An Essay on the Principle of Population, as It Affects the Future Improvement of Society
An Essay on the Principle of Population, as It Affects the Future Improvement of Society
$45.99
USDResulting from discussions with his father on the works of Condorcet and William Godwin, Thomas Malthus (1766–1834) published anonymously in 1798 his first and most famous work. Written as a polite attack on French post-revolutionary speculations on social and human perfectibility, this remains one of the most powerful statements of the limits to human hopes set by the tension between population growth and natural resources. Central to his philosophy was the belief that 'The power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man'. The publication was extremely controversial, not only because of the discussions of prostitution, contraception and sex, but also because Malthus denied the right of the poor to be supported in the face of famine, poverty and disease. This 1798 first edition led to a riposte from Godwin, Of Population (1820), which is also reissued in this series.
Product details
February 2021Paperback
9781108079143
420 pages
216 × 140 × 24 mm
0.532kg
Available
Table of Contents
- Preface
- 1. Question stated
- 2. The different rations in which population and food increase
- 3. The savage or hunter state shortly reviewed
- 4. State of civilized nations
- 5. The second, or positive check to population examined, in England
- 6. New colonies
- 7. A probable cause of epidemics
- 8. Mr Wallace
- 9. M. Condorcet's conjecture concerning the organic perfectibility of man
- 10. Mr Godwin's system of equality
- 11. Mr Godwin's conjecture concerning the future extinction of the passion between the sexes
- 12. Mr Godwin's conjecture concerning the indefinite prolongation of human life
- 13. Error of Mr Godwin in considering man too much in the light of a being merely rational
- 14. Mr Godwin's five propositions respecting political truth
- 15. Models too perfect, may sometimes rather impede than promote improvement
- 16. Probable error of Dr Adam Smith
- 17. Question of the proper definition of the wealth of a state
- 18. The constant pressure of distress on man
- 19. The sorrows of life necessary to soften and humanize the heart.
