I find error concealed every where under general propositions. The children of the poor, says one, thrive better than those of the rich. If it be so, it ought not to be so in common reason. But the same person will tell you, I have made my son a merchant; he will be a rich man. Why? Because (A B) was a merchant, who, from nothing, died worth a hundred thousand pounds. But if you go through all the letters of the alphabet following (A B), among those who set out as he did, you will find, that perhaps every one of them died a bankrupt. Those who prove successful are remarkable: those who miscarry are never heard of. It is just so with respect to the question before us. But to return to our tables, and what are called calculations. One marriage produces four children at a medium in England. If you reckon 6,000,000 of people in that country, and that 1⁄30 part dies annually, then to keep up the stock it is sufficient that 200,000 be annually born; add to this the yearly increase of 9000, the total of births will then be 209,000: for if 200,000 die this year, and if 209,000 be born, this must certainly imply an increase of 9000, providing we suppose the acquisition of foreigners to be equal to the exportation of the natives. As this is only meant as an illustration, I need not examine the matter of fact. The next question is, how many marriages, properly contracted or encouraged as above, will give this increase? For we may know that these subsisting in that kingdom, joined with the effects of extramatrimonial conjunctions, is just sufficient to produce it. I imagine that nothing but experiment can give the solution of this question. Mr. King supposes every 104th person in England to marry yearly, that is 57,682 persons, or 28,841 couples. If this number of marriages be supposed to subsist with fertility for seven years, producing a child every year, the number of 200,000 births would be procured; but I apprehend that marriages, rightly contracted, subsist much longer in general than seven years, even with fertility, though not in proportion to a child every year: consequently, the number of marriages constantly subsisting with fertility in England, where it is supposed that 28,841 are yearly contracted, must be much greater than seven times that number, or than 201,887. If we suppose the whole of the 209,000 births to be produced by marriages, at three marriages to every child annually produced, then the number of marriages subsisting will be 627,000. From these speculations (for I do not pretend to call them calculations) I conclude, that the more fruitful marriages are rendered (not with regard to procreation, merely, but multiplication, which I have above distinguished) the fewer become necessary; and the fewer unnecessary marriages are contracted, the better for the state, and the less misery for those who contract them. I shall here stop, and leave to the reader to draw his conclusions, putting him in mind of the wide