Social England : a record of the progress of the people in religion, laws, learning, arts, industry, commerce, science, literature and manners, from the earliest times to the present day . ared in 1798. Hitherto it had generally been assumed thatan increased population was a rational object of ho])e. NowEnglands pojnilation was increasing at an unprecedented rate(p. (iol), but with it the poverty of the working classes was alsoincreasing. Economic theories are generally the outcome ofspecial economic conditions. In this case the injurious effectsof a growing po])ulation were largely due to thr
Social England : a record of the progress of the people in religion, laws, learning, arts, industry, commerce, science, literature and manners, from the earliest times to the present day . ared in 1798. Hitherto it had generally been assumed thatan increased population was a rational object of ho])e. NowEnglands pojnilation was increasing at an unprecedented rate(p. (iol), but with it the poverty of the working classes was alsoincreasing. Economic theories are generally the outcome ofspecial economic conditions. In this case the injurious effectsof a growing po])ulation were largely due to three sets ofcircumstances, viz.: (1) The disorganisation caused by theindustrial revolution, with the special inducements it offered Malthus. THE NATIONAL ECONOMY, 655 to cliild labour from the point of view of immediate wa2,-es,and the absence of any protective influences of Factory Acts,Education Acts, etc. (2) The hio-h price of bread aggravatedby the war, Avhich made the importation of food dangerousand expensive, and cut us oft from some of the markets whichwould otherwise have supplied us with food. (3) A defectivepoor law (of which more will be said in the next chapter), which. THE REV. T i;. 5IALT1IUS, AFTER .JOIIXLINXELL. directly encouraged the reckless multiplication ot the jjoorestclasses. The doctrines of Malthus also fitted in with anothertendency which lay almost outside the sphere of reaction against the French Revolution included a reactionagainst the high hopes of human perfectibility—of a golden agethat would reign on earth when once political tyrannies wereoverthrown. To cherish such hopes now was to be suspected ofFrench sympathies, of lack of patriotism, and of the desire topromote a reign of terror. Malthus struck the hardest blowthat had yet been struck at political Utopias, for he maintainedthat there was a cause intimately united with the very nature 656 liErnLVTIOX AXD REACTION 1784 ot man, ftital to all such Utopias, namely, the tendenc
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