At the great
banquet of Nature there is no plate laid for him. Nature
commands him to take himself away, and she will not be slow to
put her order into execution.[6]
[6 The passage quoted may not be given in the exact words used by
Malthus, it having reached its present shape through the medium
of a French rendering--Translator.
This then is the necessary, the fatal, conclusion of political
economy,--a conclusion which I shall demonstrate by evidence
hitherto unknown in this field of inquiry,--Death to him who does
not possess!
In order better to grasp the thought of Malthus, let us translate
it into philosophical propositions by stripping it of its
rhetorical gloss:--
"Individual liberty, and property, which is its expression, are
economical data; equality and solidarity are not.
"Under this system, each one by himself, each one for himself:
labor, like all merchandise, is subject to fluctuation: hence the
risks of the proletariat.
"Whoever has neither income nor wages has no right to demand
anything of others: his misfortune falls on his own head; in the
game of fortune, luck has been against him.
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