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Progress respecting Food and Population 1
In temperate climes, men fed originally on fruits that grow without culture, and on the flesh of land-animals. As such animals become shy when often hunted, there is a contrivance of nature, no less simple than effectual, which engages men to bear with chearfulness the fatigues of<86> hunting, and the uncertainty of capture; and that is, an appetite for hunting. Hunger alone is not sufficient: savages who act by sense, not by foresight, move not when the stomach is full; and it would be too late when the stomach is empty, to form a hunting-party. As that appetite is common to all savages whose food depends on hunting; it is an illustrious instance of providential care, the adapting the internal constitution of man to his external circumstances.* The ap-<87>petite for hunting, though among us little necessary for food, is to this day remark-<88>able in young men, high and low, rich and poor. Natural propensities may be rendered faint or obscure, but never are totally eradicated.
Fish was not early the food of man. Water is not our element; and savages probably did not attempt to draw food from the sea or from rivers, till land-animals became scarce. Plutarch in his Symposiacs observes, that the Syrians and Greeks of old abstained from fish. Menelaus(a) complains, that his companions had been reduced by hunger to that food; and though the Grecian camp at the siege of Troy was on the sea-shore, there is not in Homer a single hint of their feeding on fish. We learn from Dion Cassius, that the Caledonians did not eat fish, though they had them in plenty; which is confirmed by Adamannus, a Scotch historian, in his<89> life of St. Columba. The ancient Caledonians depended almost entirely on deer for food; because in a cold country the fruits that grow spontaneously afford little nourishment; and domestic animals, which at present so much abound, were not early known in the north of Britain.
Antiquaries talk of acorns, nuts, and other shell-fruits, as the only vegetable food that men had originally, overlooking wheat, rice, barley, &c. which must from the creation have grown spontaneously: for surely, when agriculture first commenced, it did not require a miracle to procure the seeds of these plants.* The<90> Laplanders, possessing a country where corn will not grow, make bread of the inner bark of trees; and Linnaeus reports, that swine there fatten on that food, as well as in Sweden upon corn.
Plenty of food procured by hunting and fishing, promotes population: but as consumption of food increases with population, wild animals, sorely persecuted, become not only more rare, but more shy. Men, thus pinched for food, are excited to try other means for supplying their wants. A fawn, a kid, or a lamb, taken alive and tamed for amusement, suggested probably flocks and herds, and introdu-<91>ced the shepherd-state. Changes are not perfected but by slow degrees: hunting and fishing continue for a long time favourite occupations; and the few animals that are domesticated, serve as a common stock to be distributed among individuals, according to their wants. But as the idle and indolent, though the least deserving, are thus the greatest consumers of the common stock, an improvement crept in, that every family should rear a stock for themselves. Men by that means being taught to rely on their own industry, displayed the hoarding principle, which multiplied flocks and herds exceedingly. And thus the shepherd-state was perfected, plenty of food being supplied at home, without ranging the woods or the waters. Hunting and fishing, being no longer necessary for food, became an amusement merely, and a gratification of the original appetite for hunting.
The finger of God may be clearly traced in the provision made of animal food for man. Gramenivorous animals, perhaps all, make palatable and wholesome food. I except not the horse: some nations feed on it; others do not, because<92> it is more profitable by its labour. Carnivorous animals, generally speaking, make not wholesome food nor palatable. The first-mentioned animals are gentle, and easily tamed: the latter are fierce, not easily tamed, and uncertain in temper when tamed. Grass grows every where in temperate regions; and men beside can multiply animal food without end, by training domestic animals to live on turnip, carrot, potatoe, and other roots. Herodotus adds the following admirable reflection: “We may rationally conjecture, that Divine Providence has rendered extremely prolific such creatures as are naturally fearful, and serve for food, lest they should be destroyed by constant consumption: whereas the rapacious and cruel are almost barren. The hare, which is the prey of beasts, birds, and men, is a great breeder: a lioness, on the contrary, the strongest and fiercest of beasts, brings forth but once.”
The shepherd-state is friendly to population. Men by plenty of food multiply apace; and, in process of time, neighbouring tribes, straitened in their pasture, go to war for extension of territory, or mi-<93>grate to land not yet occupied. Necessity, the mother of invention, suggested agriculture. When corn growing spontaneously was rendered scarce by consumption, it was an obvious thought to propagate it by art: nature was the guide, which carries on its work of propagation with seeds that drop from a plant in their maturity, and spring up new plants. As the land was possessed in common, the seed of course was sown in common; and the product was stored in a common repository, to be parcelled out among individuals in want, as the common stock of animals had been formerly. We have for our authority Diodorus Siculus, that the Celtiberians divided their land annually among individuals, to be laboured for the use of the public; and that the product was stored up, and distributed from time to time among the necessitous. A lasting division of the land among the members of the state, securing to each man the product of his own skill and labour, was a great spur to industry, and multiplied food exceedingly. Population made a rapid progress, and government became an art; <94> for agriculture and commerce cannot flourish without salutary laws.
Natural fruits ripen to greater perfection in a temperate than in a cold climate, and cultivation is more easy; which circumstances make it highly probable, that agriculture became first an art in temperate climes. The culture of corn was so early in Greece, as to make a branch of its fabulous history: in Egypt it must have been coeval with the inhabitants; for while the Nile overflows, they cannot subsist without corn(a). Nor without corn could the ancient monarchies of Assyria and Babylon have been so populous and powerful as they are said to have been. In the northern parts of Europe, wheat, barley, pease, and perhaps oats, are foreign plants: as the climate is not friendly to corn, agriculture must have crept northward by slow degrees; and, even at present, it requires no small portion both of skill and industry to bring corn to maturity in such a climate. Hence it may be inferred with certainty, that the shepherd-state continued longer in northern climates than in those nearer the sun. <95> Cold countries, however, are friendly to population; and the northern people, multiplying beyond the food that can be supplied by flocks and herds, were compelled to throw off many swarms in search of new habitations. Their frequent migrations were for many years a dreadful scourge to neighbouring nations. People, amazed at the multitude of the invaders, judged, that the countries from whence they issued must have been exceedingly populous; and hence the North was termed officina gentium. But scarcity of food in the shepherd-state was the true cause; the north of Europe, in all probability, is as well peopled at present as ever it was, though its migrations have ceased, corn and commerce having put an end to that terrible scourge.* Denmark at present feeds <96> 2,000,000 inhabitants; Sweden, according to a list made up anno 1760, 2,383,113; and these countries must be much more populous than of old, when over-run with immense woods, and when agriculture was unknown. Had the Danes and Norwegians been acquainted with agriculture in the ninth and tenth centuries, when they poured out multitudes upon their neighbours, they would not have ventured their lives in frail vessels upon a tempestuous ocean, in order to distress nations who were not their enemies. But hunger is a cogent motive; and hunger gave to these pirates superiority in arms above every nation that enjoyed plenty at home. Luckily such depredations must have intervals; for as they necessarily occasion great havock even among the victors, the remainder finding sufficiency of<97> food at home, rest there till an increasing population forces them again to action.† Agriculture, which fixes people to
