CONCLUSION.

Ir is deducible, from the foregoing sheets, that the continuation of the human species is the grand and sole effect of the principle of population; and that this principle is sufficiently strong to people all countries, up to the limits. of their capacity to yield the means of subsistence. The exertion of this power of increase is, however, so entirely regulated by external circumstances, that no certain rate of its operation can be assumed; and we, therefore, seem to be restricted, in a very considerable degree, to the investigation of particular facts and circumstances. These, indeed, will be found highly interesting, and will afford data of the utmost importance in political economy. The present state of the earth, and the very tardy increase of mankind, during the last 1800 years, tend to prove, that the general limit to the increase of population is very, very distant. No country has as yet been fully peopled;

and even those regions of the earth, which have the most teemed with human beings, have, at the period of their greatest populousness, yielded, or (which is the same thing) obtained surplus food either for exportation, or for home consumption in the support of idleness or unproductive labour. The want of the necessaries of life will constitute the actual limit to the increase of the numbers of mankind. This want has never naturally existed in an absolute and general sense. In all the countries which have fallen under our observation, in which uniform distress has existed from want of food, there has been the want of industry, or its misdirection, or the wrong appropriation of its produce. These evils have been caused by ignorance or by bad government; and we may rest assured, that in those countries in which complaints are now made concerning redundant population, one or more of these causes is in operation. Ignorance, however, is a remediable evil, and will be cured very simply by the diffusion of knowledge. But bad governments, whose gross ignorance blinds them to their true interest, cannot be so easily remedied. These, as of Spain and Turkey, which shut out information from their subjects, as well as from themselves, and which, by so. doing, occasion a redundant population, that is, a miserably oppressed people, must undergo

a thorough change ere the progress of improve

ment can commence.

While the produce of labour can be increased, the increase of labour cannot render that produce insufficient for the support of that labour; the augmentation of the cause cannot produce a diminution of the absolute effect. That the approximation to the complete peopling of any country is not a matter of rapid accomplishment, appears evident, from a consideration of the state of China, a country in which the combined influence of national policy and superstition has, for many ages, been directed to that object. In this country then, if in any, we ought to discover an excess of population. Instead of which, we have found, that the Chinese empire is still able to produce much more food, and, consequently, to support many more people.

Considerably near approaches to the natural limit of population might be made under a good government, though they are impossible under a bad one. Such approaches, so far from being injurious, would be very desirable; for, in every stage of improvement, through which society passes, an increased tendency is acquired, to keep within the limits of the actual means of subsistence. This is manifest, because whenever an improved government has given to its subjects a greater degree of foresight, in

dustry, and personal dignity, such has been the invariable result. The stream of population has widened and deepened its channels, but has never overflowed its banks, when suffered to proceed on its course, free from artificial obstructions. The higher men rank in the scale of intellect, the more refined are their notions; and the more multiplied their objects of comfort, the more reason they will have to avoid and the less temptation to contract improvident marriages, and the greater will be their moral worth of character.

The restless movements of children, and the active energy displayed by adults, equally prove, that a state of varied labour or exertion, bodily or mental; is the natural state of our race; while the anatomy of the human subject as clearly shews, that indolence in a child, and idleness in a man, are owing either to corporeal or intellectual disease, natural or acquired. As mankind are fitted and designed to labour, for the acquisition of their necessaries and conveniences, the all-wise Creator has furnished the raw material only; but that he has furnished to an extent far beyond ordinary comprehension. The increase and regulation of labour being placed in our own power, and the material for its employment and support being indefinitely great, it follows, that our main object of research is, to discover the