Page:Malthus 1807 A letter to Samuel Whitbread.djvu/35

 the burden of a tax, which, as it falls not only on the net rents of the landlord but in part on the capital employed in agriculture, must necessarily impede the progress of cultivation. But till some effectual and satisfactory provision can be made against the danger that I have pointed out, I should greatly fear, that in endeavouring to avoid one evil, we might fall into another far mow fatal and extensive in its consequences.

Could such a provision indeed be made, the principal objection to the Poor Laws would be done away. If we could be secure, that, though the number of the dependent poor might increase with the increasing population, yet that their proportion to it would remain the same; and if this proportion were not so great as very materially to affect the whole body, the question would at once assume a different form. It would still be true however that the Poor Laws even in such a state