It is possible that some of the changes reviewed above may be of a beneficial character. However that may be, there can be no question that, taken together, they indicate so complete an alteration in the circumstances surrounding the admission of aliens to this country as to require that the entire immigration situation be considered in the light of present conditions, rather than of past history. The old stock arguments, _pro_ and _con_, which seem to have stood the test of time, need to be thoroughly reviewed. The modern immigrant must be viewed in the setting of to-day. Especially must it be borne in mind that the fact—if such it be—that immigration in the past has worked no injury to the nation, and has resulted in good to the immigrants, by no means indicates that a continuance of past policy and practice in the matter will entail no serious evil consequences, nor bring about disaster in the future. CHAPTER XVIII THE NATURE OF THE PROBLEM Much is said and written in these days about the “immigration problem,” yet it is only rarely that there appears a conscious effort to prove that such a problem exists, or to analyze its character. Is there in the United States an immigration problem? If so, in what does it consist? To answer these two questions is the purpose of the present chapter. When the great new lands of the Western Hemisphere were made available to the inhabitants of Europe by the efforts of Columbus and the later explorers and discoverers, there opened up before humanity tremendous possibilities of advance.[346] The ratio between men and land was changed for the whole civilized world. An enormous area of fertile country was presented to the nations of Europe, by which the operation of the Malthusian principles was checked. Peoples who had reached the saturation point of population in Europe were given the opportunity to utilize their acquired arts in a virgin and practically uninhabited region. On account of the difficulties of transportation, and the consequent slow settlement of the new world, the results of this great alteration were only tardily developed. In many ways the entire progress of civilization during the nineteenth century is the outward expression of the transformation in conditions which then took place. So far as the human mind can anticipate, nothing of a similar nature can ever happen again on this earth.