Note 20 — OCELLUS LUCANUS ON THE UNIVERSE.

This observation applies only to well regulated cities, but in London and other large cities, where the population is not restricted to a definite number, this abundant propagation of the species is, to the greater part of the community, attended with extreme misery and want. Plato and Aristotle, who rank among the wisest men that ever lived, were decidedly of opinion, that the population of a city should be limited. Hence, the former of these philosophers says, “that in a city where the inhabitants do not know each other, there is no light, but profound darkness;” and the latter, “that as 10,000 inhabitants are too few for a city, so 100,000 are too many.”