cultivation which we have every reason to believe was resorted to very early in some of the most populous parts of the earth, and especially in Judea, it remains for time to discover. Lord Bacon observes, that "the setting of wheat has been left off, because of the trouble and pains1." It was revived in this country for a time, but is, I believe, again very generally abandoned, for a reason which is substantially the same with that Lord Bacon assigns, and which it would be hard to reconcile with the existence of a superfluity of human beings and a deficiency of food; namely, because "it does not pay:" expressions which only assert, in other terms, that it is not wanted.

(20) I shall not prolong this part of the discussion by entering into any calculations myself, in order to show how many human beings any particular part, or the whole of the earth, might sustain; many besides Dr. Anderson have already made them; nor shall I presume to determine with him that this kingdom would support one hundred fold its present numbers, or with Mr. Malthus, that the world would only accommodate ten times as many as it does now. I shall rather hazard an opinion, which, I trust, I shall prove, before I have concluded this volume, to rest upon surer grounds than mere conjecture,-that the ratio of human increase will pause far sooner than that of the means of subsistence. Nature does not love to place her operations on the utmost boundaries of possibility, nor to put in jeopardy the happiness, much less the existence, of any of her offspring, by nice and exact calculations, liable to be disturbed by accidental events. In all probability, she has not, therefore, anticipated this universal and extreme culture, nor yet that general parsimony in the sharing of 1 Nat. Hist., cent. v., § 442.

its products, to which such views might seem to lead. On the contrary, she appears to secure all her important ends by the amplest means; life is, of all those ends, the most important: and, moreover, it is as plainly her intention to unite pleasure with existence, as it is to confer and perpetuate it. As it respects sustentation, there is not the least evidence, throughout all the tribes of animal life, that is not abundantly sufficient, as will be further shown hereafter. Respecting man, as far as she is concerned, his provision is superabundant, not only satisfying his wants, but soliciting his appetite by a constant succession of grateful varieties, which increase around him the more he multiplies, and the farther he advances in the social system. Such has been the experience of the human race hitherto; and if we carry forth our ideas to the end of time (if our anti-populationists will admit that time is to terminate), when "the great globe itself, and all that it inherits, shall dissolve," it will be at a period probably when society shall have advanced to a state of comparative ease, and in a time of more universal plenty, when they shall be "marrying and giving in marriage"-enjoying, as well as perpetuating, existence-rather than suffering the last act of that final tragedy with which the system I am opposing threatens the human race.

(21) To advert, then, once more, to the geometric and arithmetical ratios: In none of the states of society already contemplated is their existence and operation possible. There only remains one condition to be examined in reference to them. It is that in which, to give imagination the utmost latitude, the means of subsistence shall have been developed to the utmost extent. When the earth, by the increase of its inhabitants, shall have its entire

surface cultivated, and that cultivation carried on in every part to the highest degree of perfection; the great and wide sea also, "in which are things innumerable," fully explored, and yielding its utmost tribute (but is that possible?) to the sustentation of human beings in a word, when nature, however solicited, can yield no further increase. Now, it must be clear, from one moment's reflection, that the arithmetical ratio of increase is a more impossible supposition in this last, than it was even in the first state of human society. Whatever becomes of the geometric ratio it is needless to enquire; the arithmetical one has come to a dead halt. Commencing from this period, the first term cannot be doubled; that is, the 1 turned into 2; nor, in the second, that 2 into 3; nor, taking the ratio at a more advanced stage, can a single unit be added to any sum which the theory may be supposed to have already generated. We have arrived at an age of the world when, " by the singular providence of God," these ratios, which, since the first of time, have never been a very harmonious couple, shall be finally divorced, and mankind left with their geometric propensities as lively as ever; but the earth shall have been deprived of its arithmetical ones. The bankruptcy of nature is announced, and its insufficient assets placed under the management of checks which have already declared the principle on which it is proper to make the dividend. The rich they will "fill with good things," but the poor and hungry they will "send empty away." I believe there is a slight alteration in the reading of this old author, but it is "another pleasing proof" how well Christianity can be made to adapt itself to the times, and, under certain expounders, to the rich and great at all times.

(22) These ratios, therefore, express nothing, and

only prove what they express. The arithmetical one cannot represent the increase in the products of nature before the earth is entirely cultivated; it is quite as impossible it should do so afterwards. From first to last, whether viewed with the lights of human reason or experience, it is as ungrounded a sophism as ever was presented to the mind of man, I shall conclude my remarks on these ratios by observing,—

First, The means of human subsistence, whether animal or vegetable, increase in a proportion, the ratio of which is in all cases greater, in many almost infinitely so (as well as far more rapid), than those assigned to the principle of human increase in the theory under notice.

Second,-Human beings increase in a different proportion, and one which is constantly regulated by their co-existing numbers.

Third, The geometric and arithmetical ratios of the prevailing principle of population, false, as we have seen, when considered separately, are, when combined, still more contrary to truth and experience. If, therefore, the series of figures which is made to represent the natural increase of mankind, and that which is to show the increase of their means of subsistence, were to be interchanged, or, in other words, turned topsyturvy, they might, though still in an inadequate degree, exhibit that overflowing sufficiency which Providence at present bestows upon the human race, as well as that increasing and inexhaustible provision which is laid up for all future generations of mankind.

104

CHAPTER VI.

OF THE CONDITION ON WHICH THE MEANS OF SUBSISTENCE ARE BESTOWED, AND THE PRECEDENCE OF

POPULATION TO PRODUCTION.

(1) THE researches of philosophy, as well as the dictates of common sense and the evidence of universal experience, prove, beyond all doubt, an intention in the Great First Cause adequately to provide for all his animated offspring; and that he is in the unceasing act of fulfilling that intention. The same lights will likewise serve to shew us that such provision is nevertheless conditional; and furthermore, that the very nature of the condition is in perfect accordance with the benignity of his universal system: that, as it respects mankind more particularly, it is made the means not merely of preserving existence, but of conferring and perpetuating happiness. That condition is exertion.

(2) Although this fact is essential to a right view of that divine economy by which the gift of existence is continued and rendered valuable to its possessors, it would not, in a work which will necessarily carry out the argument to a considerable length, have been made a subject of distinct consideration, had it not been for a very extraordinary position which seems fundamental to the theory now controverted; namely, an asserted precedence in the production of food to the increase of population'. I am not sorry, however, that the argument must necessarily take this direction,

'Malthus, Essay on Population, pp. 476, 477, 478, &c.