(2.ii.23) We may conclude, therefore, that, in the most favourable circumstances, ten birthsare the measure of fecundity in the female of the human species; and that of the children born asmall proportion would die before the age of maturity. For occasional instances of barrenness,and for this small degree of mortality, let us make much more than the necessary allowance, adeduction of one-half; and say, That every human pair, united at an early age, commanding a fullsupply of things necessary for physical welfare, exempt from the necessity of oppressive labour,and sufficiently skilled to make the best use of their circumstances for preventing disease andmortality among themselves and their children, would, one with another, rear five children. Ifthis is the case, it is needless to exhibit an accurate calculation, to show that population woulddouble itself in some moderate portion of years. It is evident, at once, that it would double itselfin a small number of years.
(2.ii.24) To meet a conclusion so well established as this, recourse has been had to certaintables, respecting population, and respecting births and deaths, in various countries. The reasoning fromthese tables evades the point in dispute. I know no tables which exhibit any thing, even if wegive them, what they never deserve, credit for exactness, except the mere fact with regard to thestate of increase. They show, or pretend to show, whether a certain population is increasing ornot increasing; and, if increasing, at what rate. But, if it appeared, from such tables, that thepopulation of every country in the world were stationary, no man, capable of reasoning, wouldinfer, that the human race is incapable of increasing. Every body knows the fact, that in thegreater number of countries, the population is stationary, or nearly so. But what does this prove,so long as we are not informed, by what causes it is prevented from increasing? We know well,that there are two causes, by which it may be prevented from increasing, how great soever itsnatural tendency to increase. The one is poverty; under which, let the number born be what itmay, all but a certain number undergo a premature destruction. The other is prudence; by whicheither marriages are sparingly contracted, or care is taken that children, beyond a certainnumber, shall not be the fruit. It is useless to inform us, that there is little or no increase ofpopulation in certain countries, if we receive not, at the same time, accurate information of thedegree in which poverty, or prudence, or other causes, operate to prevent it.
(2.ii.25) That population, therefore, has such a tendency to increase as would enable it todouble itself in a small number of years, is a proposition resting on the strongest evidence, whichnothing worth the name of evidence has been brought to controvert.
3. Proof that capital has a less tendency than Population toincrease rapidly (2.ii.26) We come next to consider the tendency which capital may have to increase. If thatshould increase as fast as population, along with every labourer produced, the means ofemployment and subsistence would also be produced; and no degradation of the great body ofthe people would be the consequence.
(2.ii.27) Though it is found, where property is secure, that there is a considerable dispositionin mankind to save; sufficient, where vast consumption is not made by the government, and wherethe difficulties of production are not very great, to make capital progressive; this disposition isstill so weak, in almost all the situations in which human beings have ever been placed, as tomake the increase of capital slow.
(2.ii.28) The annual produce is always distributed in such a manner, that, either the greatbody of the people are liberally provided with what is necessary for subsistence and enjoyment, when ofcourse a smaller portion goes to swell the incomes of the rich; or, the great body of the peopleare reduced to mere necessaries, when there is naturally a class of people whose incomes arelarge. To one or other of these two cases the state of every community approximates.
(2.ii.29) 1. In the case, in which there is a class reduced to necessaries, and a class of rich, itis evident that the first have not the means of saving. A class of rich men, in the middle of a classof poor, are not apt to save. The possession of a large fortune generally whets the appetite forimmediate enjoyment. And the man who is already in possession of a fortune, yielding him allthe enjoyments which fortune can command, has little inducement to save. In such a state of thesocial order, any rapid increase of capital is opposed by causes which are in general irresistible.
(2.ii.30) 2. We are next to consider the state of the social order, in which a large share of theannual produce is distributed among the great body of the people. In that situation, neither theclass which labours, nor that which is maintained without labouring, has any forcible motives tosave.
(2.ii.31) When a man possesses, what we are now supposing possessed by the great body ofthe people, food, clothing, lodging, and all other things sufficient not only for comfortable, butpleasurable existence, he possesses the means of all the substantial enjoyments of human life.
