described as the ratio of the population of a country to the food which the land can produce for their support. It must be remembered that Malthus wrote in an age of Protection, and that the prevailing idea of the time was that the population of a country was to be fed by the produce of that country; and, things being as they were, it was a somewhat alarming revelation when he proved that, whereas the population tended to increase in a geometrical ratio as 1, 2, 4, 8, etc., the food-producing capabilities of the land could only be made to increase in an arithmetical ratio, as 1, 2, 3, 4, etc. This being so, the writer's attention was naturally directed to the possible checks on the increase of the population, and it is for this that his name has been held up by pseudo-philanthropists to the abuse of the easily-led portion of mankind, as a man devoid of sympathy towards the poorer classes, a cold-blooded statistician with an utter disregard of the feelings of the people about whom he writes. As well might a doctor, who prescribes unpleasant medicines, be called hard-hearted; all that Malthus does is to point out the fact that an evil exists, and that there are remedies, some always present and always working, and some which, in contradiction of those which do exist and should not, should exist, and might exist, but as a rule, do not. Some of the checks to population may perhaps be taken as being between these two extremes, such as utter destitution, compulsory military service, the prevalence of epidemic disease or any similar cause; but apart from such more or less exceptional checks, Malthus divides his remedies into these two classesfirstly, preventive, meaning such as are instituted by the action of reason and prudence, such as the avoidance of marriage without the prospect of being able to sustain a family; and secondly, positive, by which he implies such checks as rise unavoidably from the laws of nature, and which he classes as misery, under which head comes the utter destitution mentioned above, with the addition of severe labour, unwholesome occupations, bad nursing, or undue exposure to the weather. All forms of vice too are positive checks, but these are of the kind which have to be taken into consideration only because they exist, and the continuance of which the most ardent opponent of the excessive increase of population cannot wish. If, upon these principles, Malthus is to be criticised in such terms as everyone must have heard used about him, it is difficult to know what social system can be so framed as to escape censure. Malthus published one essay upon the Principles of Population before he gave to the world the work upon which his reputation is founded. Among many treatises upon the different points of Political Economy raised in his time, an Inquiry into the Nature and Progress of Rent, and the Principles by which it is Regulated, published in 1815, is perhaps the most important. HENRY HALLAM, born 1798; died 1859. Published View of the State of Europe during the Middle Ages, 1818. Constitutional History of England, 1827. Introduction to the Literature of Europe in the 15th, 16th, and 17th Centuries, 1837-39. JOHN LINGARD, born 1771; died 1851. Published Catholic Loyalty Vindicated, 1805. Antiquities of the Anglo-Saxon Church, 1809. THOMAS M'CRIE, born 1772; died 1835. Published Life of John Knox, 1812. Life of Andrew Melville, 1819. Suppression of the Reformation in Spain, 1829. JEREMY BENTHAM, born 1747; died 1832. A Plea for the Constitution, 1803. Scotch Reform Considered, 1808. Elements of the Art of Packing, 1810. With many other works on political and economical science. Théorie des Peines et des Recompences, 1802. Sir JAMES MACKINTOSH, born 1765; died 1832. Published Vindicia Gallica, 1791. Introductory Discourse to Lectures on Law, 1799, (in Encyclopædia Britannica) separately, 1836. History of England, 1830-31. Fragment on Causes of Revolution of 1688, 1834. JAMES MILL, born 1773; died 1836. Published History of India, 1818. Elements of Political Economy, 1821. With many lesser works on political subjects, and contributions to reviews and other periodicals. Rev. THOMAS ROBERT MALTHUS, born 1766; died 1834. Published An Essay on the Principle of Population, 1798. enlarged in 2d edition, 1803. An Inquiry into the Nature and Progress of Rent, 1815. Principles of Political Economy, 1820. With smaller works on Political Questions, the Corn Laws, Poor Laws, &c. CHAPTER IX. THEOLOGIANS. It is hardly possible to reckon so important a name as that of Paley as belonging to the period within which we are limited. It is true that his last publication, and one of his most important, came before the world only in 1802, but neither in his life nor his work was there any variety from the moderate religiousness and scientific dignified apologetics of the eighteenth century, to which he belonged. His first publication on Moral Philosophy appeared to some of Bentham's friends to be likely to "take the wind out of the sails" of the Utilitarian system, and alarmed them momentarily, eliciting from the philosopher himself a half cry of panic. But this alarm seems to have been without foundation. Paley's works, whether judiciously or not we need not pause to inquire, are still text-books at the universities, but the scepticism against which he set his forces in array was not of the kind to which we are now accustomed, which takes much of the force from his defence. They are still however eminently readable in a merely literary point of view, and extracts might be made, in which the reader would find much happiness of expression |