Зображення сторінки
PDF
ePub

have been but 82,117, against 138,158 of children.*

Of the

colored population of that city, the deaths are to the births as 7 to 3, or more than 2 to 1.†

In no country of the world do we meet such remarkable contrasts great length of life, under certain conditions, here presenting itself side by side with an infant mortality scarcely exceeded in the world. In the eight years ending with 1855, the average age, at death, of males of all professions, in Massachusetts, who had survived 20 years, was nearly 63 years. On the other hand, we have the facts, that whereas, in the city of Baltimore, from 1831 to 1840, the deaths were 1 in 43, they are now 1 in 40that in New York, in 1810, there died 1 in 46, against 1 in 41 in 1815, 1 in 37 in 1820, 1 in 34 in 1825, and 1 in 28 in 1855. §

For the new States, we have no statistics, but the general fact presents itself, that the people who are driven, by an adverse policy, prematurely to commence the work of settlement, are constantly endeavoring to cultivate the richer soils, in advance of the conditions required for the preservation of health and life. Of this, disease and death are necessary consequences - the system

[ocr errors]

* The total deaths in England, in 1855, were ..................................................................... 216,587 Of these, there were under 5 years

89,527

(being about 44 per cent. of the whole.) The total deaths in London were ............................ ........................... ............................ 31,354 Of these, under 5 years

And from 5 to 65

13,200 13,714

The chance of life in London is, therefore, fully equal to that of Boston, and greatly superior to that of New York.

The still-born children of New York, in 1855, were 1659 in number. Their ratio to the total deaths was 1 in 13.70.

[ocr errors]

SHATTUCK: Memorials of the Shattuck Family, p. 44. This work, probably the most remarkable contribution to vital statistics that has yet been made, is the production of a gentleman to whom we are largely indebted for the admirable character of the Massachusetts Reports. In it are given accounts of 1037 descendants from a couple who married in 1642. Of these, only 13.40 per cent died under 20. Of 898 who attained that age, 91-84 per cent. married the proportion borne by the married to the whole number being 79.27. Of 377 marriages in the first six generations, 53 of which were second, and 6 third marriages, the average product was 64 children. The average age of marriage was, of males, from 24 to 25 years; females, 20 to 22. Of 522 whose age at death has been correctly ascertained, 14.37 per cent. died before 15-the average of all being 53 years. Of those who passed 20, the average was 631. The total number of descendants, bearing the family name, of this single couple, is estimated at 5297.

Much of the extraordinary increase here observed, is due to immigration- the yearly average of foreign deaths being 30 per cent., and rising, on some occasions, to 35 per cent. of the whole. In the ten years ending in 1856, the deaths of immigrants numbered 64,494.

which crowds the cities at the cost of life, producing the same effects throughout the West.

As men are enabled to come together and combine their efforts, life is prolonged, and all become more free. As they are forced to separate, life is shortened, and the laborer becomes less free. That the American tendency is in this latter direction, and that it has become more decided in the period that has elapsed since the free trade and dispersive policy was adopted by the generally dominant party of the Union, are facts that cannot now be questioned. Hence it is, that, with each succeeding year, growing pauperism, intemperance, and immorality, furnish new and stronger evidence to be adduced in support of the doctrine of over-population.*

§ 8. Enforced celibacy is very frequently, as we are assured, a cause of ill health. That it is, however, which is so freely recommended, under the name of "moral restraint," by teachers who hold that the Creator has so mischievously constructed the laws to which he has subjected man, as to require that his creatures shall task their faculties to the utmost, in the effort to make them work aright. Widely different is such restraint upon the reproduction of the species, from that other one which is found in man's development-in his growing self-respect-in his augmented feeling of responsibility to his family, to his fellow-men, and to the Giver of all good, for the use to which he applies the powers with which he has been invested. That, however, being but the moral side of the question, it is needed that we now look to the physical one, with a view to ascertain how far the two are in harmony with each other.

[ocr errors]

Having shown, sufficiently for our purpose, how far the moral elements of the individual MAN fitted, as he is, to become the master of nature—are such as qualify him for meeting and mastering the accidents to which he is necessarily exposed, we have next to look to the agencies and laws developed in his organism, and provided for the purpose of adjusting the reproductive function to the ever-varying condition and requirements of the race

* The number of paupers relieved in the State of New York, in 1857, was nearly 180,000, of whom 81,000 were foreigners, 2320 lunatics, 531 idiots, and 55 deaf mutes.

at times increasing fertility, so as to repair the wastes of war and pestilence, and at others, restraining it within the limits required for the happier times of peace.

The belief in the existence of such laws, arising fairly out of the philosophy of the general providence every where else in nature so clearly manifest, it is neither unsafe nor illogical to rest, upon this ground alone, our faith in the existence of a law governing the movement of population, in perfect harmony with those changes in the societary conditions to which it is related the system of existence being pledged to a persistent and orderly endeavor for the fulfilment of all the ends logically expectant in every department of the universe.

The assurance of faith, however-in this, as in all other departments of natural knowledge- finding its best support in the philosophy of facts, we turn to the economy of the human constitution, to see what science has discovered in the domain of physiology, tending to confirm us in the belief to which we are so naturally led.

The human body consists of a multitude of parts, with an equal variety of offices and endowments—the heart, arteries, and veins, being the organs of circulation—the muscles, those of motion and the glands, of secretion. The abdominal viscera are concerned with digestion, and the thoracic, with respiration-the sexual organs having charge of reproduction. To the brain and nerves are committed sensation, perception, volition, intellection, and emotion, and, especially, the supreme function of co-ordinating the actions of all the other organs of the complex structure thus providing for, and securing, that concert and unity of service of all the parts, manifold as are their combinations, that are needed for perfect organization.

To the aggregate of all these various organisms, there must be a limit of vital force- some certain point, or quantity, at which it reaches its ultimatum. It is, therefore, a consequence of such limitation, that upon an equal, or unequal, distribution of this determinate amount of vital power among the several organisms, will depend the respective efficiencies of each and all. The total vital force is capable of, and liable to, great inequality of distribution, not only in those diversions of energy from one set of organs, for concentration upon another, that we see to occur

on every change of occupation, but steadily and habitually, throughout the whole period of individual life. In some persons, the muscular system is far more occupied than is the mental. In others, the nutritive organs absorb much of that general vigor, which it had been their destination to support. In a smaller

number, the intellectual and moral powers are exerted to the injury of the nutritive and muscular systems; while in women, the reproductive system, in some one or other form, from puberty to old age, trenches largely upon the intellectual faculties.

[ocr errors]

All of these irregularities are found within the limits of what is called health-though frequently occurring in such extremes, as to place them beyond the meaning of that term, in its fullest sense. In disease, the predominance resulting from disturbance of the balance of the various functions, becomes much more marked exhibiting in greater force the diminution of power in one set of organs, resulting from excess of activity in others. A strong man, struck down with fever, has his nervous sensibility excited, and his circulation exaggerated-the secreting and muscular systems being simultaneously rendered nearly powerless. With every nerve tingling with excitement; with the brain in a state of delirium, and the blood-vessels in a state of rude commotion; the patient is prostrate with muscular debility — the action of the skin and viscera being nearly suspended, even where not wholly so.

Thus, both in health and in disease, the various offices of the living body may, and habitually do, undergo great modifications of their respective activities. It may be said, generally, that the vital force cannot be habitually concentrated upon any one part of the structure, except at the expense of the other portions. It is, however, almost universally true, that those functions which minister to the animal life, and those which serve for the continuance of the race, prompted, as they are, by instinctive forces, absorb the largest share of the system's strength, to the detriment of those other and higher faculties, which require education and discipline for their development in full and energetic proportion. In other words, the nutritive and sexual functions, as a rule, have, over the moral and intellectual ones, all the advantages resulting from the impulsiveness of propensities, as against the aspirations

of the rarer and nobler faculties, which depend upon culture for their strength.

While such antagonism of the various functions of the body is thus a general and natural result of the vital organization, it is curious to observe that a specially eminent relation of this kind obtains between the nervous and reproductive powers. Mere muscular drudgery does not appear to be, in any manner, unfavorable to fecundity-the slaves of our Southern plantations, and the ignorant peasantry of Ireland, being among the most prolific classes of the race. The absence of mental activity would seem, in both these cases, to afford the explanation. So, too, is it, with the robust pioneers of new countries-men, whose avocations involve a certain amount of labor of the brain, but not to such extent as to place the latter in balance with their physical functions. Being, indeed, chiefly employed in the service of these latter, it is, both in quality and amount, perfectly compatible with the lower offices of the body.

The well known chastity and infertility of the hunter tribes, instead of being exceptional, or inconsistent with the views above propounded, is, in point of fact, a striking evidence of their general truth. The adjustment which it affirms is clearly shown, whether the agencies at work to effect it are as clearly explicable or not. These men, like the beasts of prey, require a hundredfold larger territory for their support than is required by men and animals of pacific habits-the self-adjusting laws therein closely conforming to the requirements of the case. Their life is one of excessive toil, intermitted only in periods of exhausted energy or depressing want. Such social intercourse as their civil polity allows them, tends rather to repress than to cultivate the affections the tone of the governing sentiments being unfriendly to the sexual impulse, while the vigilance and alertness of mind required in the difficulties and hazards of the customary chase, as well as of the frequent conflicts with their neighbor savages, give, and that, too, necessarily, great additional force to those other causes which antagonise the function of reproduction.

The drudges of our imperfect civilization, on the contrary, employ their muscular strength under very little nervous excitement the action of their mental powers being at the lowest rate that is possible to rational creatures. The hunter, as we see, requires

« НазадПродовжити »