ting powers, and
perpetually muttering around us; were the skies 'like brass,' without
a cloud to produce one genial drop to refresh the thirsty earth, and
famine, consequently, visibly on the approach; I say, would such a
state of things, as resulting from the constant laws of Nature, be
'reconcilable with the attributes we assign to the Deity,' or with any
attributes which in these inventive days could be assigned to him, so
as to represent him as anything but the tormenter, rather than the kind
benefactor, of his creatures? Life, in such a condition, would be like
the unceasingly threatened and miserable existence of Damocles at the
table of Dionysius, and the tyrant himself the worthy image of the Deity
of the anti-populationists."

Surely this is wretched trifling. Is it on the number of bad harvests,
or of volcanic eruptions, that this great question depends? Mr Sadler's
piety, it seems, would be proof against one rainy summer, but would
be overcome by three or four in succession. On the coasts of the
Mediterranean, where earthquakes are rare, he would be an optimist.
South America would make him a sceptic, and Java a decided Manichean.
To say that religion assigns a solemn office to these visitations is
nothing to the purpose. Why was man so constituted as to need such
warnings? It is equally unmeaning to say that philosophy refers these
events to benevolent general laws of nature. In so far as the laws of
nature produce evil, they are clearly not benevolent. They may produce
much good. But why is this good mixed with evil? The most subtle and
powerful intellects have been labouring for centuries to solve these
difficulties. The true solution, we are inclined to think, is that which
has been rather suggested, than developed, by Paley and Butler. But
there is not one solution which will not apply quite as well to the
evils of over-population as to any other evil. Many excellent people
think that it is presumptuous to meddle with such high questions at all,
and that, though there doubtless is an explanation, our faculties are
not sufficiently enlarged to comprehend that explanation. This mode of
getting rid of the difficulty, again, will apply quite as well to the
evils of over-population as to any other evils. We are sure that those
who humbly confess their inability to expound the great enigma act more
rationally and more decorously than Mr Sadler, who tells us, with the
utmost confidence, which are the means and