Life and Writings of Thomas R. Malthus

by Charles R. Drysdale

In his third chapter our author reviews the population checks in the lowest stage of human society; and shows how impossible it is for such unfortunate peoples as the natives of the Tierra del Fuego, or of Van Diemen’s Land, to increase rapidly in numbers, owing to their extreme ignorance of the laws of nature. In New Zealand, Captain Cook found the checks to population to be war, and starvation so great as to prompt to cannibalism, in a country where, as it is at present colonized by a civilized people, the deaths seem not to exceed fifteen per 1,000 annually, and population doubles in about twenty years or less, without counting immigrants.

In Mr. Malthus’ day, there still existed large numbers of those unfortunate races of American Indians, which are now so rapidly disappearing in the modern “struggle for existence” with civilised Europeans. Then, as now, these tribes lived principally by hunting and fishing, most narrow modes of subsistence. The mortality of infants among such tribes was always enormous, and the Jesuit missionaries mentioned how that the Indians of South America were subject to perpetual diseases for which they knew no remedy; scarcely ever did the individuals of such tribes attain to an advanced age; and the checks to population among them were chiefly of the positive kind—plagues, starvation, brutal wars, and disease. The North American Indians, too, lived in such a state of filth and over-crowding in their huts, that every infectious disease carried off vast numbers. Cannibalism, according to Captain Cook, as seen in New Zealand and other islands, originated in the fearful privations experienced by such peoples when their numbers were pressing on the food supplies.

And here let us quote Malthus’ own words,—“It is not that the American tribes have never increased sufficiently to render the pastoral or agricultural state necessary to them; but, from some cause or other, they have not adopted in any great degree these more plentiful modes of procuring subsistence, and therefore cannot have increased so as to become populous. If hunger alone could have prompted the savage tribes of America to such a change in their habits, I do not conceive that there would have been a single nation of hunters and fishers remaining; but, it is evident, that some fortunate train of circumstances, in addition to this stimulus, is necessary for the purpose.”

In chapter v., our author gives a curious account of how population was checked in the islands of the South Seas. It is among such islands as these (and, indeed, the British islands in ancient times resembled them greatly), that we trace the origin of many of the singular institutions destined to retard the rapid increase of mankind—cannibalism, late marriages, the consecration of virginity, and ferocious punishments against such women as reproduce the species at too early an age. Captain Cook found such a constant state of warfare existing among the various tribes in New Zealand, that each village in its turn applied to him to assist them in destroying the others. In his third voyage he adds that warlike ferocity is so constant “that one hardly ever finds a New Zealander off his guard, either by night or day.”

In Otaheite and the Society Islands, again, where the size of the islands was too small, and the knowledge of navigation acquired by the islanders too scanty to make it possible for population to increase rapidly, all sorts of sufferings were seen among the poorer classes of the people; the richer classes, however, seemed, according to Captain Cook, to check their own increase by having recourse to the fearful practice of infanticide, to an enormous and unparalleled extent. Even with these checks, however, population, in the South Sea Islands, occasionally pressed so hard on subsistence that animal food became very scarce in certain seasons, and such destructive wars ensued that Captain Vancouver, on visiting Otaheite, in 1777, and again in 1791, found that most of his friends of 1777 were dead, having been killed in the wars. Prostitution, and destruction of female infants, were extremely common in Otaheite in Captain Cook’s time.

In taking a general review of that department of human society, classed under the name of savage life, the only advantage Malthus notices is the possession of a greater degree of leisure by the mass of the people, than that possessed by those of civilised countries. “There is less work to be done, and, consequently, there is less labour. When we consider the incessant toil to which the lower classes, in civilised societies, are condemned, this cannot but appear to us a striking advantage; but it is probably overbalanced by greater disadvantages.”

This remark of Mr. Malthus shows us, to a certain extent, on what J. J. Rousseau founded his belief as to the superior happiness of the state of nature over the civilised. Had Rousseau read the Essay on Population, he could not, we believe, have failed to perceive that the evils of civilisation are almost solely due to the universal want of knowledge of the Population Law. The late marriages, and prostitution, so bitterly inveighed against by that author, are merely the sorrowful population checks of most modern civilised nations, that have passed into the pastoral and agricultural stages of society, and have not yet proceeded far enough to control the enormous fecundity of the race by less painful and more thoughtful expedients than those which Jean Jacques Rousseau so clearly perceived and so powerfully denounced in the French society of the reign of Louis XV.

After speaking of the positive checks to population which have been so universal among savage nations, Mr. Malthus proceeds in chapter vi. to treat of the checks which prevented increase among the ancient inhabitants of the North of Europe. Astonishment has often been expressed at the hordes of warriors that, at various periods of the decay of the Roman Empire, were poured down upon it from the Northern nations. Mr. Malthus explains, with great clearness, that, wherever the customs of such nations as composed the immigrants were such as to conduce to health and early marriage, the immense fecundity of the race fully accounts for these crowds of immigrants so rapidly succeeding each other until the destruction of Rome ensued. Machiavel, in the beginning of his History of Florence, says: “The people who inhabit the northern parts that lie between the Rhine and the Danube, living in a healthful and prolific climate, often increase to such a degree, that vast numbers of them are forced to leave their country and go in search of new habitations. These emigrations proved the destruction of the Roman Empire.”

There can be no doubt that this is a true account of the way in which poverty and over-rapid reproduction cause emigration in ancient and modern times; and we cannot help regarding the present warlike policy of England and Germany as signs of a growing over-population in both of these States, which tempts the proletaire members of the governing classes to seek ever fresh territory, and makes the other classes of society so tolerant of such unjust conduct in their rulers. In fact, it may be truly said that the adoption of Neo-Malthusian views is the only really revolutionary measure, and the only safeguard of nations against wars of conquest or intestinal dissension.

In chapter vii. Malthus speaks of the checks to population among modern pastoral nations. Pastoral nations, although not so poor as hunting nations, are, of course, far more unable to acquire wealth than nations that have adopted agricultural pursuits. Hence, population increases but slowly in such communities, and they are often on the verge of famine for lengthened periods. Volney, in his travels, says, that the pastoral tribes of the Arabian desert deny that the religion of Mahomet was made for them. “For how,” they say, “can we perform ablutions when we have no water; how can we give alms when we have no riches; or what occasion can there be to fast during the month of Ramadan, when we fast all the year?”