In 1860, sixty-three per cent of the couples married in Great Britain had families of four or more children; in 1925 only twenty per cent had more than four.

Hard as it may appear in individual instances , dependent poverty ought to be held disgraceful.

The ordeal of virtue is to resist all temptation to evil.

The first business of philosophy is to account for things as they are; and till our theories will do this, they ought not to be the ground of any practical conclusion.

A feather will weigh down a scale when there is nothing in the opposite one.

In a state therefore of great equality and virtue, where pure and simple manners prevailed, the increase of the human species would evidently be much greater than any increase that has been hitherto known.

A great emigration necessarily implies unhappiness of some kind or other in the country that is deserted.