A probable cause of epidemics--Extracts from Mr Suessmilch's
tables--Periodical returns of sickly seasons to be expected in certain
cases--Proportion of births to burials for short periods in any country
an inadequate criterion of the real average increase of
population--Best criterion of a permanent increase of population--Great
frugality of living one of the causes of the famines of China and
Indostan--Evil tendency of one of the clauses in Mr Pitt's Poor
Bill--Only one proper way of encouraging population--Causes of the
Happiness of nations--Famine, the last and most dreadful mode by which
nature represses a redundant population--The three propositions
considered as established.
By great attention to cleanliness, the plague seems at length to be
completely expelled from London. But it is not improbable that among
the secondary causes that produce even sickly seasons and epidemics
ought to be ranked a crowded population and unwholesome and
insufficient food. I have been led to this remark, by looking over some
of the tables of Mr Suessmilch, which Dr Price has extracted in one of
his notes to the postscript on the controversy respecting the
population of England and Wales. They are considered as very correct,
and if such tables were general, they would throw great light on the
different ways by which population is repressed and prevented from
increasing beyond the means of subsistence in any country. I will
extract a part of the tables, with Dr Price's remarks.
IN THE KINGDOM OF PRUSSIA, AND DUKEDOM OF LITHUANIA
Proportion Proportion
Births Burials Marriages of Births to of Births to
Marriages Burials
10 Yrs to 1702 21,963 14,718 5,928 37 to 10 150 to 100
5 Yrs to 1716 21,602 11,984 4,968 37 to 10 180 to 100
5 Yrs to 1756 28,392 19,154 5,599 50 to 10 148 to 100
"N.B. In 1709 and 1710, a pestilence carried off 247,733 of the
inhabitants of this country, and in 1736 and 1737, epidemics prevailed,
which again checked its increase."
It may be remarked, that the greatest proportion of births to burials,
was in the five years after the great pestilence.
DUCHY OF POMERANIA
Proportion Proportion
Annual Average Births Burials Marriages of Births to of Births to
Marriages Burials
6 yrs to 1702 6,540 4,647 1,810 36 to 10 140 to 100
6 yrs to 1708 7,455 4,208 1,875 39 to 10 177 to 100
6 yrs to 1726 8,432 5,627 2,131 39 to 10 150 to 100
6 yrs to 1756 12,767 9,281 2,957 43 to 10 137 to 100
"In this instance the inhabitants appear to have been almost doubled in
fifty-six years, no very bad epidemics having once interrupted the
increase, but the three years immediately follow ing the last period
(to 1759) were so sickly that the births were sunk to 10,229 and the
burials raised to 15,068."
Is it not probable that in this case the number of inhabitants had
increased faster than the food and the accommodations necessary to
preserve them in health? The mass of the people would, upon this
supposition, be obliged to live harder, and a greater number would be
crowded together in one house, and it is not surely improbable that
these were among the natural causes that produced the three sickly
years. These causes may produce such an effect, though the country,
absolutely considered, may not be extremely crowded and populous. In a
country even thinly inhabited, if an increase of population take place,
before more food is raised, and more houses are built, the inhabitants
must be distressed in some degree for room and subsistence. Were the
marriages in England, for the next eight or ten years, to be more
prolifick than usual, or even were a greater number of marriages than
usual to take place, supposing the number of houses to remain the same,
instead of five or six to a cottage, there must be seven or eight, and
this, added to the necessity of harder living, would probably have a
very unfavourable effect on the health of the common people.
NEUMARK OF BRANDENBURGH
Proportion Proportion
Annual Average Births Burials Marriages of Births to of Births to
Marriages Burials
5 yrs to 1701 5,433 3,483 1,436 37 to 10 155 to 100
5 yrs to 1726 7,012 4,254 1,713 40 to 10 164 to 100
5 yrs to 1756 7,978 5,567 1,891 42 to 10 143 to 100
"Epidemics prevailed for six years, from 1736, to 1741, which checked
the increase."
DUKEDOM OF MAGDEBURGH
Proportion Proportion
Annual Average Births Burials Marriages of Births to of Births to
Marriages Burials
5 yrs to 1702 6,431 4,103 1,681 38 to 10 156 to 100
5 yrs to 1717 7,590 5,335 2,076 36 to 10 142 to 100
5 yrs to 1756 8,850 8,069 2,193 40 to 10 109 to 100
"The years 1738, 1740, 1750, and 1751, were particularly sickly."
For further information on this subject, I refer the reader to Mr
Suessmilch's tables. The extracts that I have made are sufficient to
shew the periodical, though irregular, returns of sickly seasons, and
it seems highly probable that a scantiness of room and food was one of
the principal causes that occasioned them.
It appears from the tables that these countries were increasing rather
fast for old states, notwithstanding the occasional seasons that
prevailed. Cultivation must have been improving, and marriages,
consequently, encouraged. For the checks to population appear to have
been rather of the positive, than of the preventive kind. When from a
prospect of increasing plenty in any country, the weight that represses
population is in some degree removed, it is highly probable that the
motion will be continued beyond the operation of the cause that first
impelled it. Or, to be more particular, when the increasing produce of
a country, and the increasing demand for labour, so far ameliorate the
condition of the labourer as greatly to encourage marriage, it is
probable that the custom of early marriages will continue till the
population of the country has gone beyond the increased produce, and
sickly seasons appear to be the natural and necessary consequence. I
should expect, therefore, that those countries where subsistence was
increasing sufficiency at times to encourage population but not to
answer all its demands, would be more subject to periodical epidemics
than those where the population could more completely accommodate
itself to the average produce.
An observation the converse of this will probably also be found true.
In those countries that are subject to periodical sicknesses, the
increase of population, or the excess of births above the burials, will
be greater in the intervals of these periods than is usual, caeteris
paribus, in the countries not so much subject to such disorders. If
Turkey and Egypt have been nearly stationary in their average
population for the last century, in the intervals of their periodical
plagues, the births must have exceeded the burials in a greater
proportion than in such countries as France and England.
The average proportion of births to burials in any country for a period
of five to ten years, will hence appear to be a very inadequate
criterion by which to judge of its real progress in population. This
proportion certainly shews the rate of increase during those five or
ten years; but we can by no means thence infer what had been the
increase for the twenty years before, or what would be the increase for
the twenty years after. Dr Price observes that Sweden, Norway, Russia,
and the kingdom of Naples, are increasing fast; but the extracts from
registers that he has given are not for periods of sufficient extent to
establish the fact. It is highly probable, however, that Sweden,
Norway, and Russia, are really increasing their population, though not
at the rate that the proportion of births to burials for the short
periods that Dr Price takes would seem to shew. (See Dr Price's
Observations, Vol. ii, postscript to the controversy on the population
of England and Wales.) For five years, ending in 1777, the proportion
of births to burials in the kingdom of Naples was 144 to 100, but there
is reason to suppose that this proportion would indicate an increase
much greater than would be really found to have taken place in that
kingdom during a period of a hundred years.
Dr Short compared the registers of many villages and market towns in
England for two periods; the first, from Queen Elizabeth to the middle
of the last century, and the second, from different years at the end of
the last century to the middle of the present. And from a comparison of
these extracts, it appears that in the former period the births
exceeded the burials in the proportion of 124 to 100, but in the
latter, only in the proportion of 111 to 100. Dr Price thinks that the
registers in the former period are not to be depended upon, but,
probably, in this instance they do not give incorrect proportions. At
least there are many reasons for expecting to find a greater excess of
births above the burials in the former period than in the latter. In
the natural progress of the population of any country, more good land
will, caeteris paribus, be taken into cultivation in the earlier stages
of it than in the later. (I say 'caeteris paribus', because the
increase of the produce of any country will always very greatly depend
on the spirit of industry that prevails, and the way in which it is
directed. The knowledge and habits of the people, and other temporary
causes, particularly the degree of civil liberty and equality existing
at the time, must always have great influence in exciting and directing
this spirit.) And a greater proportional yearly increase of produce
will almost invariably be followed by a greater proportional increase
of population. But, besides this great cause, which would naturally
give the excess of births above burials greater at the end of Queen
Elizabeth's reign than in the middle of the present century, I cannot
help thinking that the occasional ravages of the plague in the former
period must have had some tendency to increase this proportion. If an
average of ten years had been taken in the intervals of the returns of
this dreadful disorder, or if the years of plague had been rejected as
accidental, the registers would certainly give the proportion of births
to burials too high for the real average increase of the population.
For some few years after the great plague in 1666, it is probable that
there was a more than usual excess of births above burials,
particularly if Dr Price's opinion be founded, that England was more
populous at the revolution (which happened only twenty-two years
afterwards) than it is at present.
Mr King, in 1693, stated the proportion of the births to the burials
throughout the Kingdom, exclusive of London, as 115 to 100. Dr Short
makes it, in the middle of the present century, 111 to 100, including
London. The proportion in France for five years, ending in 1774, was
117 to 100. If these statements are near the truth; and if there are no
very great variations at particular periods in the proportions, it
would appear that the population of France and England has accommodated
itself very nearly to the average produce of each country. The
discouragements to marriage, the consequent vicious habits, war,
luxury, the silent though certain depopulation of large towns, and the
close habitations, and insufficient food of many of the poor, prevent
population from increasing beyond the means of subsistence; and, if I
may use an expression which certainly at first appears strange,
supercede the necessity of great and ravaging epidemics to repress what
is redundant. Were a wasting plague to sweep off two millions in
England, and six millions in France, there can be no doubt whatever
that, after the inhabitants had recovered from the dreadful shock, the
proportion of births to burials would be much above what it is in
either country at present.
In New Jersey, the proportion of births to deaths on an average of
seven years, ending in 1743, was as 300 to 100. In France and England,
taking the highest proportion, it is as 117 to 100. Great and
astonishing as this difference is, we ought not to be so wonder-struck
at it as to attribute it to the miraculous interposition of heaven. The
causes of it are not remote, latent and mysterious; but near us, round
about us, and open to the investigation of every inquiring mind. It
accords with the most liberal spirit of philosophy to suppose that not
a stone can fall, or a plant rise, without the immediate agency of
divine power. But we know from experience that these operations of what
we call nature have been conducted almost invariably according to fixed
laws. And since the world began, the causes of population and
depopulation have probably been as constant as any of the laws of
nature with which we are acquainted.
The passion between the sexes has appeared in every age to be so nearly
the same that it may always be considered, in algebraic language, as a
given quantity. The great law of necessity which prevents population
from increasing in any country beyond the food which it can either
produce or acquire, is a law so open to our view, so obvious and
evident to our understandings, and so completely confirmed by the
experience of every age, that we cannot for a moment doubt it. The
different modes which nature takes to prevent or repress a redundant
population do not appear, indeed, to us so certain and regular, but
though we cannot always predict the mode we may with certainty predict
the fact. If the proportion of births to deaths for a few years
indicate an increase of numbers much beyond the proportional increased
or acquired produce of the country, we may be perfectly certain that
unless an emigration takes place, the deaths will shortly exceed the
births; and that the increase that had taken place for a few years
cannot be the real average increase of the population of the country.
Were there no other depopulating causes, every country would, without
doubt, be subject to periodical pestilences or famine.
The only true criterion of a real and permanent increase in the
population of any country is the increase of the means of subsistence.
But even, this criterion is subject to some slight variations which
are, however, completely open to our view and observations. In some
countries population appears to have been forced, that is, the people
have been habituated by degrees to live almost upon the smallest
possible quantity of food. There must have been periods in such
counties when population increased permanently, without an increase in
the means of subsistence. China seems to answer to this description. If
the accounts we have of it are to be trusted, the lower classes of
people are in the habit of living almost upon the smallest possible
quantity of food and are glad to get any putrid offals that European
labourers would rather starve than eat. The law in China which permits
parents to expose their children has tended principally thus to force
the population. A nation in this state must necessarily be subject to
famines. Where a country is so populous in proportion to the means of
subsistence that the average produce of it is but barely sufficient to
support the lives of the inhabitants, any deficiency from the badness
of seasons must be fatal. It is probable that the very frugal manner in
which the Gentoos are in the habit of living contributes in some degree
to the famines of Indostan.
In America, where the reward of labour is at present so liberal, the
lower classes might retrench very considerably in a year of scarcity
without materially distressing themselves. A famine therefore seems to
be almost impossible. It may be expected that in the progress of the
population of America, the labourers will in time be much less
liberally rewarded. The numbers will in this case permanently increase
without a proportional increase in the means of subsistence.
In the different states of Europe there must be some variations in the
proportion between the number of inhabitants and the quantity of food
consumed, arising from the different habits of living that prevail in
each state. The labourers of the South of England are so accustomed to
eat fine wheaten bread that they will suffer themselves to be half
starved before they will submit to live like the Scotch peasants. They
might perhaps in time, by the constant operation of the hard law of
necessity, be reduced to live even like the Lower Chinese, and the
country would then, with the same quantity of food, support a greater
population. But to effect this must always be a most difficult, and,
every friend to humanity will hope, an abortive attempt. Nothing is so
common as to hear of encouragements that ought to be given to
population. If the tendency of mankind to increase be so great as I
have represented it to be, it may appear strange that this increase
does not come when it is thus repeatedly called for. The true reason is
that the demand for a greater population is made without preparing the
funds necessary to support it. Increase the demand for agricultural
labour by promoting cultivation, and with it consequently increase the
produce of the country, and ameliorate the condition of the labourer,
and no apprehensions whatever need be entertained of the proportional
increase of population. An attempt to effect this purpose in any other
way is vicious, cruel, and tyrannical, and in any state of tolerable
freedom cannot therefore succeed. It may appear to be the interest of
the rulers, and the rich of a state, to force population, and thereby
lower the price of labour, and consequently the expense of fleets and
armies, and the cost of manufactures for foreign sale; but every
attempt of the kind should be carefully watched and strenuously
resisted by the friends of the poor, particularly when it comes under
the deceitful garb of benevolence, and is likely, on that account, to
be cheerfully and cordially received by the common people.
I entirely acquit Mr Pitt of any sinister intention in that clause of
his Poor Bill which allows a shilling a week to every labourer for each
child he has above three. I confess, that before the bill was brought
into Parliament, and for some time after, I thought that such a
regulation would be highly beneficial, but further reflection on the
subject has convinced me that if its object be to better the condition
of the poor, it is calculated to defeat the very purpose which it has
in view. It has no tendency that I can discover to increase the produce
of the country, and if it tend to increase the population, without
increasing the produce, the necessary and inevitable consequence
appears to be that the same produce must be divided among a greater
number, and consequently that a day's labour will purchase a smaller
quantity of provisions, and the poor therefore in general must be more
distressed.
I have mentioned some cases where population may permanently increase
without a proportional increase in the means of subsistence. But it is
evident that the variation in different states, between the food and
the numbers supported by it, is restricted to a limit beyond which it
cannot pass. In every country, the population of which is not
absolutely decreasing, the food must be necessarily sufficient to
support, and to continue, the race of labourers.
Other circumstances being the same, it may be affirmed that countries
are populous according to the quantity of human food which they
produce, and happy according to the liberality with which that food is
divided, or the quantity which a day's labour will purchase. Corn
countries are more populous than pasture countries, and rice countries
more populous than corn countries. The lands in England are not suited
to rice, but they would all bear potatoes; and Dr Adam Smith observes
that if potatoes were to become the favourite vegetable food of the
common people, and if the same quantity of land was employed in their
culture as is now employed in the culture of corn, the country would be
able to support a much greater population, and would consequently in a
very short time have it.
The happiness of a country does not depend, absolutely, upon its
poverty or its riches, upon its youth or its age, upon its being thinly
or fully inhabited, but upon the rapidity with which it is increasing,
upon the degree in which the yearly increase of food approaches to the
yearly increase of an unrestricted population. This approximation is
always the nearest in new colonies, where the knowledge and industry of
an old state operate on the fertile unappropriated land of a new one.
In other cases, the youth or the age of a state is not in this respect
of very great importance. It is probable that the food of Great Britain
is divided in as great plenty to the inhabitants, at the present
period, as it was two thousand, three thousand, or four thousand years
ago. And there is reason to believe that the poor and thinly inhabited
tracts of the Scotch Highlands are as much distressed by an overcharged
population as the rich and populous province of Flanders.
Were a country never to be overrun by a people more advanced in arts,
but left to its own natural progress in civilization; from the time
that its produce might be considered as an unit, to the time that it
might be considered as a million, during the lapse of many hundred
years, there would not be a single period when the mass of the people
could be said to be free from distress, either directly or indirectly,
for want of food. In every state in Europe, since we have first had
accounts of it, millions and millions of human existences have been
repressed from this simple cause; though perhaps in some of these
states an absolute famine has never been known.
Famine seems to be the last, the most dreadful resource of nature. The
power of population is so superior to the power in the earth to produce
subsistence for man, that premature death must in some shape or other
visit the human race. The vices of mankind are active and able
ministers of depopulation. They are the precursors in the great army of
destruction; and often finish the dreadful work themselves. But should
they fail in this war of extermination, sickly seasons, epidemics,
pestilence, and plague, advance in terrific array, and sweep off their
thousands and ten thousands. Should success be still incomplete,
gigantic inevitable famine stalks in the rear, and with one mighty blow
levels the population with the food of the world.
Must it not then be acknowledged by an attentive examiner of the
histories of mankind, that in every age and in every state in which man
has existed, or does now exist.
That the increase of population is necessarily limited by the means of
subsistence.
That population does invariably increase when the means of subsistence
increase. And that the superior power of population it repressed, and
the actual population kept equal to the means of subsistence, by misery
and vice?