unlike the clergyman of the _Enquirer_, for we are told by Godwin himself, “he has neither laboured to excite hatred nor contempt against me and my tenets; he has argued the questions between us just as if they had never been made a theme for political party and the intrigues of faction; he has argued just as if he had no end in view but the investigation of evidence and the development of truth” (p. 55 ft.). Moreover, he has “made as unquestionable an addition to the theory of political economy as any writer for a century past. The grand propositions and outlines of his work will, I believe, be found not less conclusive and certain than they are new. For myself, I cannot refuse to take some pride in so far as by my writings I gave the occasion and furnished an incentive to the producing so valuable a treatise” (p. 56). Surely concession could no further go. Godwin even admits the arithmetical and geometrical ratios.[824] His criticisms are all on the checks, which (be it remembered) were only the checks of the first essay, vice, misery, and the fear of them. Are Governments henceforward to prevent the evils of an excessive population by encouraging these unsightly counter-agents? and is every scheme for the amelioration of man’s lot foredoomed? No, the “author of the essay” has too small an idea of the resources of the human mind; it is no conclusive argument against a scheme to say that when it is realized it will probably not last.[825] He does not attach sufficient weight to the fact that in England, for example, “prudence and pride” prevent early marriages, and from late ones come smaller families. In a state of universal improvement there would be not less but more of these feelings, and a similar effect would follow in a greater degree.[826]