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An Essay on the Principle of Population by T. R. (Thomas Robert) Malthus
page 32 of 192 (16%)
the accounts we have of China that it seems difficult to
reconcile with this reasoning. It is said that early marriages
very generally prevail through all the ranks of the Chinese. Yet
Dr Adam Smith supposes that population in China is stationary.
These two circumstances appear to be irreconcilable. It certainly
seems very little probable that the population of China is fast
increasing. Every acre of land has been so long in cultivation
that we can hardly conceive there is any great yearly addition to
the average produce. The fact, perhaps, of the universality of
early marriages may not be sufficiently ascertained. If it be
supposed true, the only way of accounting for the difficulty,
with our present knowledge of the subject, appears to be that the
redundant population, necessarily occasioned by the prevalence of
early marriages, must be repressed by occasional famines, and by
the custom of exposing children, which, in times of distress, is
probably more frequent than is ever acknowledged to Europeans.
Relative to this barbarous practice, it is difficult to avoid
remarking, that there cannot be a stronger proof of the
distresses that have been felt by mankind for want of food, than
the existence of a custom that thus violates the most natural
principle of the human heart. It appears to have been very
general among ancient nations, and certainly tended rather to
increase population.

In examining the principal states of modern Europe, we shall
find that though they have increased very considerably in
population since they were nations of shepherds, yet that at
present their progress is but slow, and instead of doubling their
numbers every twenty-five years they require three or four
hundred years, or more, for that purpose. Some, indeed, may be
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