From what I have here said, the reader may perceive, that it is not without reason that I have treated the principles relating to my subject in general, and that I avoid as much as possible to reason from facts alledged as to the state of particular countries. Those our author builds upon may be true, and may be false: the proportion of births and deaths in one place is no rule for another; we know nothing exactly about the state of this question in the British isles; and it may even daily vary, from a thousand circumstances. War _may_ destroy population as well as agriculture, and it _may not_, according to circumstances. When the calamity falls upon the breeders, and when these are supposed the only people in the country in a capacity of bringing up their children, births will soon diminish. When it destroys the indigent, who cannot bring up their children, or who do not marry, births will remain the same. The killing the wethers of a flock of sheep does not diminish the brood of lambs next year; the killing of old pigeons makes a pigeon-house thrive. When the calamity falls upon the farmers, who make our lands produce, agriculture is hurt, no doubt: does it fall upon the superfluities of cities, and other classes of the free hands, it may diminish manufacturers, but agriculture will go on, while there is a demand for its produce; and if a diminution of consumption at home be a consequence of the war, the augmentation upon exportation will more than compensate it. I do not find that war _diminishes_ the demand for subsistence. The long wars in Flanders in the beginning of this century interrupted agriculture now and then, but did not destroy it. That in the Palatinate in the end of the last ruined the country so, that it has hardly as yet recovered it. War has different effects, according to circumstances. OBJ. The population of the British isles is not stopt for want of food, because one-sixth part of the crop is annually exported. I answer, That it is still stopt for want of food, for the exportation only marks that the home demand is satisfied; but this does not prove that the inhabitants are full fed, although they can buy no more at the exportation-price. Those who cannot buy, are exactly those who I say die for want of subsistence: could they buy, they would live and multiply, and no grain perhaps would be exported. This is a plain consequence of my reasoning; and my principal point in view throughout this whole book, is to find out a method for enabling those to buy who at present cannot, and who therefore do not multiply; because they can give no equivalent to the farmers for their superfluity, which consequently they export. By this application of our principles, I have no occasion to call in question our author’s facts. It is no matter what be the state of the case: if the principles I lay down be just, they must resolve every phenomenon. ------------------------------------------------------------------------