Quotes from Thomas Malthus

The perpetual tendency of the race of man to increase beyond the means of subsistence is one of the general laws of animated nature, which we can have no reason to expect to change.

Whether the law of marriage be instituted or not, the dictate of nature and virtue seems to be an early attachment to one woman.

It accords with the most liberal spirit of philosophy to suppose that not a stone can fall, or a plant rise, without the immediate agency of divine power.

The first business of philosophy is to account for things as they are; and till our theories will do this, they ought not to be the ground of any practical conclusion.

The power of population is so superior to the power of the earth to produce subsistence for man, that premature death must in some shape or other visit the human race.

To prevent the recurrence of misery is, alas! beyond the power of man.

In 1860, sixty-three per cent of the couples married in Great Britain had families of four or more children; in 1925 only twenty per cent had more than four.

The great and unlooked for discoveries that have taken place of late years have all concurred to lead many men into the opinion that we were touching on a period big with the most important changes.

The power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man.

No limits whatever are placed to the productions of the earth; they may increase forever.

Each pursues his own theory, little solicitous to correct or improve it by an attention to what is advanced by his opponents.

Population, when unchecked, increases in a geometrical ratio.

The histories of mankind are histories only of the higher classes.

I do not know that any writer has supposed that on this earth man will ultimately be able to live without food.

I think it will be found that experience, the true source and foundation of all knowledge, invariably confirms its truth.

Population, when unchecked, goes on doubling itself every 25 years or increases in a geometrical ratio.

The most baleful mischiefs may be expected from the unmanly conduct of not daring to face truth because it is unpleasing.

It is an acknowledged truth in philosophy that a just theory will always be confirmed by experiment.

It has been said, and perhaps with truth, that the conclusions of Political Economy partake more of the certainty of the stricter sciences than those of most of the other branches of human knowledge.

The doctrine of population has been conspicuously absent, not because I doubt in the least its truth and vast importance, but because it forms no part of the direct problem of economics.

It has appeared that from the inevitable laws of our nature, some human beings must suffer from want. These are the unhappy persons who, in the great lottery of life, have drawn a blank.

The friend of the present order of things condemns all political speculations in the gross.

A writer may tell me that he thinks man will ultimately become an ostrich. I cannot properly contradict him.

Had population and food increased in the same ratio, it is probable that man might never have emerged from the savage state.