castic criticism of our main anti-populationist. I believe the accusation of ignorance, though so confidently urged against the former, has nevertheless been withdrawn; but, as I pursue the argument from no personal motives, (God forbid!) and, as the impression made by the more recent and popular writer may be still too generally prevalent, I shall not suppress my refutation of the following extraordinary positions. (3) "He," Dr. Price, " did not," says Mr. Malthus, "understand this subject," (the method of computing the proportion of births to marriages,)" though he "has a long and elaborate note on it. He merely "thought, that the list of annual births and marriages "did not, in all cases, express accurately the prolific"ness of marriages; but he does not seem to have been "in the smallest degree aware, that they had absolutely "nothing to do with it; and that, so far from being "merely inaccurate, it would be impossible from such "lists, unaccompanied by other information, to tell with "certainty, whether the prolificness in the marriages of any country were such as to yield 2 births or 100 "births in the course of their duration. Such lists, therefore, considered as expressing the prolificness of "marriages, must be rejected as perfectly useless; but, "considered as expressing the proportion of the born "which lives to be married, should be preserved as "highly valuable, and as giving a most interesting and "desirable piece of information'." 66 (4) I confess that all my attempts to reconcile the preceding passage to common sense have been ineffectual; so have theirs also to whom I have submitted it, whose minds were far from being clouded by any aversion to the system it is brought forward to support. The language is too plain to admit of any other inter1 1 Malthus, Essay on Population, pp. 228, 229. pretation, than that the annual marriages and births are so far from indicating their usual relations in any country, that, for aught they express to the contrary, the proportions of the latter, compared with the former, may be two, or they may be fifty to one. Now this, on every possible view of the subject, is as erroneous a position as was ever advanced: bearing in mind that the period of marriage, and the issue resulting from it, though not contemporary, are more nearly so than any other events happening to the same individuals which at all affect the subject of population; and not, perhaps, on the general average, exceeding the term of nine years: it appears strange indeed, that this anachronism is objected to as fatal to all just calculations on the subject, by one who has, nevertheless, founded most of his own on events far more remote, and having necessarily less connexion with each other; instances of which have been already given, and others will be added. On referring to Dr. Price, I am convinced, that instead of his not understanding his subject, he comprehended perfectly, and expressed with his usual perspicacity, all that can be known about it, namely, that in a stationary population, the movements of which a are uniform, the annual births, divided by the annual marriages, will accurately express the average prolificness of the latter; that in a retrograding one, (a case so rare as to deserve little consideration,) it will give that prolificness somewhat too great, and in an increasing one, on the contrary, too small; but the brevity of the average period of female prolificness will prevent this progression from operating to any great degree on the calculation. (5) These positions of Dr. Price are, in fact, almost too clear to render either proof or illustration necessary. If we take the register of a community for a certain term (twenty-five years for instance,) the whole 161 PROLIFICNESS OF of the births contained in it, divided by the whole of the marriages, give the average prolificness of the a certain number of the births at the commencement latter, as usually calculated. But, strictly speaking, of the register, belong to marriages previously contracted, and not therefore enrolled in it. On the contrary, all the marriages at its termination have not added their whole number of births. Now, it is plain that, to render this document critically exact, as to the prolificness of all the marriages contained in it, it is necessary to deduct the births at the commencement which do not belong to the registered marriages, and add those which are due to them at its termination. If the community has been exactly stationary during this period, these will be equal, and the usual method will therefore express the prolificness precisely; if it be decreasing, the births to be deducted will exceed in their number those to be added, and that method will then have given the prolificness too high; but lastly, if it be increasing, the births to be deducted will, on the contrary, be fewer than those that have to be added, and the prolificness as calculated by the register will appear too low. All this Dr. Price clearly comprehended; and he must have seen, likewise, that in a term sufficiently extended, all such rectifications would be incalculably trivial; while, even in short ones, the constant tendency of Nature to equalize her operations would, generally speaking, render them unnecessary. Seeing, then, that in all such instances as the foregoing, the great majority of the births and marriages registered actually belonged to each other, and that in others their proportions were relatively established by irreversible laws, it is quite true that "he did not seem to be in the smallest degree aware" that an examination of "the lists of annual births and marriages," had nothing to do with the subject of "the prolificness" of the latter, so that he could not gather from them whether they yielded "two or a hundred births each." The idea is preposterous. Dr. Price, I must repeat, perfectly understood this part of his subject, when he said that these annual records did not in all cases exactly express the prolificness in question'. (6) But if there be little inaccuracy in the result obtained from correct registers, as at present examined, there is still less when they are used for comparison, which is the most material purpose to which they can be applied, and almost the only one bearing upon the main argument of this work. In these comparisons between countries whose respective population is stationary, or equally advancing, the relative results will be strictly correct; and where that advance is unequal, the difference in the short period of time to which the average fertility of marriages is limited, will be so trivial as to render the rectification unnecessary. (7) But in order to place this matter, which Mr. Malthus conceives had been unaccountably overlooked till his time, in a clear point of view, which will show, I think, that he alone has been bewildered upon it, I shall present it in the form of simple calculation. Suppose a population of 480,000 persons, amongst whom there shall take place, annually, one marriage in every 120, one birth in every 30, and one death in every 40 of the whole number; not contending that these are the precise proportions in any country, (though, perhaps, not differing much from those which exist in several,) but as fully answering all the purposes of an illustration as though they were exact; the following table will exhibit the progress of such a population, for a period of a quarter of a century. 1 Dr. Price, Observations on Reversionary Payments, vol. i., p. 265, note. |