Note 242-10 — Chapter I

The rule that population tends to extend everywhere as far as the means of subsistence will permit, Sismondi, N. Principes, VII, ch. 3, has taken occasion to ridicule, basing himself on the example of the Montmorency family. This family has, notoriously, always lived in superabundance, and is, notwithstanding, on the verge of extinction. Sismondi here forgets the relativity of the idea "means of subsistence." Persons occupying an exalted social position not only think that they want more in this respect, but they are wont in forming marriage contracts to use the greatest and frequently exaggerated caution. Hence it is that families of this rank become, relatively speaking, frequently extinct; and, moreover, such a fact is here most frequently taken notice of. Sadler, Law of Population, 1830, infers from the frequent extinction of English noble families, that wealth leads to sterility; and, on the other hand, poverty (but not famine!) to prolificacy; and Doubleday's (True Law of Population, 12 ff.) suggestion, in explanation hereof, that over-fed animals and over-manured plants are sterile, as ably refuted in the Edinburg Rev., LI. It is there shown that the marriages of the English peers are fruitful above the average; that their extinction is partly due to the fact that the younger sons seldom married, and that hence there is a lack of collateral relations. But, in great part, such extinction is only apparent; since such a family is said to be extinct when only the male stem is extinct. The French nobility, from the 9th to the 11th century, continually increased in number. After this, the succession of females and cases of extinction became more frequent, because the nobility, in order to keep their estates together, began to not desire many sons. Sismondi, Hist. des Français, V, 182. Compare Benoiston de Châteauneuf,[TN 72] De la Durée des Familles[TN 73] nobles en France, in the proceedings of the Académie des Sciences morales et politiques, II, 792 ff. Besides, between 1611 and 1819, 763 English baronet families became actually extinct, 653 continued to exist, and 139 had been raised to the peerage; an average of from 3 to 4 peer families became extinct yearly. (Statist. Journal, 1869, 224.) There were, about 1569 2,219 Venetian nobili; in 1581, 1,843 (Daru, VI, 240 ff.); in Addison's time (1705), only 1,500. On the decrease of the Roman patricians, see Dionys., Hal., I, 85; Tacit., Ann., XI, 25; on that of the Spartan knights: Clinton, Fasti Hellenici, II, 407 ff.; of the ehrbaren Geschlechter, at Nürnberg: Hegel, N. Stadtchroniken, 1862, 214. Compare, also, Westminster Rev., Oct., 1849.