not subject himself to greater difficulties than he at present
feels? Will he not be obliged to labour harder? and if he has a
large family, will his utmost exertions enable him to support
them? May he not see his offspring in rags and misery, and
clamouring for bread that he cannot give them? And may he not be
reduced to the grating necessity of forfeiting his independence,
and of being obliged to the sparing hand of charity for support?

These considerations are calculated to prevent, and certainly
do prevent, a very great number in all civilized nations from
pursuing the dictate of nature in an early attachment to one
woman. And this restraint almost necessarily, though not
absolutely so, produces vice. Yet in all societies, even those
that are most vicious, the tendency to a virtuous attachment is
so strong that there is a constant effort towards an increase of
population. This constant effort as constantly tends to subject
the lower classes of the society to distress and to prevent any
great permanent amelioration of their condition.

The way in which, these effects are produced seems to be
this. We will suppose the means of subsistence in any country
just equal to the easy support of its inhabitants. The constant
effort towards population, which is found to act even in the most
vicious societies, increases the number of people before the
means of subsistence are increased. The food therefore which
before supported seven millions must now be divided among seven
millions and a half or eight millions. The poor consequently must
live much worse, and many of them be reduced to severe distress.
The number of labourers also being above the proportion of the
work in the market, the price of labour must tend toward a