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ment of a liberal and enlarged system of commercial policy, Were we gradually to recur to the sound principle of free trade, and to renounce every attempt to foster and encourage one branch of industry more than another, the chances of injudicious production would be very greatly diminished, and, when it did occur, it would be much sooner rectified. Hitherto, when too much capital has been attracted to one branch of industry, instead of leaving it to find out other channels of investment for itself, Government has generally interfered to prevent the restoration of that natural equilibrium between the price and cost of production which the ardour of speculation may sometimes derange; but which the self-interest of those concerned will, when let alone, infallibly restore. It is to this interference on the part of Government, that nine-tenths of the gluts which now occur may be traced. The restrictive and prohibitive system has wrenched society out of its natural position. It has placed every thing on an insecure basis. Our corn laws, for example, by raising the average price of corn in Great Britain to nearly double its price in every other country, prevents all exportation in a year of unusual plenty until the price has sunk 40 or 50 per cent. below the cost of production, or until the agriculturists have been involved in the extreme of misery and ruin. Such is universally the case. Every artificial stimulus, whatever may be its momentary effect on the department of industry to which it is applied, is immediately disadvantageous to others, and ultimately ruinous to that

which it was intended to promote. No arbitrary regulation, no act of the Legislature, can add any thing to the capital of the country; it can only force it into artificial channels. Besides, after a sufficiency of capital has flowed into these channels, a reaction must commence. There can be no foreign vent for their surplus produce; and whenever any change of fashion, or fluctuation in the taste of the consumers occasions a falling off in the demand, the warehouses are sure to be filled with commodities which, in a state of freedom, would not have been produced. The ignorant and the interested always ascribe such gluts to an excess of productive power. The truth is, however, that they conclusively indicate its diminution; and that they are the necessary and inevitable result of the application of those poisonous nostrums by which the natural and healthy state of the public economy is vitiated and deranged.

* M. Say was the first who showed, in a satisfactory manner, that effective demand depends upon production (see his chapter de Debouchès ;) and that gluts are the result of the misap plication, and not of the increase, of productive power. The same important principle was soon after developed by Mr Mill; who has illustrated it with his accustomed talent, both in his admirable tract entitled, Commerce Defended, (p. 80.) and in his Elements, (p. 222.)

But, although the establishment of this principle is wholly due to the distinguished authors just mentioned, it had been noticed by Dean Tucker, in a pamphlet published in 1752, (Queries on the Naturalization Bill, p. 13;) and is very clear

SECTION V.

Population always proportioned to the means of SubsistenceCapacity of the principle of Population to repair the ravages of Plagues and Famines-Comparative increase of Capital and Population.

THE circumstances most favourable for the production of wealth being thus traced and exhibited, we shall now shortly investigate those that determine the increase and diminution of man himself.

From the remotest antiquity down to our own times, it had been the uniform policy of legislators to give an artificial stimulus to population, by encouraging early marriages, and bestowing rewards on those who had reared the greatest number of children. But the researches of Mr Malthus, who, though not the original discoverer of the principle of population, was certainly the first to establish it on a secure foundation, have shown the mischievous nature

ly stated in a Tract published in 1795-" Demand," says the writer," is at all times regulated by production, which it never can exceed, and which it must always accompany.While there is production there must be demand, nor is it possible to conceive the one without the other. Το suppose that there may be a production of commodities without a demand -provided these commodities be of the right species, and no individual can have any interest in producing any other-is as absurd as to suppose, that the revenues of the several individuals composing the society may be too great for their consumption. Sketch of the Advance and Decline of Nations, p. 82.

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of all such interference. They have shown, that every increase in the numbers of the people, occasioned by artificial expedients, and which is not either preceded or accompanied by a corresponding increase in the means of subsistence, can be productive only of misery, or of increased mortality;—that the difficulty never is to bring human beings into the world, but to feed, clothe, and educate them when there ;-that mankind do every where increase their numbers, till their multiplication is restrained by the difficulty of providing subsistence, and the consequent poverty of some part of the society;-and that, consequently, instead of attempting to strenghen the principle of increase, we should invariably endeavour to control and regulate it.

If the extraordinary pains most governments have taken to encourage the increase of population had not been positively pernicious, it is pretty evident they were at any rate quite uncalled for and unnecessary. Man does not require any adventitious inducement to stimulate him to enter into the matrimonial state. Wherever two persons have the means of subsisting, a marriage invariably takes place. "The demand for men," says Dr Smith, "like that for any other commodity, necessarily regulates the production of men; quickens it when it goes on too slowly; and stops it when it advances too fast. It is this demand which regulates and determines the state of population in all the different countries of the world-in North America, in Europe, and in China; which renders it rapidly pro

gressive in the first, slow and gradual in the second, and altogether stationary in the last." The widest and most comprehensive experience confirms the truth of this remark. Those who inquire into the past and present state of the world, will find, that the population of all countries has been invariably proportioned to their means of subsistence. Whenever these means have been increased, population has also been increased, or been better provided for; and when they have been diminished, the population has been worse provided for, or has sustained an actual diminution of numbers, or both effects have followed.

But the principle of increase in the human race is so powerful as not only to keep the population of the most favoured countries, and where industry is most productive, up to the means of subsistence, but to give it a strong tendency to exceed them. Not a few of the inhabitants of those countries that are making the most rapid advances in the accumulation of wealth, have to maintain a constant struggle with poverty, and are but insufficiently supplied with the articles necessary to provide for the wants of a numerous family. Subsistence is the grand desideratum. If it be supplied in sufficient abundance, population may safely be left to take care of itself. So far from there being the least risk of its falling below the means of subsistence, the danger is all on the other side. There are no limits to the prolific power of

* I. p. 22.

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