PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION.
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CHAP. XVI.
Probable error of Dr. Adam Smith in representing every increase of the revenue or stock of a society as an increase in the funds for the maintenance of labour.—Instances where an increase of wealth can have no tendency to better the condition of the labouring poor.—England has increased in riches without a proportional increase in the funds for the maintenance of labour.—The state of the poor in China would not be improved by an increase of wealth from manufactures.
The professed object of Dr. Adam Smith's inquiry is the nature and causes of the wealth of nations. There is another inquiry, however, perhaps still more interesting, which he occasionally mixes with it; I mean an inquiry into the causes which affect the happiness of nations or the happiness and comfort of the lower orders of society, which is the most numerous class in every nation. I am sufficiently aware of the
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