places have increased, the prolificness of marriages has sensibly diminished, so I shall conclude this chapter by shewing that such diminution is not attributable to the increased prevalence of the preventive check, although this has been confidently alleged by those who, being compelled to admit a fact universally acknowledged, have attempted to evade its import by that gratuitous assertion.

(18) In proof that the "preventive check" has diminished, as the population of the different countries already examined has advanced, or, in other words, that the marriages have increased in a super-proportion, I need only remind the reader of the true method of calculating that proportion, explained, it is conceived, in the seventh and eighth Chapters of the preceding Book, and then refer him to any country where the facts necessary for determining the point have been recorded. Several countries have already been examined in reference to the subject, particularly France, Sweden, and England. Regarding France, nothing further shall be added; and I shall only allude again to Sweden, for the purpose of exhibiting once more the singular error into which the theory of superfecundity has betrayed its principal advocates. Mr. Malthus, noticing the diminished mortality of that country, says that it must have been occasioned by the increased operation of the preventive check." From another calculation which he received from M. Nicander, he thus deduces the same conclusion, "according to M. Wargen"tin as quoted by Sussmilch, five standing marriages

produced yearly one child; but in the latter period,” (about the termination of the last century,)" the pro"portion of standing marriages to annual births was as 5, and subtracting illegitimate children, as 5% to 1, a proof that, in the latter period, the marriages

"had not been quite so early and so prolific'." Now how stand the facts regarding this point? This author himself states, on the authority of Wargentin, that, a little after the middle of the last century, the proportion of marriages to the population, on the average of a few years, was 1 in 112, and of the deaths, 1 in 34. In 1805, the mortality had sunk, it appears, to 1 in 40.92. As he has not given the results of the enumeration of 1823, I will supply the omission. The proportions then were, of the marriages, 1 in 112; precisely the same as at the first period referred to, and of the deaths, 1 in 47.95. Now supposing the population to have been stationary, in every 10,000 births there would have been, at the first period, 6204 persons married; at the last, 8562; leaving out of consideration second marriages, which being, doubtless, about proportionably numerous in both cases, cannot affect the question. But the population was not stationary during the interval, but, on the contrary, it had augmented about one half; and the effect of that augmentation is such as still further to strengthen the general conclusion, at which we have already arrived. So far, therefore, from the truth is the supposition regarding the increasing, operation of the preventive check in that country. The acknowledged diminution, therefore, in the fecundity of standing marriages, remains in full proof of the position, that human prolificness diminishes as population increases.

(19) Respecting England, few words will be required to negative the notion that the operation of what is denominated the preventive check increases. Towards the conclusion of the seventeenth century, the proportion of marriages to the population was, as has been already shewn, computed to be 1 in 134. But

1 1 Malthus, Essay on Population, p. 209.

now, taking the whole of the first twenty years of the present century into the account, and calculating by the mean number of the marriages, and the mean amount of the population during this time, as beyond all doubt the most unexceptionable method, that proportion has risen to 1 in 121. Taking, then, into consideration the increased duration of life at the latter date, which necessarily accumulates so much larger a number of co-existing individuals from the same number of births; can any supposition be more opposite to truth than that which assumes this check to have increased? On the contrary, its diminution is not only certain at present, but it has been shewn to be on the decline during the period in question, by an authority, whom, strange to say, Mr. Malthus has quoted in support of a directly contrary conclusion, I mean the indefatigable Dr. Short. He says expressly, that "the numbers which "die of late in celibacy, seem far short of what they "were before';" and he goes on to determine the proportion of that excess. But I shall pursue the subject no further. It is ridiculous to speak of the increasing prevalence of the preventive check in this country, as it respects the great mass of the community, whose numbers alone govern the question; it is worse than ridiculous, when we reflect that those who, when they have to make good their abhorrent theory, emphatically dwell on the effects of this check, can, nevertheless, when they resolve it into a practical question, turn round and inveigh against the early and improvident marriages of the poor, that is, of the vast bulk of the people of England.

(20) It may, perhaps, have been noticed, that no references have been made to the proportion of the 1 Dr. Short, New Observations, &c., p. 74.

marriages of Ireland and the United States of America; two countries nevertheless which have been specially appealed to in the preceding chapters, in support of the law of population. The argument is foregone as it regards those countries, for this conclusive reason, namely, because the documents are not in existence respecting them which only could enable us to pursue it; the marriages not being regularly registered, much less is their number known or published in either country. It would be too absurd, however, to suppose that the principle of population, which has been already thence demonstrated with such certainty and precision, and which conforms so exactly to what has been proved to be its operation in other countries, should be reversed as it regards these, in this one unnoticeable particular.

(21) But to conclude, by referring to the entire argument of this chapter. Seeing the evidence of decisive, uniform, universal facts as to this subject, will the assertions that, relatively speaking, deaths make room for marriages; that these again are restrained by the prevalence of the preventive check, which increases in its operation as population accumulates; and lastly, that the prolificness of marriages is diminished in proportion as that check prevails, be any longer hazarded-forming, as they do, essential parts of a theory as degrading to philosophy and truth, as it is injurious to the feelings and interests of human beings.

534

CHAPTER XIX.

OF THE LAW OF POPULATION; AS PROVED BY THE EFFECT UPON HUMAN PROLIFICNESS OF ANY CONSIDERABLE

DIMINUTION OF INHABITANTS.

(1) THE next branch of the argument is of a singularly curious and important nature. It may indeed be regarded as little more than a corollary of the general principle, and as establishing it by a series of converse proofs; but it is of such a character, as most powerfully to arrest our attention, and it must be regarded as amounting to a moral demonstration of the theory for which I contend, at least with such as admit the system of Nature to result from Supreme wisdom and benevolence. It is this: the fecundity of marriages increases with the diminution of population.

(2) Happily for mankind, the instances of a considerable decrease in the inhabitants of any country or district are of rare occurrence, and the periods at which such diminutions have taken place are mostly remote from our times. It has been already observed, that an advancing population has been almost invariably accompanied by a greater diffusion of the comforts and conveniencies of life; has spread cultivation, meliorated climate, secured and equalized the products of the earth, and extended the limits of human life. Above all, those sweeping calamities, plagues and epidemics, whose office it is, according to the doctrine of some, to clear the world of its