The Sun.
London, England, 1822-01-29 00:00:00

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4,„„ ,

TUESDAY,
JANUARY
29, 1822

not. Oven be able to sneeze wihout the risk of
giving oar neighbour a black eye (-?r a bloody
nose.

This, however, would have served as well as.
• Dr. Price's penny placed out at compound in-
terest, to illustrate the power of numbers. • But
What shall we say; When Mr. Malthus goes on in
various parts of his Essay seriously toreAson, as
if this geometrical ratio of increase-• was neces--
sarily operative? And yet again,- what shall we
say when we• find Statesman, Ministersi NOble•-•
men, and Capitalists, with the Edinburgh Re-
viewers at their backs, gravely, and- for well nigh
a qnarter of a century; with all the gravity 'whiCh
the bird of night (not the amorous Philorne4
-assumes when the sun
.begins to peer above thie7.
horizon, setting lOng faces, and looking soleiimly•l
at each other om.theAi4st•inig7irtiace of this grand
modern discovery. -
You could scarcely suppose, Sir, that. the very
man.who wrote those sensible passages (already
quoted more than once). which go to prove that
the passiOnof the sexes is to be governed, and•
that the duty of governing it rests exactly on the
same ground as the duty of governing other pas-
,sions, could have deliberately penned the fol-
lowing sentence :
"Thus it appears that a SoCiety, constituted according to
the most beautiful form that imagination can conceive, with
benevolence for its moving, principle instead of self-love, and
with every evil disposition in all its members corrected by rea-
son, not force, would, from the inevitable laws of nature, and
not from any fault in human institutions, degenerate in a very
short period into a Society cOnstiucted upon a plan not essen-
tially different from that which prevails in every known State at
present ; a Society divided into a class of proprietors and a
class of labourers, and with -self-love for the mainspring of the
great machine."—, Vol. 2, p. 268.
It has been. well said, that inventors should
have good memories. Mr. Malthus, who is an
inventor of the first water, ought not to have lost
sight of this inevitable law of nature, when he
favours us witlr-his own scheme for ameliorating
the state of society. Among the forms of society
which " imagination can conceive," (and recol-
lect it is to all these,without any exception, that
the foregoing sentence applies) is that which Mr.
Malthus himself has fancied, " in which each in-
dividual endeavoured to attain happiness by the
strict fUlfilment of these duties, which the most
enlightened of the ancient Philosophers (not your
clay dreamers) deduced from the laws of nature,
and which have been directly taught; and re-
ceived such powerful sanctions in the moral code

of Christianity." Ah ! Mr. Malthus, you area
Christian ; a teacher of Christianity, and, ac-
cording to a form prescribed by its Holy Founder,
you pray daily that " Gon's will may be done
on earth as it is in heaven," and you have your.
self told us how we are to ascertain what is
the will of GOD.

" According to the genuine principles of' moral science (say
you), the method of coming at the will of God from the light
of nature, is to inquire into the tendency of the action to pro.
mote or diminish the general happiness."—Vol. 3, p. 98.
And yet you find by the light of nature, a law
of nature directly opposed to the will of God.
Did Jesus'Christlinow any thing of this ine-
vitable law of nature, which you Say would over-
throw .a society 4c in which every evil disposition
in all its members was corrected by reason ?" I
hope not. If he had, it is not to be believed
that he would have taught us to pray for the
establishment on earth of that very state of society'
which you tell us, if it existed to-morrow, would
be cast down and destroyed by an inevitable law
of nature ; that is to say, by a law of nature more
powerful than the will of the Creator and Go-
hyernor of the world, whose power no creature is
able to resist.

But you d'o not, perhaps, deem it allowable for
an unlearned Layman to preach. You may say,
with the French Sgavans before the Revolution,
that what is theologically true, may be philoso-
phically false.; and vice versa, that you are rea-
soning from facts and past experience, and
are not talking-of miraculous interpositions.
shall have a great deal to say hereafter (always
presuming that you, Mr. Editor, will continue
Co grant me the same indulgence which I have
hitherto experienced at your hands), concerning
many distinctions which have been- made, where
no difference appears to exist ; and especially as
to the distinction between the laws of nature and
the conduct of Divine Providence. At present
I am content to forego'all advantages derivable
from theological- sourdes, and to combat Mr.
Malthus on the lower ground which he has
taken. lie has reviewed the state o► society in
former periods, and carefully compared it with
its present state in various parts of the world ;
and from that survey he has arrived at a know,
ledge of the laws which fix the destiny of man.
And an awful destiny it is, according to some
parts of his work, He tells us that, by an ine-
vitable law of nature, the human species doubles
itself in 25 years ;--,-that no human institutions,
however wise, can evade its force ;—and that
even a' state of society, in which every evil
disposition in all its weathers was corrected by
reason, could not stand against it for the short
'space of two. generations. Do I deal, uthirly
with Mr. Malthus ? Have' I. not given you,
agaiti.and again, his very word.;, text an:l con-
text? . His obServation' is not that the law in
questio❑ would be too strong. for the scheme. of
More, or Condorcet, or Godwin; but for any
the most beautiful that imagination can conceive,
" with benevolence for its moving principle, hi,
stead of self-love, and with every evil disposition
in all its members corrected by reason; by rea-
son, not by fancy, and consequently by all those
reasonings which the author has himself urged
with a view to the proper guidance of that power
which is capable of peopling a desart region in a
small number of years;. and yet,. under other
circumstances, is capable of being confined, by
human energy and virtue, to any limits, however
ilarrow, at• the expence of a small• comparative