An Essay on the Principle of Population: Or, A View of Its Past and Present Effects on Human Happiness; with an Inquiry Into Our Prospects Respecting the Future Removal Or Mitigation of the Evils which it Occasions, Volume 2J. Murray, 1817 - 507 pages |
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Common terms and phrases
Adam Smith age of marriage agricultural annual appear average bank of England births and deaths births to deaths births to marriages bounty burials calculated capital causes CHAP circumstances commodities compared consequently considerable coun crease crowded houses cultivation degree diminished distress effect emigration England estimate Europe excess of births foreign France greater number human improvement increase of population industry inhabitants labouring classes land live to marry lower classes manufactures means of subsistence mortality nation natural nearly necessary neral number of births observed occasioned parish particular period of doubling plague poor poor-laws popu portion present price of corn price of labour price of provisions probable profits progress proportion of births proportion of marriages pulation quantity raw produce reason registers riages rience Russia scarcity shew shillings society supply supposed Sussmilch system of equality take place tion tivation towns tural wages of labour whole population
Popular passages
Page 333 - ... a convenient stock of flax, hemp, wool, thread, iron, and other necessary ware and stuff to set the poor on work, and also competent sums of money for and towards the necessary relief of the lame, impotent, old, blind, and such other among them being poor and not able to work, and...
Page 329 - Even when they have an opportunity of saving, they seldom exercise it ; but all that they earn beyond their present necessities goes, generally speaking, to the ale-house. The poor-laws may therefore be said to diminish both the power and the will to save among the common people; and thus to weaken one of the strongest incentives to sobriety and industry, and consequently to happiness.
Page 333 - ... for setting to work all such persons, married or unmarried, having no means to maintain them, and use no ordinary and daily trade of life to get their living by...
Page 239 - It is a perfectly just observation of Mr. Godwin, that, "There is a principle in human society, by which population is perpetually kept down to the level of the means of subsistence.
Page 37 - A man of liberal education, but with an income only just sufficient to enable him to associate in the rank of gentlemen...
Page 245 - The irremediableness of marriage, as it is at present constituted, undoubtedly deters many from entering into this state. An unshackled intercourse on the contrary would be a most powerful incitement to early attachments; and as we are supposing no anxiety about the future support of children to exist, I do not conceive that there would be one -woman in a hundred, of twenty-three years of age, without a family.
Page 242 - Man cannot live in the midst of plenty. All cannot share alike the bounties of nature. Were there no established administration of property, every man would be obliged to guard with force his little store.
Page 241 - No man would be an enemy to his neighbour, for they would have no subject of contention; and, of consequence, philanthropy would resume the empire which reason assigns her. Mind would be delivered from her perpetual anxiety about corporal support, and free to expatiate in the field of thought, which is congenial to her. Each would assist the enquiries of alL^ This would) indeed, be a happy state.
Page 244 - The labours of luxury are at end. And the necessary labours of agriculture are shared amicably among all. The number of persons, and the produce of the island, we suppose to be the same as at present. The spirit of benevolence, guided by impartial justice, will divide this produce among all the members of the society according to their wants.
Page 330 - A man who might not be deterred from going to the ale-house from the consideration that on his death, or sickness, he should leave his wife and family upon the parish might yet hesitate in thus dissipating his earnings if he were assured that, in either of these cases, his family must starve or be left to the support of casual bounty.