termittent than to practice constant
restraint.

It is just here that Malthus failed to anticipate the future. Malthus
believed that "moral restraint" would lessen the marriage rate, but
would have no direct effect on the fecundity of marriage.

A man would not put upon himself the self-denial and restraint, which
abstinence from marriage implied, for a longer period than he could
help.

The greater the national prosperity, therefore, the higher the
birth-rate. But prosperity keeps well in advance of the birth-rate; in
other words, population, though it still _tends_ to, does not actually
_press_ upon the food supply.

If the moral restraint of Malthus be extended so as to include
intermittent moral restraint within the marriage bond, then, under one
or other, or all of his three checks, vice, misery, and moral restraint,
will be found the explanation of the remarkable demographic phenomena of
recent years.

_Misery_ will cover deaths from starvation and poverty, the limitation
of births from abortion due to hardship, from deaths due to improper
food, clothing, and housing; and emigration to avoid hardship.

_Vice_ will cover criminal abortions, limitation of births from
venereal disease, deaths from intemperance, etc., and artificial checks
to conception. Malthus included artificial checks of this kind under
vice (7 ed. of Essay, p. 9.n.), though they have some claim to be
considered under moral restraint. But the question will be referred to
in a later chapter.

_Moral restraint_ will cover those checks to conception, voluntarily
practised in order to escape the burden and responsibility of rearing
children--continence, delayed marriage, and intermittent restraint.

No other checks are directly operative.

Misgovernment and the unequal distribution of wealth and land affect
population indirectly only, and can only act through one or other or all
of the checks already mentioned.

CHAPTER III.

DECLINING BIRTH-RATE.

_Decline of birth-rates rapid and persistent.--Food cost in New
Zealand.--Relation of birth-rate to prosperity before and after
1877.--Neo-Malthusian propaganda.--Marriage rates and fecundity of
marriage.--Statistics of Hearts of Oak Friendly Society.--Deliberate
desire of parents to limit family increase._

It is not the purpose of this work to follow any further the population
problem so far as it relates to deaths and emigration. Attention will be
concentrated on births, and t