W. of N. Book IV, chap. var (vol IL, p
8. Adam Smith combat le projet philanthropique, préconisé par Wilberforce, de repeupler l'Écosse en fondant des villages de pécheurs (Rae, Life of Adam Smith, p. 401).
9. Pol. Just., Book VIIT, chap. 11, 2 6d., vol. IL, pp. 460-461. 10. W. of N., Introduction (vol. I, p. 2).
11. Principle, of Population, 1re éd. chap. 1 : The most important argument that I shall adduce is certainly not new. The principles on which it depends have been explained in part by Hume, and more at large by Dr. Adam Smith. It has been advanced and applied to the present subject, though not with its proper weight, or in the most forcible point of view, by Mr. Wallace ; and it may probably have been stated by many writers that I have never met with.— Cf. Preface to the Second Edition (9 the éd., 1888, p. I, le nom de Price ajouté à ceux de Hume, Smith et Wallace). — Autres précurseurs : Davenant, « Essay upon the probable means of making a people gainers in the balance of trade », 1699 (ap. Eden, State of the Poor, vol. I, p. 231) : « The bodies of men are without doubt the most valuable treasure of a country; and in their sphere, the ordinary people are as serviceable to the commonwealth as the rich, if they are employed in honest labour and useful arts; and, such being more in number, do more contribute to increase the nation’s wealth, than the higher rank, — But a country may be populous and get poor (as were the ancient Gauls and Scythians) so that numbers, unless they are well employed, make the body politic big, but unwieldy ; strong, but unactive; as to any uses of good government. Theirs is a wrong opinion, who think that mouths profit a country that consume its product : and it may be more truly affirmed, that he who does not some way serve the commonwealth, either by being employed himself, or by employing others, is not only a useless, but a hurtful mémber to it. — As itis charity, and what indeed we owe to human kind, to make provision for the aged, the lame, the sick, the blind, and the impotent; so it is a justice we owe to the commonwealth not to suffer such as have health, and who might maintain themselves, to be drones, and live upon the labour of others. — Cf. l'ouvrage d’Ogilvie, paru sans nom d'auteur, An Essay upon the Right of Property in Land, with respect to its foundation in the Law of Nature; its present establishment by the municipal laws of Europe; and the Regulations by which it might be rendered more beneficial to the lower Ranks of Mankiod, London (1781. — Sect. Il. Of the Right of Property, as founded on Public Utility). — 15. The increase of public happiness, is the true primary object which ought to claim the attention of every state. It is to be attained by increasing the common standard or measure of happiness, which every citizen may have a chance of enjoying under the protection of the state; and by increasing the number of citizens, who are to enjoy this common measure of happiness. The increase of opulence, or of
dominion, are subordinate objects, and only to be pursued, as they tend to the increase of happiness, or of numbers; to both of which they are in some respects, and in certain cases, unfriendly. —16. Whatever regulations tend directly to increase the common measure of happiness, enjoyed by each individual citizen, tend assuredly to increase the numbers of citizens. But every regulation, tending to increase the number of citizens, does not cerfainly tend to increase the common measure of happiness, and, in various situations of the community, may tend to diminish it. The first sort of regulations, are therefore to be preferred, in case of interference, to the second.
12. Townshend a même employé l'expression « principles of population », en un sens un peu différent, dans À Journey Through Spain in the years 1786 and 1787, with particular attention to the agriculture, manufactures, commerce, population, taxes, and revenue of that country; and remarks in passing through a part of France. By Joseph Townshend, A. M. rector of Pewsey, Wilts ; and late of Clare Hall, Cambridge, 1791 ; vol. IT, pp. 207 sqq.— Joseph Townshend était le frère du politicien de la Cité, et le voisin de campagne de lord Shelburne (v. Bowring, vol. X, p. 515). — Cf. Free Thoughts on despotic and free governments, as connected with the happiness of the governor and lhe governed, Londres, 1781, chap. IX. On population. 4. The strength and prosperity of every nation depends upon the number of its inhabitants... Mais 2. The number ofinhabitants in any country will bear proportion to the ease with which the man and wife can gain subsistence, together with the personal security afforded by the government of that country. — Toutes les citations qui suivent sont empruntées à À Dissertation on the Poor Laws, by a well wisher to mankind, Londres, 1786 (anonyme).
13. Dissertation, sect. VII. 14. Dissertation, sect. VIII, 15. Dissertation, sect. IX.
16. Thoughts and Details on Scarcily, originally presented to the right hon, William Pitt, 1795 (Works, vol. VII, pp. 325 sqq).
17. Lellers, addressed to a member of the present Partiament, on the proposals for peace with the regicide directory of France, 1796, letter IF, on the Rupture of Negociations ; the Terms of Peace proposed ; and the Resources of the Country for the Continuance of the War. (Works, vol. VIII, pp. 195 sqq.)
18. Vol. VIE, p.334: What is doing, supposes or pretends that the farmer and the labourer have opposite interests ; — that the farmer oppresses the labourer ; and that a gentleman called a justice of peace, is the protector of the latter, and a controul and restraint on the former... But in the case of the farmer and the labourer, the interests are always the same, and it is absolutely impossible that their free contracts can be onerous to
either party. It is the interest of the farmer, that his work should be done with effect and celerity ; and that cannot be, unless the labourer is well fed. — pp. 336-337: It is, therefore, the first and fundamental interest of the labourer, that the farmer should have a full incoming profit on the product of his labour. The proposition is self-evident, and nothing but the malignity, perverseness, and ill governed passions of mankind, and particularly the envy they bear to each others prosperity, could prevent their seeing and acknowledging it, with thankfulness to the benign. and wise Disposer of all things, who obliges men, whether they willor not, in pursuing their own selfish interests, to connect the general good with their own individual success.
21. Burke écrit comme Godwin avait fait : « The rich are the pensioners of the poor, and are maintained by their superfluity. They are under an absolute, hereditary, and indefeasible dependence on those who labour » ; mais c’est pour ajouter aussitôt: «and are miscalled the poor », et il continue : « The labouring people are only poor, because they are numerous. Numbers in their nature imply poverty. In a fair distribution among a vast multitude, none can have much. That class of dependent pensioners called the rich, is so extremely small, that if all their throats were cut, and a distribution made of all they consume in a year, it would not give a bit of bread and cheese for one night’s supper to those who labour, and who in reality feed both the pensioners and themselves, » Thoughts and Details, vol. VII, p. 328.
22. Thoughis and Details, vol. VII, pp. 328-329; Letters on a regicide peace; vol. VIII, pp. 299-300. — Cf. W. of N., vol. I, pp. 80, 82, 85.
23. Third letter, vol. VII, p. 300, 24. Thoughts and Detaïüs, vol. VII p. 343.
25. Reproduit dansle Traité des Récompenses, livre IV, chap. x, pp. 304- 305. — Trail écrivait à Bentham, le 26 février 1787 (Bowring, vol. X, p. 172) : « The state of the poor laws has excited a good deal of attention. Gilbert, who has undertaken to reform them, is utterly incapable; but the information he has been enabled by the legislature to collect, may be useful to wiser heads. — Cf. Introduction, Bowring, vol I, p.103 : By offences against populalion, such offences whereof the tendency is to diminish the numbers or impair the political value of the sum total of the members of the community. — Et plus haut p. 402 : With regard to the sources or funds from whence these instruments, howsoever applied (the instruments which government, whether in the averting of evil or in the producting of positive good, can have to work with) must be derived, such of them as come under the denomination of persons must be taken out of the whole number of persons that are in the community, that is,
out of the total population of the state; so that the greater the population the greater may cϾleris paribus be this branch of the public wealth ; and the less, the less.
