period, the number is at a stand, the period during which it remains stationary, is equally irregular. How, then, it is demanded, can numbers, which thus incessantly fluctuate, proceed in geometrical progression?

It will be answered, this reasoning is founded on the actual state of population, whereas the argument to which it is opposed, has respect to the inherent power of population, and to the results of that power, supposing its operations were unchecked. It is replied, that it has been shown above, that according to the statement of Mr. Malthus himself, no state of society can be conceived in which checks must not of necessity exist, and that, therefore, it is of the essence of this proposition to suppose, what in the nature of things is insupposable. But if the advocates of this hypothesis will be content to say, that there is an inherent power in population, constantly, rapidly, and greatly to increase, there will no longer remain any essential difference of opinion between them and their opponents. It follows from some of Mr. Godwin's own statements, that there is a power in the human species, under certain circumstances, rapidly to multiply its numbers, and if the geometrical ratio be

* Mr. Godwin allows, that in Sweden there has been a doubling of the population, from procreation only, in little more than one hundred years.

given up, this is all which Mr. Malthus himself can affirm. In the principle that there is an inherent power of increase, they are agreed: they differ only according to the ratio of increase, which both must allow it is not possible to determine with exactness from any data we yet possess. The one contends that the ratio of increase is extremely rapid, the other, that though may be occasionally rapid, it is generally slow: but, at all events, Mr. Godwin must admit the truth so constantly and earnestly inculcated by Mr. Malthus, for it follows from the facts recognised by himself, no less than from the theory he opposes, namely, that prudential restraint is necessary, that without it indigence is inevitable, and that the consequence of indigence must be vice and misery.

it

Without doubt, the final decision of this controversy will depend upon the facts that shall be ascertained, relative to the number of immigrants into America. The system of Mr. Malthus is founded upon the assumption, that the increase in America has been produced by procreation only. That increase has frequently been ascertained to be from procreation only," is the proposition to which he constantly has recourse, and on which every thing is made to rest. If this proposition shall be confirmed, his system is established; if it shall be refuted, it falls.

To a certain extent, indeed, some objection

might still reasonably be made to his second main position, namely, that while population, if suffered to expand freely, would go on for ever to increase in geometrical progression, subsistence could not by the wisest and best combination of human agency, be doubled faster than in arithmetical progression. In answer to this, it is urged, that civilization itself is founded on the principle, and depends upon the fact, that every man has the power of producing more than is necessary to his own subsistence; and that this alone is sufficient to prove, that let mankind increase in whatever ratio they may, subsistence may be made to keep pace with it, until the whole habitable globe shall have been cultivated in such a manner as actually to yield all that it is physically capable of yielding: that whatever be the ratio of increase among mankind, it is in the power of man to cause vegetables and animals, the food of man, to increase with equal rapidity up to the point just stated that if the vegetable productions of the earth cannot be doubled in a geometrical progression, there is not the shadow of reason to believe that any thing in nature can; and that, in regard to animals, if they increase in the same sort of series as human beings, which there is no reason to doubt, there can be no want of subsistence, whatever be that series, for this increase is subsistence. Lastly, that the actual increase, whatever be its ratio, must necessarily

be by infants, who consume little that the demand for subsistence, therefore, at whatever rate the consumers multiply, must be gradual; and, consequently, that it must always be possible to raise the additional quantity which may be needed; at least, until the earth shall be physically capable of yielding no more than it actually produces.

From this account of the real state of the question, the following conclusions are deducible, for the sake of establishing which, the subject has been here adverted to.

I. In the first place, it is evident, that even if the law of population be such as is stated by Mr. Malthus, it is not incompatible with the progressive improvement of man. It is commonly said, that this hypothesis must degrade man in the estimation of man, because it represents him as too cheap; and that this low estimation of the value of a human being, this contempt of human nature, is fatal to human improvement, and is at the foundation of the enormous errors of statesmen, and the gigantic crimes of warriors; that they could not squander life and violate happiness as they do, did they judge of man as he is; that their estimation of him is universally acknowledged to have arisen from their own selfish and ill-regulated passions: but that to view him as the Essay on Population represents him, is to render him valueless in the

eye of reason itself; to make philosophy enter into an alliance with tyranny against him; to snatch from science the shield she was wont to hold over him; and to cover with it his direst foes-error, corruption and oppression.

But it may well be questioned, whether on a sober and thorough consideration of the subject, there will appear to be any truth in this representation. For the dignity and worth of man must depend upon what he is, and it is not possible that any opinion respecting the rate at which he multiplies his species, can affect our estimation of his nature, his faculties, and his capacity of improvement, for the plain reason that these must remain just the same, whatever that rate may be.

Because man is endowed with the faculty of reason, can foresee the consequences of his actions, and regulate his conduct by a prudent regard to his well-being, therefore it is in his power to derive from the law of population, supposing it to be such as has been stated, the most excellent advantages, and to prevent it from producing any evil whatever. Suppose the principle of population really is what Mr. Malthus says it is, susceptible of the effect of, in no long time, peopling all the stars, and that if it had gone on unchecked for eighteen hundred years, it would have produced men enough to fill the