The Detroit times. [volume] (Detroit, Mich.) 1903-1920, 1913-02-15
XVIII.

(Copyright, by 0uick.l
Father Noah. on the Ark, fortunately had a voyage
so short that the tendency of his live stockhuman
and brute--to swarm and increase In numbers prob
ably gave him trouble
But board the Good ship Earth are doomed
to voyage OF indefinite length. IL IL awful truth
that every living thing board tends TO multiply
and that plants and animals all do multiply until
their further increase Is stopped by lack OF food
which is famine by encroachments their increas-
Ing numbers-which is war or by parasites and pests
which is pestilence.
We know. too that tends to multiply-the
Noah family already numbers 80 people to every
square mile OF land our old Ark, Earth, counting
In desert swamp. rock and sand. well as arabic.
And this human swarm Is growing faster than
ever. There great authorities who desire that
War, Pestilence and Famine inherent In the
frame OF human society in that OF wolves rabbits
worms and fishes
All we can say that II this not true. Man is the
only living thing OF which II is not true.
But IL II is true. what shall we say OF God who
placed here. with the urge upon us to multiply SO
coercve that II has filled the Orient with three thou
sand people 20 the square mile?
Two OF the most virile minds In the world are
Theodore Roosevelt and Rudyard Kipling. In many
ways they alike Both something in the
Berserker linestark. men, each with bushel
OF brains Each has his ideas this matter OF popu
lation-and they seem to be opposite ideas In
recent story Kipling prophesyng Of the year 1000,
hundred million, hve hundred and then to four hun
dred and nifty. THE planet" one OF his char
acters has taken all precautions against crowds for
the past hundred years" Anyhow, says another.
"men live century apiece the average now"
1--WE all rich and happy" another. because
we so few and live 30 long. In this story Kip
ling human powers so far increased that girl
runs a cultivator by OF switch in the house.
So, il have got his meaning. prophesies Rudyard
Kpling
Roosevelt the other hand seems to fear evil from
a decreasing brth-rate. He cries out against what
he calls suicide ! do not think he has uttered
his full thought in the premises perhaps for reasons
OF policy suspect that there be people whom he.
would like to having fewer children. and those
whom he would fain see rear more.
This brings us Passengers on the, Good Ship Earth
consideration OF the kind OF passengers who do
multiply and the sort. IL any. who do not. II there
Is sort which do not, are they better or worse
Passengers than those who do! IL we are to stay on
this spinning air-shp 1t shoots through space-if
we cannot get on by death, and III descend
ants are sail after have been absorbed back
into the Decks from which rose. the question must
be OF interest II really think must 1t not be the
one most interesting of all questions!
The Chinese have an annual birth rate OF between
SO and 60 to the thousand In Russia 1t Is 49, In
French Canada it Is probably equal to the Russian
rate In Japan 1t Is only little. II any. less In
Germany It Is IS. In German Austria and Spain Ii
is "a. In Italy. Holland and Finland 1t Is about 80.