And he goes on to observe that, " as the labourer would (in this case) receive 70 bushels of wheat for 47 weeks' labour, exclusive of five weeks for harvest; and as a family of six persons consumes in a year no more than 48 bushels ; it is clear that such wages of labour would cut off every pretence of parochial assist ance ; and of necessity the conclusion would follow, that all right to it in men thus paid should be annihilated for ever a ." An adjustment of this kind, either enforced by law or used as a guide in the distribution of parish assistance, as suggested by Mr. Young, would be open to insuperable objections. At particular times it might be the means of con- verting a dearth into a famine. And in its ge- neral operation, and supposing no change of habits among the labouring classes, it would be tantamount to saying that, under all circum- stances, whether the affairs of the country were prosperous or adverse ; whether its resources in land were still great, or nearly exhausted ; the population ought to increase exactly at the same rate, a conclusion which involves an im- possibility. If however this adjustment, instead of being a Annals of Agriculture, No. 270, p. 91> note. enforced 320 APPENDIX. enforced by law, were produced by the increas* ing operation of the prudential check to mar- riage, the effect would be totally different, and in the highest degree beneficial to society. A gradual change in the habits of the labouring classes would then effect the necessary retarda- tion in the rate of increase, and would propor- ion the supply of labour to the effective de- mand, as society continued to advance, not only without the pressure of a diminishing quantity of food, but under the enjoyment of an increased quantity of conveniences and comforts ; and in the progress of cultivation and wealth the condition of the lower classes of society would be in a state of constant im- provement. A peck of wheat a day cannot be considered in any light as excessive wages. In the early periods of cultivation, indeed, when corn is low in exchangeable value, much more is fre- quently earned ; but in such a country as Eng- land, where the price of corn, compared with manufactures and foreign commodities, is high, it would do much towards placing the great mass of the labouring classes in a state of comparative comfort and independence; and it would be extremely desirable, with a view to the virtue and happiness of human society, that no land should be taken into cultivation that APPENDIX. 321 that could not pay the labourers employed upon it to this amount. With these wages as the average minimum, all those who were unmarried, or, being mar- ried, had small families, would be extremely well off; while those who had large families, though they would unquestionably be subjected sometimes to a severe pressure, would in gene- ral be able, by the sacrifice of conveniences and comforts, to support themselves without parish assistance. And not only would the amount and distribution of the wages of labour greatly increase the stimulus to industry and economy throughout all the working classes of the society, and place the great body of them in a very superior situation, but it would fur- nish them with the means of making an effec- tual demand for a great amount of foreign commodities and domestic manufactures, and thus, at the same time that it would promote individual and general happiness, would ad- vance the mercantile and manufacturing pro- sperity of the country a . Mr. Weyland, a The merchants and manufacturers who so loudly cla- mour for cheap corn and low money wages, think only of selling their commodities abroad, and often forget that they have to find a market for their returns at home, which they can never do to any great extent, when the # vol. III. Y money 322 APPENDIX. Mr. Weyland, however, finds it utterly im- possible to reconcile the necessity of moral restraint either with the nature of man, or the plain dictates of religion on the subject of mar- riage. Whether the check to population, which he would substitute for it, is more consistent with the nature of a rational being, the precepts of revelation, and the benevolence of the Deity, must be left to the judgment of the reader. This check, it is already known, is no other than the unhealthiness and mortality of towns and manufactories". And though I have never felt any difficulty in reconciling to the goodness of the Deity the necessity of practising the vir- tue of moral restraint in a state allowed to be a state of discipline and trial; yet I confess that I could make no attempt to reason on the subject, if I were obliged to believe, with Mr. Weyland, that a large proportion of the money wages of the working classes, and monied incomes in general, are low. One of the principal causes of the check which foreign commerce has experienced during the last two or three years, has been the great diminution of the home market for foreign produce. With regard to the indisposition to marriage in towns, I do not believe that it is greater than in the country, except as far as it arises from the greater expense of maintaining a family, and the greater facility of illicit intercourse. human APPENDIX. 323 human race was doomed by the inscrutable ordinations of Providence to a premature death in large towns. If indeed such peculiar unhealthiness and mortality were the proper and natural check to the progress of population in the advanced stages of society, we should justly have reason to apprehend that, by improving the healthiness of our towns and manufactories, as we have done in England during the last twenty years, we might really defeat the designs of Provi- dence. And though I have too much respect for Mr. Weyland to suppose that he would de- precate all attempts to diminish the mortality of towns, and render manufactories less de- structive to the health of the children employed in them ; yet certainly his principles lead to this conclusion, since his theory has been com- pletely destroyed by those laudable efforts which have made the mortality of England a country abounding in towns and manufactories, less than the mortality of Sweden a country in a state almost purely agricultural. It was my object in the two chapters on Moral Restraint, and its Effects on Society, to shew that the evils arising from the principle of population were exactly of the same nature as the evils arising from the excessive or irregular gratification of the human passions in general ; and 324 APPENDIX. and that from the existence of these evils we had no more reason to conclude that the prin- ciple 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 diminu- tion or extinction, instead of regulation and direction. If this view of the subject be allowed to be correct, it will naturally follow that, notwith- standing the acknowledged evils occasioned by the principle of population, the advantages de- rived from it under the present constitution of things may very greatly overbalance them. A slight sketch of the nature of these ad- vantages, 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 considerable 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 developement and com- pletion of views, of which only an intimation could be given in the Essay. I fully agree with Mr. Sumner as to the bene- ficial effects which result from the principle of population, and feel entirely convinced that the natural tendency of the human race to increase faster than the possible increase of the means of APPENDIX. 325 of subsistence could not be either destroyed or essentially diminished without diminishing that hope of rising and fear of falling in society, so necessary to the improvement of the human faculties and the advancement of human hap- piness. 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 account, 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. Indeed 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 indi- vidual has the power of avoiding the evil con- sequences to himself and society resulting from the principle of population by the practice of a virtue clearly dictated to him by the light of nature, 326 APPENDIX. 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 ob- jections which have been made to the principles and conclusions of the Essay on Population has come from persons for whose moral and reli- gious character I have so high a respect, that it would have been particularly gratifying to me to obtain their approbation 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 weaknesses of human nature, and the feel- ings 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 consi- dered by a competent tribunal as having a tend- ency 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 ob- jected to, and I have made some few further corrections of the same kind in the present edition. APPENDIX. 327 edition. By these alterations I hope and be- lieve that the work has been improved without impairing its principles. But I still trust that whether it is read with or without these altera- tions, every reader of candour must acknow- ledge 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 happi- ness of the lower classes of society. FINIS. rriotrd bj W. CLOWES, NonkambrU4-ourt, Strand, LomIm. 0C1 rz University of California SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 405 Hilgard Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90024-1388 Return this material to the library from which it was borrowed. OCT 1 7 1995 ziiy biaoNV-soi^ (o qZZ 3 1158 00388 5208 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY AA 000113 905 4 llFO%