and sooner than forego which, they would put an additional restraint on their power of multiplication; so that wages would rise, not by increase of deaths but by diminution of births. In these cases, then, wages do adapt themselves to the price of food, though after an interval of almost a generation.170 If wages were previously so high that they could bear reduction, to which the obstacle was a high standard of comfort habitual among the laborers, a rise of the price of food, or any other disadvantageous change in their circumstances, may operate in two ways: (a) it may correct itself by a rise of wages, brought about through a gradual effect on the prudential check to population; or (b) it may permanently lower the standard of living of the class, in case their previous habits in respect of population prove stronger than their previous habits in respect of comfort. In that case the injury done to them will be permanent, and their deteriorated condition will become a new minimum, tending to perpetuate [pg 187] itself as the more ample minimum did before. It is to be feared that, of the two modes in which the cause may operate, the last (b) is the most frequent, or at all events sufficiently so to render all propositions, ascribing a self-repairing quality to the calamities which befall the laboring-classes, practically of no
The converse case occurs when, by improvements in agriculture, the repeal of corn laws, or other such causes, the necessaries of the laborers are cheapened, and they are enabled with the same [money] wages to command greater comforts than before. Wages will not fall immediately: it is even possible that they may rise; but they will fall at last, so as to leave the laborers no better off than before, unless during this interval of prosperity the standard of comfort regarded as indispensable by the class is permanently raised. Unfortunately this salutary effect is by no