great enigma act more rationally and more decorously than Mr. Sadler, who tells us, with the utmost confidence, which are the means and which the ends, which the exceptions and which the rules, in the government of the universe--who consents to bear a little evil without denying the divine benevolence, but distinctly announces that a certain quantity of dry weather or stormy weather would force him to regard the Deity as the tyrant of his crea tures. The great discovery by which Mr. Sadler has, as he conceives, vindicated the ways of Providence is enounced with all the pomp of capital letters. We must particularly beg that our readers will peruse it with attention. "No one fact relative to the human species is more clearly ascertained, whether by general observation or actual proof, than that their fecundity varies in different commueffects this variation, without the necessity of those cruel and unnatural expedients so frequently adverted to, constitutes what I presume to call THE LAW OF POPULATION; and that law may be thus briefly enunciated: nities and countries. The principle which "THE PROLIFICNESS OF HUMAN BEINGS, OTHERWISE SIMILARLY CIRCUMSTANCED, VARIES INVERSELY AS THEIR NUMBERS. It appears, however, that it is not to the use of mathematical words, but only to the use of those words in their right senses that Mr. Sadler objects. The law of inverse variation, or inverse proportion, is as much a part of mathematical science as the law of geometric progression. The only difference in this respect between Mr. Malthus and Mr. Sadler is, that Mr. Malthus knows what is meant by geometric progression, and that Mr. Sadler has not the faintest notion of what is meant by inverse variation. Had he understood the proposition which he has enounced with so much pomp, its ludicrous absurdity must at once have flashed on his mind. Let it be supposed that there is a tract in the back settlements of Ame rica, or in New South Wales, equal in size to London, with only a single couple, a man and his wife, living upon it. The population of London, with its immediate suburbs, is now probably about a million and a half. The average fecundity of a marriage in London is, as Mr. Sadler tells us, 2.35. How many children will the woman in the back settlements bear "The preceding definition may be thus according to Mr. Sadler's theory? The amplified and explained. Premising, as a solution of the problem is easy. As mere truism, that marriages under precisely the population in this tract in the back similar circumstances will, on the average, be equally fruitful everywhere, I proceed to settlements is to the population of state, first, that the prolificness of a given London, so will be the number of chilnumber of marriages will, all other circum-dren born from a marriage in London stances being the same, vary in proportion to the condensation of the population, so that to the number of children born from that prolificness shall be greatest where the the marriage of this couple in the back numbers on an equal space are the fewest, settlements. That is to sayand, on the contrary, the smallest where those numbers are the largest." Mr. Sadler, at setting out, abuses Mr. Malthus for enouncing his theory in terms taken from the exact sciences. Applied to the mensuration of human fecundity," he tells us, "the most fallacious of all things is geometrical demonstration ;" and he again informs us that those "act an irrational and irreverent part who affect to measure the mighty depth of God's mercies by their arithmetic, and to demonstrate, by their geometrical ratios, that it is inadequate to receive and contain the efflux of that fountain of life which is in Him." 2: 1,500,000 :: 2·35: 1,762,500. The lady will have 1,762,500 children: a large "efflux of the fountain of life," to borrow Mr. Sadler's sonorous rhetoric, as the most philoprogenitive parent could possibly desire. But let us, instead of putting cases of our own, look at some of those which Mr. Sadler has brought forward in support of his theory. The following table, he tells us, exhibits a striking proof of the truth of his main position. It seems to us to prove only that Mr. Sadler does not know what inverse proportion means. Is 1 to 160 as 3.66 to 548? If Mr. | which Mr. Sadler generally takes is a Sadler's principle were just, the num- square mile. The population at the ber of children produced by a marriage Cape of Good Hope is, according to at the Cape would be, not 5:48, but very near 600. Or take America and France. Is 4 to 140 as 4.22 to 5.22? The number of births to a marriage in North America ought, according to this proportion, to be about 150. Mr. Sadler states the law of population in England thus: "Where the inhabitants are found to be on the square mile, From 50 to 100 (2 counties) the births to 66 100 marriages are 100 to 150 (9 counties) 150 to 200 (16 counties) 200 to 250 (4 counties) 250 to 300 (5 counties) 300 to 350 (3 counties) 500 to 600 (2 counties) 4000 and upwards (1 county) 396 378 353 him, one to the square mile. That of London is two hundred thousand to the square mile. The number of children at the Cape, Mr. Sadler informs us, is 5'48 to a marriage. In London, he states it at 2:35 to a marriage. Now how can that of which all the variations lie between 2.35 and 5.48 vary, either directly or inversely, as that which admits of all the variations between one and two 420 hundred thousand? Mr. Sadler evi390 dently does not know the meaning of 388 the word proportion. A million is a larger quantity than ten. A hundred 331 is a larger quantity than five. Mr. 246 Sadler thinks, therefore, that there is dred is to five as a million is to ten, or no impropriety in saying that a hunin the inverse ratio of ten to a million. He proposes to prove that the fecundity of marriages varies in inverse proportion to the density of the population. But all that he attempts to prove is that, while the population increases from one to a hundred and sixty on the square mile, the fecundity will diminish from 5:48 to 3.66; and that again, while the population increases from one hundred and sixty to two hundred thousand on the square mile, the fecundity will diminish from 3.66 to 2:35. Now, I think it quite reasonable to conclude, that, were there not another document in existence relative to this subject, the facts thus deduced from the census of England are fully sufficient to demonstrate the position, that the fecundity of human beings varies inversely as their numbers. How, I ask, can it be evaded?" What, we ask, is there to evade? Is 246 to 420 as 50 to 4000? Is 331 to 396 as 100 to 500? If the law propounded by Mr. Sadler were correct, the births to a hundred marriages in the least populous part of England, would be 246 x 4000 that is 19,680, 50 -nearly two hundred children to every mother. But we will not carry on these calculations. The absurdity of Mr. Sadler's proposition is so palpable that it is unnecessary to select particular instances. Let us see what are the extremes of population and fecundity in well-known countries. The space The proposition which Mr. Sadler enounces, without understanding the words which he uses, would indeed, if it could be proved, set us at ease as to the dangers of over-population. But it is, as we have shown, a proposition so grossly absurd that it is difficult for any man to keep his countenance while he repeats it. The utmost that Mr. Now, if the population of a place in Sadler has ever attempted to prove is which the fecundity is less and the this, that the fecundity of the human mortality greater than in other places race diminishes as population becomes still goes on increasing by propagation, more condensed,-but that the diminu- it follows that in other places the potion of fecundity bears a very small pulation will increase, and increase still ratio to the increase of population, faster. There is clearly nothing in Mr. so that, while the population on a Sadler's boasted law of fecundity which square mile is multiplied two hundred-will keep the population from multithousand-fold, the fecundity decreases by little more than one half. Does this principle vindicate the honour of God? Does it hold out any new hope or comfort to man? Not at all. We pledge ourselves to show, with the utmost strictness of reasoning, from Mr. Sadler's own principles, and from facts of the most notorious description, that every consequence which follows from the law of geometrical progression, laid down by Mr. Malthus, will follow from the law, miscalled a law of inverse variation, which has been laid down by Mr. Sadler. London is the most thickly peopled spot of its size in the known world. Therefore the fecundity of the population of London must, according to Mr. Sadler, be less than the fecundity of human beings living on any other spot of equal size. Mr. Sadler tells us, that the ratios of mortality are influenced by the different degrees in which the population is condensated; and that, other circumstances being similar, the relative number of deaths in a thinlypopulated, or country district, is less than that which takes place in towns, and in towns of a moderate size less again than that which exists in large and populous cities." Therefore the mortality in London must, according to him, be greater than in other places. But, though, according to Mr. Sadler, the fecundity is less in London than elsewhere, and though the mortality is greater there than elsewhere, we find that even in London the number of births greatly exceeds the number of deaths. During the ten years which ended with 1820, there were fifty thousand more baptisms than burials within the bills of mortality. It follows, therefore, that, even within London itself, an increase of the population is taking place by internal propagation. plying till the whole earth is as thick with human beings as St. Giles's parish. If Mr. Sadler denies this, he must hold that, in places less thickly peopled than London, marriages may be less fruitful than in London, which is directly contrary to his own principles; or that in places less thickly peopled than London, and similarly situated, people will die faster than in London, which is again directly contrary to his own principles. Now, if it follows, as it clearly does follow, from Mr. Sadler's own doctrines, that the human race might be stowed together by three or four hundred to the acre, and might still, as far as the principle of propagation is concerned, go on increasing, what advantage, in a religious or moral point of view, has his theory over that of Mr. Malthus? The principle of Mr. Malthus, says Mr. Sadler, leads to consequences of the most frightful description. Be it so. But do not all these consequences spring equally from his own principle? Revealed religion condemns Mr. Malthus. Be it so. But Mr. Sadler must share in the reproach of heresy. The theory of Mr. Malthus represents the Deity as a Dionysius hanging the sword over the heads of his trembling slaves. Be it so. But under what rhetorical figure are we to represent the Deity of Mr. Sadler? A man who wishes to serve the cause of religion ought to hesitate long before he stakes the truth of religion on the event of a controversy respecting facts in the physical world. For a time he may succeed in making a theory which he dislikes unpopular by persuading the public that it contradicts the Scriptures and is inconsistent with the attributes of the Deity. But, if at last an overwhelming force of evidence proves this maligned theory to be true, what is the effect of the arguments by which the objector has attempted to prove In every age the Church has been cautioned against this fatal and impious rashness by its most illustrious members, by the fervid Augustin, by the subtle Aquinas, by the all-accomplished Pascal. The warning has been given in vain. That close alliance which, under the disguise of the most deadly enmity, has always subsisted between fanaticism and atheism is still unbroken. At one time, the cry was,"If you hold that the earth moves round the sun, you deny the truth of the Bible." Popes, conclaves, and religious orders, rose up against the Copernican heresy. But, as Pascal said, they could not prevent the earth from moving, or themselves from moving along with it. One thing, however, they could do, and they did. They could teach numbers to consider the Bible as a collection of old women's stories which the progress of civilization and knowledge was refuting one by one. They had attempted to show that the Ptolemaic system was as much a part of Christianity as the resurrection of the dead. Was it strange, then, that, when the Ptolemaic system became an object of ridicule to every man of education in Catholic countries, the doctrine of the resurrection should be in peril? In the present generation, and in our own country, the prevailing system of geology has been, with equal folly, attacked on the ground that it is inconsistent with the Mosaic dates. And here we have Mr. Sadler, out of his especial zeal for religion, first proving that the doctrine of superfecundity is irreconcilable with the goodness of God, and then laying down principles, and stating facts, from which the doctrine of superfecundity necessarily follows. This blundering piety reminds us of the adventures of a certain missionary who went to convert the in 66 habitants of Madagascar. The good father had an audience of the king, and began to instruct his majesty in the history of the human race as given in the Scriptures. "Thus, sir," said he, was woman made out of the rib of man, and ever since that time a woman has had one rib more than a man." “Surely, father, you must be mistaken there," said the king. "Mistaken!" said the missionary. "It is an indisputable fact. My faith upon it! My life upon it!" The good man had heard the fact asserted by his nurse when he was a child,—had always considered it as a strong confirmation of the Scriptures, and fully believed it without having ever thought of verifying it. The king ordered a man and woman, the leanest that could be found, to be brought before him, and desired his spiritual instructor to count their ribs. The father counted over and over, upward and downward, and still found the same number in both. He then cleared his throat, stammered, stuttered, and began to assure the king that, though he had committed a little error in saying that a woman had more ribs than a man, he was quite right in saying that the first woman was made out of the rib of the first man. "How can I tell that?" said the king. "You come to me with a strange story which you say is revealed to you from heaven. I have already made you confess that one half of it is a lie and how can you have the face to expect that I shall believe the other half?" We have shown that Mr. Sadler's theory, if it be true, is as much a theory of superfecundity as that of Mr. Malthus. But it is not true. And from Mr. Sadler's own tables we will prove that it is not true. The fecundity of the human race in England Mr. Sadler rates as follows:"Where the inhabitants are found to be on the square mile From 50 to 100 (2 counties) the births to 100 marriages are 420 396 390 388 378 353 351 246 500 to 600 (2 counties) 4000 and upwards (1 county) Having given this table, he begins, as usual, to boast and triumph. "Were in the right sense of the words inverse there not another document on the sub- variation. But certainly they would, ject in existence," says he, "the facts"if there were no other document in thus deduced from the census of Eng- existence," appear to indicate someland are sufficient to demonstrate the thing like what Mr. Sadler means by position, that the fecundity of human be- inverse variation. Unhappily for him, ings varies inversely as their numbers." however, there are other documents in In no case would these facts demon-existence; and he has himselffurnished strate that the fecundity of human be- us with them. We will extract another ings varies inversely as their numbers of his tables : : Showing the Operation of the Law of Population in the different Hundreds of the County of Lancaster. Then comes the shout of exultation as regularly as the Gloria Patri at the end of a Psalm. "Is there any possibility of gainsaying the conclusions these facts force upon us; namely that the fecundity of marriages is regulated by the density of the population, and inversely to it?" Certainly these tables, taken separately, look well for Mr. Sadler's theory. He must be a bungling gamester who cannot win when he is suffered to pack the cards his own way. We must beg leave to shuffle them a little; and we In the table which we have quoted, numbered lxiv., he tells us that in Almondness, where the population is 267 to the square mile, there are 415 births to 100 marriages. The population of Almondness is twice as thick as the population of the nine counties referred to in the other table. the number of births to a marriage is greater in Almondness than in those counties. Yet Once more, he tells us that in three counties, in which the population was from 300 to 350 on the square mile, the births to 100 marriages were 353. He afterwards rates them at 375. Again |