inhabitants as the peculiar circumstance which rendered this latter country formidable.96
Italy, it is probable however, has decayed; but how many great cities does it still contain? Venice, Genoa, Pavia, Turin, Milan, Naples, Florence, Leghorn, which either {p169} subsisted not in ancient times, or were then very inconsiderable. If we reflect on this, we shall not be apt to carry matters to so great an extreme as is usual with regard to this subject.
When the Roman authors complain that Italy, which formerly exported corn, became dependent on all the provinces for its daily bread, they never ascribe this alteration to the increase of its inhabitants, but to the neglect of tillage and agriculture. A natural effect of that pernicious practice of importing corn in order to distribute it gratis among the Roman citizens, and a very bad means of multiplying the inhabitants of any country.97 The sportula, so much talked of by Martial and Juvenal, being presents regularly made by the great lords to their smaller clients, must have had a like tendency to produce idleness, debauchery, and a continual decay among the people. The parish-rates have at present the same bad consequences in England.
Were I to assign a period when I imagine this part of the world might possibly contain more inhabitants than at present, I should pitch upon the age of Trajan and the Antonines, the great extent of the Roman Empire being then civilized and cultivated, settled almost in a profound peace both foreign and domestic, and living under the same regular police and government.98 But we are told that all {p170} extensive governments, especially absolute monarchies, are destructive to population, and contain a secret vice and poison, which destroy the effect of all these promising appearances. To confirm this, there is a passage cited from Plutarch, which being somewhat singular, we shall here examine it.