|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 32
If this be the ideal of the State, life is of less value than the
product of labour, for it can be more easily and readily replaced.
But the ideal of the perfect state is not wealth but the robust
happiness of its members.
The happiness of its members is best promoted by the maximum increase in
its numbers, consistent with ample space and food. With ample space and
food multiplication works automatically, being kept up to the limit of
space and food by the procreative instinct.
If it can be shown that multiplication is not sufficiently stimulated by
this instinct, then it must be concluded that, _in the minds of the
citizens_ the space and food are not ample.
In New Zealand the procreative impulse does not keep multiplication at
an equal pace with the apparent supply of food and space, and this is
due, as has been shown, to the fact that our citizens are not satisfied
that the supply _is_ ample.
They have come to enlarge the definition of "food," and this term now
includes luxuries easily obtainable for themselves and their families.
But the luxuries of life and living can only be easily obtained when
individual effort to obtain them is unhampered. Every burden which a man
has to bear (only the best are here referred to,--the fit members of the
State) limits his power to provide for himself, and any he may bring
into the world.
If the State decrees that a citizen shall support himself, his mate, and
his progeny, well and good,--if he has no other burden to bear, no other
responsibility, he knows exactly where he is and what he has to do, and
directs his energies and controls his impulses, and enlarges his desires
to suit his tastes and purposes.
But if the State decrees that a citizen shall not only support all for
whose existence he is responsible, but also all those unable to support
themselves, born into the world in increasing numbers as congenital
defectives, and manufactured in the world by legalised drinking saloons,
and by pauperising charitable aid and benevolent institutions, then our
self-respecting right-respecting citizen must decide whether he will
forego the luxury and ease that he may enjoy, and rear the normal
family, or curtail his own progeny, and support the army of defectives
thrown upon society by the State-encouraged fertility of the unfit.
It has already been shown, that in this colony the best fit to multiply
are ceasing to do so, because of a desire to attain a social and
financial stability that will protect them and their dependents from
want or the prospect of want. There is every reason to believe, that
when this stability is assured the normal family soon follows.
The love of luxurious idleness and a passion for excitement, which were
typical of the voluntarily barren women of ancient Rome, have little
place with us, as a cause of limited nativity.
Men and women reason out, that they cannot bear all the burdens that the
State imposes upon them, support an increasing army of paupers, and
lunatics and defectives, and non-producers, and that luxuriously, and at
the same time incur the additional burden of rearing a large family.
Let us examine these burdens, and see if the complaint of our best stock
is justified.
The amount raised by taxation in New Zealand (including local rates)
during the year 1902-03, amounted per head of population (excluding
Maories) to �5 4s. 7d. The bread-winners in New Zealand number according
to official returns, 340,230, and the total rates and taxes collected
for the year 1902-03 amounted to �4,174,787 or �12 5s. 4d. for each
bread-winner for the year.
On March 31st, 1901 (the last census date) there were 23.01 persons per
thousand of population over 15 years of age, unable to work from
sickness, accident and infirmity. Of these 12.72 were due to sickness
and accident, and 10.29 to "specified infirmities."
The proportion of those suffering from sickness and accident in 1874 was
12.64 per 1000 over 15 years, practically the same as for 1901, while
disability from "specified infirmities" (lunacy, idiocy, epilepsy,
deformity, etc.)--degeneracies strongly hereditary--rose rapidly from
5.32 in 1874 to 10.29 in 1901, or taking the total sickness and
infirmity, from 17.96 in 1874 to 23.01 in 1901.
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|