of Essay, p. 9.n.), though they have some claim to be
considered under moral restraint. But the question will be referred to
in a later chapter.
_Moral restraint_ will cover those checks to conception, voluntarily
practised in order to escape the burden and responsibility of rearing
children--continence, delayed marriage, and intermittent restraint.
No other checks are directly operative.
Misgovernment and the unequal distribution of wealth and land affect
population indirectly only, and can only act through one or other or all
of the checks already mentioned.
CHAPTER III.
DECLINING BIRTH-RATE.
_Decline of birth-rates rapid and persistent.--Food cost in New
Zealand.--Relation of birth-rate to prosperity before and after
1877.--Neo-Malthusian propaganda.--Marriage rates and fecundity of
marriage.--Statistics of Hearts of Oak Friendly Society.--Deliberate
desire of parents to limit family increase._
It is not the purpose of this work to follow any further the population
problem so far as it relates to deaths and emigration. Attention will be
concentrated on births, and the influences which control their rates.
A rapid and continuous decline in the birth-rate of Northern and Western
Europe, in contravention of all known biological and economic laws, has
filled demographists with amazement.
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