Wherever therefore there is liberty, the power of increase is exerted, and the superabundant effects are repressed afterwards by want of room and nourishment, which is common to animals and plants, and among animals by becoming the prey of others.
The effects of this check on man are more complicated.

Impelled to the increase of his species by an equally powerful instinct, reason interrupts his career and asks him whether he may not bring beings into the world for whom he cannot provide the means of subsistence.

In a state of equality, this would be the simple question.

In the present state of society, other considerations occur.

Will he not lower his rank in life?
Will he not subject himself to greater difficulties than he at present feels?
Will he not be obliged to labour harder?
and if he has a large family, will his utmost exertions enable him to support them?
May he not see his offspring in rags and misery, and clamouring for bread that he cannot give them?
And may he not be reduced to the grating necessity of forfeiting his independence, and of being obliged to the sparing hand of charity for support?
These considerations are calculated to prevent, and certainly do prevent, a very great number in all civilized nations from pursuing the dictate of nature in an early attachment to one woman.