AN ESSAY ON THE PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION OR A VIEW OF ITS PAST AND PRESENT EFFECTS ON HUMAN HAPPINESS, WITH AN INQUIRY INTO OUR PROSPECTS RESPECTING THE FUTURE REMOVAL OR MITIGATION OF THE EVILS WHICH IT OCCASIONS. BY THE REV. T. R. MALTHUS, A. M., F.R.S. LATE FELLOW OF JESUS COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE, AND PROFESSOR OF HISTORY AND POLITICAL Seventh Edition. LONDON: REEVES AND TURNER, 196 STRAND, W.C. AND 100 CHANCERY LANE. 1872. PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. THE Essay on the Principle of Population, which I published in 1798, was suggested, as is expressed in the Preface, by a paper in Mr Godwin's Inquirer. It was written on the impulse of the occasion, and from the few materials which were then within my reach in a country situation. The only authors from whose writings I. had deduced the principle which formed the main argument of the Essay, were Hume, Wallace, Adam Smith, and Dr Price; and my object was to apply it, to try the truth of those speculations on the perfectibility of man and society, which at that time excited a considerable portion of the public attention. In the course of the discussion I was naturally led into some examination of the effects of this principle on the existing state of society. It appeared to account for much of that poverty and misery observable among the lower classes of people in every nation, and for those reiterated failures in the efforts of the higher classes to relieve them. The more I considered the subject in this point. of view, the more importance it seemed to acquire; and this consideration, joined to the degree of public attention which the Essay excited, determined me to turn my leisure reading towards an historical examination of the effects of the principle of population on the past and present state of society; that, by illustrating the subject more generally, and drawing those inferences from it, in application to the actual state of things, which experience seemed to warrant, I might give it a more practical and permanent interest. |