LETTER CXXII. Usbek to the Same.

THE propagation of mankind is vastly promoted by a mild government. All republics are certain proofs of this; and above all others, Swisserland and Holland, which are the two worst countries in Europe, if we consider the nature of their land, and which are nevertheless the best peopled. Nothing invites strangers more than liberty and wealth, which always follow the former: the first is searched after for its own sake; and we are led by our wants into the country where the latter is to be acquired. The species increase itself in a country where the plenty of it supports the children without diminishing the substance of their fathers. The equality of citizens, which commonly produces an equality in their fortunes, brings plenty and life into every part of the body politic, and extends them through the whole. In countries subject to an arbitrary power it is not the same: the prince, the courtiers, and some private persons, possess all the riches, whilst all the rest groan beneath extreme poverty. If a man is in bad circumstances, and is sensible that his children would be poorer than himself, he will not marry; or if he does marry, he will be afraid of having too great a number of children, who may

complete the destruction of his fortune, and sink into the condition of their father. I own that the rustic or peasant, being once married, will people that state alike, whether he be rich or poor; this consideration does not affect him, he hath always a sure inheritance to leave to his children, which is a plough, and nothing prevents him from blindly following the instinct of nature. But what purpose, in a state, do those numbers of children answer, who languish in misery? Almost all of them perish as soon as they are born: they seldom thrive; weak and feeble they die by retail, a thousand different ways, whilst others are carried away wholesale by frequent popular distempers, which poverty and a bad diet always produce: those which escape, reach the age of manhood without having the strength of it, and languish all the remainder of their lives. Men are like plants, that never flourish if they are not well cultivated: among a miserable people, the species loses, and even sometimes degenerates. France can supply us with a sufficient proof of this. In the late wars, the fear all the youths were in of being enrolled in the militia, forced them to marry, and this at too tender an age, and in the bosom of poverty. From so many marriages sprung such numbers of children, which are now looked for in vain, and whom misery, famine, and sickness, have destroyed. Now, if in so happy a climate, in a kingdom of so much policy as France, such remarks as these may be made, what may be done in other states?

Paris, the 23d of the moon Ramazan,
1718.