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From \textit{The Athen\ae um}, 8 August 1835, pp. 593--594
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\textit{On Man, and the Developement of his Faculties, \&c.}---[\textit{Sur
l'Homme et le D\'eveloppe\-ment de ses Facut\'es \&c.}] By A. Quetelet,
Secretary to the Royal Academy of Brussels. London: Bossange \& Co.
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AMONGST the infinite variety of circumstances by which man is surrounded in
nature and in society, there are but few whose cause is sufficiently simple
and direct to become matter of intuitive perception. By dint of long and
painful study, a certain portion of these phenomena has been traced to causes
operating by universal laws; which laws, being accurately ascertained, present
a key, enabling the observer to calculate with the utmost precision the
possible results of their agency. In a far greater number of cases, either
so obscure or so complicated, as to elude the perseverance of the inquirer:
the law of their activity remains unascertained; and no safe inference can be
drawn as to its consequences in any given contingency. Man, however, by
interest and by curiosity impelled to account to himself for whatever strikes
upon his senses, invented an explanation of these last train of appearances,
by referring them to an unknown and mystical principle which he christened
Chance. To say that a thing has happened by chance, is, indeed, merely to
say that it has happened because it has happened! The word, notwithstanding,
has acquired, from use, a real and a philosophical meaning---either as a
confession of ignorance, or as an abridged expression for an unknown formula.
In this last sense, the value of a chance may become a fit subject for inquiry.
In the most obscure cases of chance agency, it is usually not difficult
to discover the action of some one or more known and determined laws as an
element of the complex causation; and, on the other hand, in the practical
application of the purest theorems of science, the result rarely fails to be
partially affected by the agency of some uncalculated item. Thus, in seeking
to learn from the sun's altitude the position we occupy on the earth, we are
enabled to calculated the astronomical causes on which the operation depends,
to the utmost nicety; but a number of inappreciable causes---imperfection in
the instruments, irregularity in the observer's powers, \&c., prevent a perfect
certainty in the result. In every complicated case, then, there are certain
agencies which universally tend to produce an identical effect; there are
others, accidental and variable in different instances, which tend to produce
in each case a different consequence. In throwing the dice, there is at every
throw the same (presumed) equality of the faces of the die, the same solidity
of all parts of its substance, the same number of possible events. These all
tend to produce the six separate faces of the die in every six throws. On the
other hand, there are the endless varieties of force employed by the gambler
in shaking and projecting the die, unknown inequalities in the die itself, in
the table which receives it, \&c.\ all tending to determine the throws in a
series altogether irregular. In any one fair throw, the action of the last
set of causes so far overmasters that of the first, that it is impossible to
determine what will be the event, scientifically, and not as a mere accidental
guess. It is found, however, by observation, that, in the long run, the
reverse is the fact; that the constant causes predominate over the accidental;
and that, by embracing a long series of events, an average result may be
obtained, which will very nearly approximate to what from theory should happen
were the constant causes alone in operation: for the unknown and varying
forces are not the less under the influence of laws, because we cannot
comprehend them; and the effects which they produce are consequently placed
within some limits, so that in some undefined series of events, their
eccentricities must be exhausted, and must balance and neutralize each other.
Thus, to go back to the instance of the sun's altitude:--- in any one
observation, it may happen, from a momentary defect in the powers of
attention, from an accidental awkwardness in managing the instrument, that
there shall arise a considerable error. But if a great number of persons
perform the same operation, the probability is, that their several errors
will be of different sorts, and that the mean result of all the operations
will, therefore, be a close approximation to the truth.
The application of this mode of seeking after certainty, and reducing
hazard to a determinate law, has long been applied by gamblers to the events
of games of chance; and by insurance companies, to determining the probable
duration of human life, and the still more incalculable chances of fire and
shipwreck. In the latter instance, it seems at first sight absolutely
impossible that, the action of elements, so proverbially inconstant, should
be reducible to any rule: yet so much otherwise is the fact, that though
particular underwriters may in any given year be ruined by some great storm
wrecking particular fleets of large value, the general business of an
underwriter is as certainly prosperous as any other branch of industry;
while competition keeps down the rate of insurance very closely to the real
extent of the risk.
This degree of certainty having been reached where accident seems to reign
exclusively, it is not surprising that philosophers should have been tempted
to apply so available a method to the appreciation of physiological and social
facts, and to the assignment of the laws which regulate the ``developement of
man.'' Accordingly, of late years, a great variety of particulars, relative
to the individual and to society, have been subjected to this method; and a
considerable increase of positive knowledge, (not otherwise obtainable) has
been acquired. The work before use embraces whatever has been most
satisfactorily demonstrated in this way, together with the results of a vast
many inquiries, instituted by the author himself, and a comprehensive view of
the entire philosophy of the subject, calculated to guide future inquiries in
their researches, and to give a determined direction to moral and
physiological statistics, such as may render them a positive and practical
science.
Upon the most superficial view of the organized structure of man, of the
modes of its action, and even of the most complex itself, it will be found
that there are certain particulars which may be considered as fixed; while
there are others which may admit of considerable variation in different
individuals. Thus, every perfect man has a heart, lungs and stomach, two
hands, and two feet; but every man has not the same complexion, stature,
weight, \&c. All men can run and walk, lift weights, digest alimentary
substances, \&c.\ \&c.; but all men cannot exert equal forces, nor digest
all aliments equally. So, too, all men love and hate, desire to possess
what is good, and to avoid what is evil, and to turn the elements that
surround them, (to the extent of their knowledge and power,) to the purposes
of self-preservation; while scarcely any two exhibit those propensities in
the same kind and degree. A very slight and superficial observance of the
species had taught philosophers, that such variations were confined within
narrow limits; and had enabled them to form an abstract conception of an
imaginary being termed ``man,'' of whom a long series of propositions were
applicable, though not strictly and rigorously predictable of any one
individual man. But while no particular human being is found precisely
identical with this imaginary ``man,'' yet, in any number of men taken at
hazard, there will be observed a manifest tendency to approach to it: and,
the larger the number, the more close will be their average approximation
to that standard. Now, as it is manifest that no general rules could be
formed for the separate government of each man in society, applicable to
his individual nature, or, in other words, that each man should be suffered
to be his own law, it follows that a perfect and complete determination of
the attributes of this abstract being is an essential preliminary to an
efficient discharge of the task of legislation; and it is a matter of
experience, that false and superficial notions of human nature have introduced
some of the most fatal errors in the social institutions of nations. If,
therefore, the application of a scientific method of investigation shall
succeed in giving a greater precision to the received ideas of this point,
a vast and important advantage will be obtained for the species.
Of the many circumstances hitherto attributed to human nature, a
considerable portion are assigned upon a coarse and rude observation; and
others are assumed from refined speculations \textit{\`a priori}
upon the supposed constitution of the animal. The latter have been the
subjects of endless dispute, and the causes of some of the most acrimonious
contentions that have disturbed the peace of society. Of those, the
discussions on free will and necessity are a prominent instance. It is,
perhaps, too much to expect that any extent of observations will suffice to
silence such disputes; and it is but too probable that if such a result were
presumable, the expectation would only serve to discredit the inquiry.
Without, however, looking to the possible attainment of this perfection, it
is abundantly clear that the old methods of seeking to establish the true
nature of the abstract man, which is the subject of legislation, have proved
insufficient to their purpose, and that, therefore, the method of
investigation embraced by the term Statistics, would be worthy of all
attention, although its application had been attended by discoveries far
less striking and satisfactory than those with which works of the description
of M.\ Quetelet's have made us acquainted. It is no small matter to have
ascertained that from amidst the chaos of individual actions, whose sum
embraces what we mean by human life, there arise as the result of every long
series of observations, for the species at large, an order and progression of
moral cause and effects sufficiently precise to become the subject of general
reasonings, and the matter of general regulation; so that definite and precise
consequences may be foretold of definite combinations of antecedents. Nor is
it any objection, that after many very accurate, but, perhaps, still
insufficient observations of fact, individuals have been tempted by an
instinctive desire of obtaining positive results, to generalise hastily, and
have drawn false conclusions. Such errors are inevitable in the progress of
all sciences; but as long as the observations on which they are founded
subsist, they may become, in the hands of subsequent inquirers, the materials
for better and more logical investigation. Thus, for example, it has been
statistically established by M.\ Guerry\footnote{See Athen\ae um, No.\ 303.},
that in certain parts of France, crimes against property are more predominant
than in others; and it has been further shown that these provinces were
precisely those where education most abounded. Hence it was inferred that
education was a cause of the commission of this species of offence. The fact
thus ascertained is not the less a fact for having become the basis of an
illogical conclusion: and subsequent reflexion showing that those provinces
are likewise the richest and most active parts of the empire, renders it
evident that the education and the crime are not cause and effect, but
concurrent effects of a common cause. The legitimate conclusion is, that
in the rich provinces the matter of dishonesty is more abundant, and that,
consequently, in the more usual language of morals, the temptation is greater.
Such errors as these are of daily occurrence in the application of the best
established laws; but they are particularly to be expected in the
investigation of a subject so complicated as the moral nature of man.
They are still, we repeat it, but so many steps to the discovery of the real
relations of things: they are, in fact, errors necessary to the attainment
of truth.
The mode of investigation employed by M.\ Quetelet, in his estimate of
the human faculties, is the same as that adopted in the formation of tables
of mortality, which form the basis of life-insurance policies. The particular
subject being chosen, (suppose the weight of children at birth,) a
considerable number of instances (and the more considerable the better) are
taken, the individuals are weighed, and the result is entered in a tabular
form, by which the extreme limits, the mean average, the proportion in which
individuals deviate from it in various degrees, are easily ascertained.
Every such item, moreover, is capable of being influenced by a variety of
external causes; and the subject, accordingly, requires to be studied in
relation to those causes; when all these have been examined, and the facts
noted, the subject is exhausted, and the average conditions of that subject
very rigorously demonstrated.
Among the various particulars on which information is required, some are
capable of direct reference to known standards, as of weight, measurement,
monetary systems, \&c.: others are cognizable only by their effects. Where
these effects rare physical, we have only to adopt the admitted supposition
that effects are proportionate to their causes, and an indirect measurement
of this last class is no less easily attained than of the first; only greater
attention is required in ascertaining the identity of the circumstances in
which the forces to be measured are exerted. With regard to moral qualities,
the means of reducing them to calculation are less immediately obvious; and
M.\ Quetelet is probably the first philosopher who has made the attempt.
Wherever the manifestations of a moral quality are not purely physical, they
cannot be the subjects of measurement. The number of books or pictures
produced is no test of the powers of the author. So, the courage, the virtue,
the prudence of different individuals cannot, by direct observation, be
reduced to numbers. The imputed absurdity of applying numbers to these cases,
is thus treated by the author.
Suppose two individuals in the daily opportunity of performing acts of
courage with an equal facility; and suppose that, yearly, one of them performs
500 such acts, and the other 300. Now, though these acts may each have a
different specific value, yet, (the two individuals being placed in like
circumstances,) they may be regarded as collectively alike---in both cases.
This being admitted, and also, that causes are as their effects, there
will be no great want of reason in assigning to these individuals courage in
the proportion of 500 to 300, or of 5:3; and this mode of appreciation would
bear a greater character of truth in proportion as the observations extended
over a greater number of years, and as the results varied within narrower
limits. The absurdity of such a calculation, then, must be looked for in the
impossibility, first, of placing the two men in a position equally favourable
to the manifestation of their courage; secondly, of taking an exact account
of their conduct; and, thirdly, of collecting a sufficiency of such
observations as would insure the least possible aberration from truth; or,
in other words, the proportion is only absurd, in so far as its conditions
are impossible to realize.
But, suppose that these two individuals were Frenchmen, and represent,
the one, the mass of Frenchmen between twenty-one and twenty-five years of
age, and the other, those between thirty-five and forty; and suppose that
instead of acts of courage, the question was concerning dishonesties, subject
to the judgement of the criminal tribunals; then, there is reason for
believing that the general tendency to theft is (in France), as regards men
of these respective ages, in the proportion of five to three; and we may
also conclude, that the men from twenty-one to thirty-five (who are, by the
population returns, about as many as those from thirty-five to forty) are
in possession of an equal facility in indulging their propensities to theft,
and that the cases adjudged are of equal gravity in both instances. * * *
In this case we may say then, first, that the individuals are very nearly
placed in the same circumstances; secondly, that if we do not know the acts
of theft they really commit, at least we know the probable ratio of their
propensity; thirdly, that this ratio is the more worthy of confidence,
because it is the result of many years observations, and that it varies
annually within very narrow limits. * * We may, therefore, regard, as highly
probable, that the disposition towards theft of our two individuals, is very
nearly what theory represents it, at least as regards France in its actual
condition.
If then, in a more perfect condition of society than the present, the
same pains were taken to register acts of courage and virtue, as now are
taken with acts of criminality, would not the means exist of measuring the
relative degrees of these qualities at the different epochs of life? The
imputed absurdity, therefore, of attempting to determine this relation for
the average man, is more apparent than real, and depends on the impossibility,
at present existing in the actual conditions of society, of procuring the
necessary elements for the calculation. * * *
For the rest, it is sufficiently clear that this result could not be
obtained by a direct comparison between two individuals, because the facts
would not be numerous enough to warrant confidence in the conclusion, and
because the individuals themselves might vary during the course of the
examination. This is not so with the abstract average man, concerning whom
many observations may be collected in a short time. We could not, by a
comparison between two men, one of from twenty-one to twenty-five, the other
from thirty-five to forty, determine their relative propensities to theft
under equal circumstances, because this propensity might not have been
revealed in a single overt act during the whole course of the observations;
which is not so, when a large number of men of the same age are the subjects
of examination.
It is sufficiently obvious that, as these conclusions are not attainable
by a direct examination of two individuals, so they are not applicable to an
individual case of comparison. If, for example, it were a question between
two servants of twenty-five and of forty-five respectively, and that there
were no other criterion of their honesty than that of their ages, it might
be prudent to choose the elder man on the general principle; but the
probability of error in doing so would be very great indeed. But if, in the
choice of a hundred servants, we were reduced to the same necessity, there is
a probability of five to three that we should benefit by abiding by the rule.
Although, therefor, the ascertained properties of the abstract average man
can never be supposed to belong to any individual, this will still be the
best rule for measuring the condition of society, as long as circumstances
continue the same.
Circumstances, however, change in the same societies with the lapse of
ages, and are different in different societies; and in these instances, the
average and abstract man will have qualities proportionally different.
Philosophy, therefore, in its estimates of human nature has need of a
repetition of the steps of the process; and, as it judges of a society by
observations on the constituent individuals, so, to obtain a perfect
knowledge of human nature, it must compare societies in all ages and climes.
For constructing tables to this end, not even the smallest elements yet exist.
We have only further to observe that, in this search after the average
man, there is nothing new. The very phrase, ``human nature,'' implies that
there is a nature common to all, and distinct from that which exists in each
individual, and such words as \textit{dwarf, giant, precocity, genius}, \&c.,
implying exception, imply also a rule to which that exception refers. The
novelty, if novelty there be, lies only in the attempt to substitute precision
for vagueness, and in seeking in direct observations for the characteristics
which have heretofore been principally deduced, \textit{\`a priori}, from
theoretical principles.
From a consideration of these preliminaries, such of our readers as have
honoured them with an attentive perusal (however previously unacquainted with
the subject) will be able to form some estimate of the vast importance of the
work under consideration---of the large field of inquiry it has opened---
and of the value of the conclusions that may be drawn from it in the business
of education, legislation, and in the many estimates of conduct and
contingencies connected with the daily concerns of life. For example, in
the case of an inquest on a child, found dead, when it is desirable to
ascertain the fact of its having been born alive, and at the full term of
gestation, as a preliminary to a judgement on the probable guilt of the
mother in abandoning it, an increase of security would be attained, if, in
addition to the purely physiological circumstances to be collected from
inspection, were adduced the comparison of its weight and stature with
those assigned to the average child at the hour of birth of the country in
question. So, likewise, if a man be found killed, and nothing decided
offers itself to explain the fact, the known average ratio of suicides to
murders in the general population, would indicate the degree of probability
of his having destroyed himself: and the ratio of suicides in persons of the
same age and sex as the victim would give an additional degree of precision
to the conclusion. In France, the ratio of suicides to murders is as 48:20,
or nearly as 5:2. Supposing, therefore, that there are marks of violence on
a French corpse, which might have arisen equally form either cause, it is
five to two that no murder has been committed; but if the victim is of an
age at which suicides are rare, the probability of murder would be increased;
whereas, in the contrary case, of the age being that at which suicides are
most frequent, the probability would be much reduced.
This probability may perhaps be thought very insufficient ground for a
decision of the whole case; but as a \textit{probability}, to be set against
\textit{any other probability} in the attendant circumstances, it is entitled
to weight.
In a subsequent notice we propose to enter more minutely into the details
of these very interesting volumes.
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From \textit{The Athen\ae um} 15 August 1835, pp. 611--613
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\noindent
\textit{On Man, and the Developement of his Faculties, \&c.}---[\textit{Sur
l'Homme et le D\'eveloppe\-ment de ses Facul\'s \&c.}] By A. Quetelet,
Secretary to the Royal Academy of Brussels. 2 vols.
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[Second Notice.]
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IN our former notice of these volumes, it was attempted to convey to the
general reader an insight into the philosophical principles, on which the
author has proceeded in his inquiries. We shall now notice some of the more
striking results; first, however, promising a word concerning the value of
statistical tables, or the credit which is due to their conclusions. The
doctrine of probabilities depending on the domain of constant causes over
those which are variable and accidental, it follows that the number of
instances to be compared must be considerable, before any conclusion can be
obtained that is worthy of confidence. At every extension of the data, the
value of the consequence rises; and, all other circumstances being equal,
M.\ Quetelet states that the probability of truth is as the square of the
number of observations. The value of a table is likewise affected by the
skill and accuracy of the observer by whom it is constructed; a bad
observation being capable of leading to positive error, which is worse than
absolute ignorance. Of these sources of doubt, it is to be observed, that
the insufficiency of data is a circumstance that declares itself; and the
reader has only to carry in his mind the relative number of instances stated
in any two discordant tables, to decide on their respective trustworthiness.
The comparative accuracy of different observers can only be collected from
internal evidence of the pains taken to avoid error, and of the general
capabilities of the parties.
Although every new series of observations must necessarily add to our
knowledge, either by coinciding with and strengthening foregone conclusions,
or by widening the field of inquiry, or by placing it in new points of view,
yet any considerable series that exhibits a mean result from which the
maximum and minimum departure is in no case very wide, may be regarded, with
safety, as offering a near approach to the truth. This probability is much
increased, when the average of tables, constructed under various
circumstances, and by different observers, coincide, or differ only by
trifling quantities. In the first tables quoted by the author, it appears
from an examination of fourteen millions and a half of births registered in
France during a lapse of fourteen years, that the average number of male
births to female was as 106.38 to 100, and that the annual departure from
their mean result was extremely trifling. The accuracy of this average is,
therefore, highly probable; and the justice of this inference is still further
confirmed by another table, in which thirty of the southern departments only
were tried, and the result found was 105.95 to 100---a deviation from 106.38
remarkably small.
But when the author proceeds to inquire into the effect of climate on a
more extended scale, in influencing the proportion of the sexes born in
different countries, he is obliged to depend upon data taken from different
sources, and, in all probability, of very unequal accuracy; the condition is
thereby divested of some degree of \textit{prima facie} likelihood. It
appears, however, that in a table embracing sixteen of the different states of
Europe, collected from different authorities, the average result is exactly as
106 to 100; and this close approximation to the cipher afforded by the French
tables, re-establishes our confidence in the fidelity of the process. It may
be concluded from this and other similar instances, when every care has been
taken to reject such documents as are manifestly erroneous, and to use the
best evidence attainable of statistical facts, that the smaller differences
in the value of tables, arising out of a more or less accurate registration,
will balance and neutralize each other, and may be safely disregarded.
Although, therefore, the mental qualities, opportunities, \&c. of different
observers are elements not subject to numerical estimation, yet, like, any
other accidental and disturbing causes, they will disappear, whenever the
series of observations is sufficiently extended. All, then, that is
necessarily to the attainment of truth, is the adequate multiplication of
observations, under every imaginable variation of circumstance, until an
average is obtained from the whole, from which the individual departures
lie within the narrowest limits.
M.\ Quetelet commences his researches by the investigation of physical
facts, as being most easily appreciable in numbers. After examining the
general proportion of male to female births, he proceeds to inquire into the
the external circumstances by which this proportion may be partially affected;
and it appears, from a number of male births is relatively less predominant
in cities than in agricultural districts, and less too among illegitimate
than legitimate children. A table, constructed by Mr.\ Babbage, of
observations made in France, Naples, Prussia, Westphalia, and Montpelier,
gives a mean average of 105.75 boys to every 100 girls born in wedlock;
while to the same number of female illegitimates, the males are but as
102.50 to 100.
Of still-born children, the proportion of boys predominates over that
of girls; and that of illegitimate over legitimate children. At Gottingen
the still-born legitimates were 3 per cent.\ on the whole births; while that
of the illegitimates extended to 15 per cent. The probable causes of this
disparity are the agitation of the mother's passions during pregnancy, the
greater physical and social difficulties of her situation, the low rank in
life in which this species of vice predominates, together with the greater
probability of direct efforts to produce abortion. The fact is a striking
illustration of the penal consequences, with which nature itself has
surrounded sexual impurity, and of the decided worldly advantage attendant
on the observance of the moral law.
In Chapter V.\ our author takes up the subject of mortality. In the
north of Europe one death occurs for 41.1 inhabitants; in the centre, for
40.8; in the south, for 33.7. But, if England be excluded, the mortality
of central Europe would be the lowest; indicating the general superior
wholesomeness of temperate climates. Excess of heat seems to be a cause
of shortening human life; but it must not be forgotten that in the countries
near the line, a defective civilization combines with temperature to
exaggerate the results.
Upon the value of the average duration of life, in determining the
relative prosperity of nations, M.\ Quetelet has some excellent remarks:-
``It may be said, that a nation is increasing in prosperity when it produces
fewer citizens, but preserves them longer. This condition is entirely to
the advantage of the population; for if the numbers born are smaller, the
useful subjects are more abundant, and the generations are not so frequently
renewed, to the injury of the state.''
``Man, in his early years, lives at the expense of society. He contracts
a debt, to be repaid at a future day; and if he does not live to discharge
it, his existence has been a burthen to his country. To estimate this
expense, it is sufficient to state that a child, from its birth till it
attains to twelve or sixteen years, cost in the year 1821, in the hospitals
of the Low Countries, 1110 francs\footnote{This sum is inexplicably small.
It probably is the average cost of the entire inmates of these establishments,
of whom a large majority die in the first years of their admission};-- say,
however, only 1000 francs. Every individual, then, who survives infancy,
contracts a sort of debt, which cannot, at least, be less than 1000
francs---the sum thus paid by society for each infant, when abandoned to
charity. In France the annual births amount to 960,000, of which 9/20 die,
before attaining to a serviceable maturity. These 430,000 unfortunates may
be considered as so many strangers, who, without fortune or industry, take
part in the general consumption, and depart without leaving any other trace
of their passage, save eternal regrets. The \textit{expense of their
maintenance, without reckoning the time they have pre-occupied, represents
the enormous sum of} 432 \textit{millions of francs}. If we consider, on
the other hand, the grief that such losses must occasion, which no human
sacrifice can compensate, it will be perceived how important a subject they
afford to the consideration of the legislator and philosopher. It cannot be
too often repeated, that the propensity of states consists less in the
multiplication, than in the preservation of their component members.''
This reflection gives a new item in the long account between mankind
and their governors, on the score of useless wars, by which so many are
cut off at the moment of their incipient utility, and the greatest possible
waste is occasioned of the national resources. In connection with this
subject, we quote a remark of the author, that ``there exists a fixed
relation between mortality and fecundity, or that the number of births is
regulated by that of the deaths.'' In a certain sense this is true; for,
supposing an epidemic to have thinned a population, it is to be presumed
that the next generation will marry earlier and in greater numbers: but,
as a general proposition, it should seem that the deaths are rather to be
considered as a dependency on the births, than as a cause of their increase.
One great cause of a large mortality in any population, is the hardship
which surrounds infancy, among the lower classes. Now, such hardship must
obviously increase, as the circumstances of the poor deteriorate, and
\textit{vice vers\^a}. But an undue increase of population is a leading
cause of this deterioration; and, therefore, an excessive increase in the
cipher of births, will generally produce a corresponding increase in the
cipher of deaths. In this matter, however, when all things are considered,
there may be a recurrent cycle of causes and effects.
``At Vareggio, (says M.\ Bossi, in his `Statistique du D\'epartment de
l'Ain,') in the principality of Lucca, a small number of inhabitants, in a
deplorable state of misery and barbarity, were from time immemorial annually
attacked with intermittents. But in the year 1741 sluices were constructed
to oppose the entrance of the sea into the low lands, which had been
previously flooded on the recurrence of high tides and tempests, the marshes
disappeared, and with them the fevers; and at present this canton is one of
the healthiest, most industrious, and richest spots on the Tuscan coast;
and the vigour, longevity, and moral character of the people, are all
proportionately improved.''
``So also,'' according to M.\ Villerm, `in the Isle of Ely, from 1813
to 1830, of 10,000 deaths of all ages, 4731 occurred before the attainment
of the tenth year; while in the other agricultural districts the average was
but 3505: and between the ages of ten and forty, the deaths in Ely were 3712,
while the general average, as before, was only 3142.''
Here is to be observed, the concurrence of a direct morbific cause of
mortality, with an indirect social agency, dependent on the poverty and
destitution of the population. In this case, it is likely that the malaria,
in carrying off its contingent, merely supplied the place of a variety of
other diseases, the usual concomitants of hardship, which would have acted,
had the population been simply overstocked, and the district been naturally
healthy. Accordingly, the same author, from a series of observations made
at Paris, has come to a conclusion, that wealth and poverty in the different
arrondissements of that city, are more influential upon the duration of life,
than all the circumstances together which may be considered as capable of
affecting the climate of specific localities.
In his inquiries on the influence of sex upon mortality, M.\ Quetelet
states that ``there exists a peculiar cause of mortality, which presses on
male infants before and immediately after birth. Of the still-born, the
number of males is as 3 to 2; while, between birth and the completion of the
two first months, the mortality is as 4 to 3, nearly; and during the three
following months as 5 to 4.
``From fourteen to eighteen, the mortality of females increases; between
twenty-one and twenty-six, that of the male; and from twenty-six to thirty
(the average epoch of marriage,) the deaths are equal; but during the period
of fecundity, the female mortality again sensibly increases; and after that
time it again diminishes, so that the deaths of the two sexes subsequently
occur in the proportion to the respective actual numbers then surviving.''
From those results, it may be concluded that the law of developement,
in the two sexes, is not precisely the same, a fact of which we have
physiological evidence. There is nothing in external circumstances, to
explain the early mortality of the males. The increasing mortality of
females, towards puberty, is more easily accounted for, partly by
physiological causes, and partly by errors in the management of female
youth. The decrease of mortality among old women is probably a consequence
of the stronger animals only surviving the accidents of earlier life.
In touching on the influence of peace and war, M.\ Quetelet justly
remarks, that statistical tables may lead to false conclusions, if employed
without due consideration. Of two countries, for example, in a state of war,
one may suffer during its continuance by actual losses in battle, fatigue,
and privations, and by a consequent diminution in the chances of marriage,
or in the importation of corn; while another may not be sensibly affected by
any of these calamities. Mr.\ Sadler, deceived by the statistical tables
concerning England, is led to deny the influence of war; whereas a comparative
table of deaths, births, and marriages for Belgium and Holland, during ten
years before, and ten years after the peace of 1814, shows that the precise
reverse was the truth in that country.
With respect to the influence of wealth on mortality, Mons.\ Quetelet
notices the fact, ``that of the persons insured at the Equitable Society,
a class eminently at its ease, only one in 81.5 died during the year 1800;
while, on the contrary, among the black slave population, one out of every
five or six perish annually; the general mortality of the negro soldiers in
the British army being only one in 33.3.''
On this head, the author most judiciously observes, ``the word riches
requires explanation. A great abundance of wealth is often only a means of
indulging the passions in excess. The most favourable condition of a people
is that which affords it the real means of providing for the real wants of
nature, without intemperance, and without the creation of fictitious wants.
In general, therefore, as Mons.\ de Tracy observes,\footnote{Commentary on
Montesquieu's `Esprit des Lois,' chap.\ xvi.---We take the opportunity of
recommending this work, of a profound and original thinker, to the English
public. Whether a translation would \textit{pay}, may be a matter of doubt;
but a translation is wanting to our literature; and some one of the
knowledge-diffusing political societies could not employ its money to more
advantage than by undertaking the task.} the people are, in this
sense, richer in nations that are counted poor, than in those esteemed
wealthy. In England, the richest of nations, a large portion of the
population subsists on charity. The rich provinces of Flanders, in like
manner, count more paupers than Luxembourg, a province where great fortunes
are rare, but where the population at large is in a state of ease. The
same is the case with Switzerland, and generally with most agricultural
countries.''\footnote{We forebear to draw the political consequences of
this statistical truth. They merit, however, the serious attention of a
nation in which so many institutions tend powerfully to promote the
concentration of property into a few hands.}
At page 220 are some curious facts respecting the influence
of professions on mortality, collected by Dr.\ Caspar, of Berlin, from which
it appears, that ``head work is more injurious than bodily labour; but that
the combination of the two is the most wearing. A sedentary life, free
from all excesses, is, on the contrary, the condition most favourable to
life.'' ``Of all professions, that of a physician, according to Dr.\
Caspar, is the most wearing; while that of the divine occupies the other
extreme of the scale. Of 100 divines, 42 reached 70 years and upwards---of
100 physicians, 24 only attained that age.---Of a thousand deaths, between
the ages of 23 and 62 inclusive, the years of greatest professional activity,
there were---of physicians, 601---of divines, 345.
In p.\ 233, is a table taken from the observations of Messrs.\ Baumann
and S\"ussmilch, showing that the deaths of illegitimate children born who
arrive at maturity, are, to that of the legitimate, as 12.3 to 7; and it
further is collected, that not more than a tenth of the illegitimate
children born arrive at maturity. Mons.\ Benoiston de Chateauneuf, in his
Considerations on Foundlings, is quoted at p.\ 233, for the astounding fact,
that of 19,420 foundlings received during 20 years into the hospital at
Dublin,\footnote{See report of the proceedings of the Statistical Section of
the British Association, in this day's \textit{Athen\ae um}.} only two
thousand were remaining alive at the end of that term. The following, taken
from the tables of Mons.\ Gouroff, is conclusive as to the mischievous effect
of Foundling Hospitals on the morals of a people: ``Mayenne, from 1799 to
1811, had no establishment were taken indiscriminantly; and in that period,
thirty infants only were exposed. Napoleon established a `\textit{tour},' or
machine for receiving children, without discovering the exposer; and between
November 1811 and March 1815 (when the Duke of Hesse Darmstadt suppressed it)
516 infants were received. In the nine following years, the number of exposed
was again reduced to nine. The same authority states, ``that the mortality in
foundling hospitals is frightful, while infanticide is scarcely prevented by
their institutions, and that the destruction of human life they occasion is
out of all proportion to the numbers they rescue.''
From certain tables of helpful practice in England, it appears that there
dies one patient in 16---In the H\^otel Dieu one in 6.8---In the Pit\'e one
in 8.2---In the Imperial Hospital, Petersburg, one in 4.5---In San Mateo, at
Pavia, one in 10.7---In the clinical wards of Prof.\ Tommasini, at Bologna,
one in 7.7.
On this subject, Mr.\ Hawkins states that the relative mortality rarely
depends on the treatment. A friend took notes of the mortality under three
physicians, in the same hospital. One was an eclectic, one an expectant
practitioner, and the third a follower of the tonic system. The mortality
was the same in each instance; but the duration of the diseases, and the
nature of their convalescence differed very widely. It is probable that
a more extended table would make the deaths more proportionate to the
protracted duration of the convalescencies.
Relative to the effect of institutions on mortality, we find that at
Velvorde, a Belgian prison, there died in 1802, one prisoner in 1.27 [!]
of the mean population of the establishment---while, in 1817, the deaths
were reduced to one in 30.36. ``One may judge,'' says Mons.\ Quetelet,
``from what has been stated, whether man, delivered to himself, and
yielding to every excess, could, in any state of society, aggravate his
mortality more, than a negligent and ignorant administration has often
done. Never, in the most dreadful plagues, in the most destructive wars,
was the mortality equal to that at Velvorde, at the beginning of the century.''
On the general question of population, Mons.\ Quetelet agrees very closely
with the views of Malthus, which he reduces to the following formul\ae :-
``Population tends to increase in a geometrical ratio. The sum of the
obstacles, which are opposed to this tendency is, \textit{c\ae teris
paribus}, as the square of the rapidity of actual increase,''---another
instance of the analogy often found to subsist between mechanical laws and
those which govern human action. ``Never, therefore, can population advance
so rapidly as to strike with violence upon its utmost possible limit. In
approaching that limit, the obstacles must multiply too rapidly to admit of a
shock. Nature will, it is true, levy her tribute of deaths in proportion to
the nearness of approach; but, that debt being paid in detail, it will be
sensible than if levied at once.''
This is the actual state of most European populations. A large tribute
of deaths is taken, by crime and privation, but destructive famines are rare.
Among many curious and refined observations respecting the the inferences to
be drawn from the population, we find the following:---
``There is a difficulty which merits particular attention, for the
importance of its solution to many questions of statistics and political
economy; it relates to the inquiry whether two populations may not have the
same ratio of births to deaths, and yet have two different durations of
life resulting from a difference in the order of mortality, in relation to
the ages of the defunct.
``Suppose, for greater simplicity, the same people to have annually
the same number of births and deaths, if, at the end of one year a table
were constructed, the average mean duration of life might perhaps be
thirty years. The next year, the mortality occurring in the same manner,
and in the same proportions, would give the same result. But if the list
of deaths for the second year, a child of one year old were substituted
for a man of forty, which would not alter the ratio of deaths to births,
the mean average of life would be shorter, because there would be a loss
of thirty-nine years. But by this change, thought the mean average was
lessened, society would be a gainer; because a useful man was preserved
in place of an expensive infant.
``This serves to prove how much we should be on our guard against
calculations of the mean duration of life, made on a small number of annual
observations, and concerning a people either prospering or declining.''
It shows, too, the folly of depending on this criterion alone, for
estimating the prosperity of a nation.
The subject of population concludes the first volume. The contents of
the second and more important, we shall reserve for a third notice.
\bigskip\bigskip
\noindent
From \textit{The Athen\ae um}, 29 August 1835, pp. 658--661.
\medskip
\noindent
\textit{On Man, and the Developement of his Faculties, \&c.}---[\textit{Sur
l'Homme et le D\'eveloppe\-ment de ses Facut\'es \&c.}] By A. Quetelet,
Secretary to the Royal Academy of Brussels. 2 vols.
\begin{center}
[Third Notice.]
\end{center}
\noindent
PASSING over such parts of M.\ Quetelet's work as treat of certain
physiological properties of man, such as his stature, weight, physical
force, \&c., in favour of newer and more interesting matter, we arrive at
his chapters on the `Developement of the Moral and Intellectual Qualities.'
This, which is the most original part of the essay, presents phenomena of
great interest to society---phenomena which, in this country at least, have
hitherto been little studies; but which are now occupying considerable
attention among statistical inquirers.
The first chapter treats of the developement of the intellectual
faculties, and commences with an account of the mode in which the author
proposes to investigate the facts.
The field (he observes) is immense; and, in the present state of the
science, little more can be offered than a few simple indications, which
may serve as land-marks to denote the first attempts at taking possession
of the subject. * * * The intellectual faculties can only be appreciated
by their effects, that is, by the actions or works they produce. In
attributing to a nation, as to an individual, all the works which it has
produced, we may judge of its fecundity and intellectual force, as compared
with those of any other nation; abstraction being however made of the
obstacles which have impeded their respective energies. Then, again, by
taking an account of the ages at which the several authors produced these
works, we have the necessary elements for estimating the law under which
their intellectual powers were developed. To render this knowledge more
precise, a classification should be made of the different sorts of
productions, such as musical, mathematical, literary, philosophic, \&c., by
which we may arrive at the general conclusion. The inquiry should be
extended from nation to nation to determine how far the developement of the
faculties is affected by the influence of localities.
As an example of what may be effected in this way, the author tries the
dramatic talent of France and England by observations on the
chefs-d'\oe uvre of forty-seven French authors, and twenty-four English,
taken respectively from `Picard's Repertoire,' and the `British Theatre.'
In attributing to the works of these authors equal literary value, there
is an obvious inaccuracy; but, though they all vary amongst each other in
poetic merit, \&c., yet it is to be supposed that the variation is not
greater on the French side, than on the English; and that, therefore, the
accuracy of the general conclusion is not affected by the error. The whole
works of these authors are arranged in tabular form, and from this table it
appears that, in both countries, the dramatic talent does not show itself
before the age of twenty; that between twenty-five and thirty, it exists
in considerable intensity, and goes on increasing till fifty or fifty-five.
From that age it undergoes a sudden and abrupt declension, which would be
more marked, if the quality of the works were taken into consideration, as
well as their numbers. In comparing the two nations, there is an apparent
advantage on the side of England, on the point of superior precocity; but
this, the author is inclined to attribute to the manner in which the numbers
were obtained, and to the difficulty which French authors have experienced
in getting their works represented in the theatre.
Another curious fact (says Mons.\ Quetelet), obtained from the tables
which I have constructed, is, that tragic talent shows itself earlier than
comic. The finest comedies on the French stage were not produced till the
authors had attained to between thirty-eight and forty years of age, nor is
there a single work belonging to \textit{la haute Com\'edie}, which was
written earlier than at thirty.
The author appears to attribute this relative precocity of tragic talent
to its nearer connexion with the epoch of exultation of the passions; but,
to us, it seems clear, that comedy, turning, as it does, on the ridicules
of society, requires a longer knowledge of the world, and a better-worked
intellect, for its production, than tragedy---which depends chiefly on that
which is most general in human nature, and may be learned from books.
In order to determine the point (he adds), the best method would be, to
trace the law which governs the developement of talent in respect to music,
painting, and whatever else tends to call the passions into play; and to
study, on the other hand, those faculties which seem the least connected
with imagination and the passions. It will appear in the subsequent pages,
that the age of twenty-five is the epoch of the maximum energy of the
passions; so that, if there be an art which depends on that energy, and does
not require great previous acquirements, its maximum must also appear about
the age of twenty-five. The intellectual faculties arise, increase and
decline in the progress of life; and each attains its maximum at a determinate
epoch. It would be important to determine the extreme limits of this
scale---namely, the faculty which arrives the first to maturity, and that
which is the latest at its maximum; because these would necessarily be simple,
and totally independent of all collateral causes.
Under the head of mental alienation, it is remarked, that ``if it be
true that lunacy follows the developement of the intelligence, that fact
will afford a measure of the accuracy of the preceding conclusions. We
have already seen that between thirty and fifty is the epoch of maximum
dramatic production in France: it is also the epoch that produces the most
numerous and obstinate cases of mental alienation. The intellect commences
its developement at twenty-five, the time when the physical developement is
completed. At this period also commences the maximum tendency to crime.''
On this subject, the author adds, in a note, ``I am of the opinion, that the
causes which tend to produce mental alienation, influence also the number of
crimes, especially those against the person. There is not, however, any
direct numerical relation between the two quantities, because crimes are
committed through other influences than that of insanity.''
In page 130, vol.\ 2, mention is made of a work on insanity by Mons.\
Fabret, from which the following conclusions are drawn:---
The number of female lunatics is about one-third more than that of males.
The month of July is the period of most frequent attack for the females,
while it is the third only in the scale, as applicable to man. There is
about a fourth more bachelors than married men insane. Males are chiefly
attacked between thirty and thirty-nine, women between forty and forty-nine.
Melancholy predominates among women, a tendency towards suicide among men.
The second chapter treats on the developement of moral qualities, a
subject hitherto nearly untouched. To estimate this element in any of its
particulars (as, for instance, in what relates to prudence), recourse must
be had to an appreciation of the overt acts which each quality originates.
To proceed with the inquiry, the greatest number of instances possible should
be collected, due attention being paid to the identity of position of the
several parties. In the choice of these materials, their classification
and discussion, the greatest sagacity and rectitude of intention is necessary.
The first observers would probably fall into many errors; but, even errors
would not be useless to the future inquirers, provided candour and
impartiality presided over the investigation: but the conducting such
researches under the influence of preconceived ideas, would be a fatal
impediment to the progress of the science. If accurate information could
be obtained of the statistics of savings banks, insurance-offices of all
sorts, and all other institutions which have foresight for their object,
and if the documents contained the ages, sexes, and professions, \&c.,
of the individuals who availed themselves of the institutions, enough would
be known to make an approximate solution of the question. In aid of these
sources of information might be applied (under the necessary precautions)
whatever could be gathered concerning the number and value of objects
deposited with pawnbrokers, which would afford a sort of measure for the
improvidence, as well of the distress, of the people. The number of
bankruptcies, tippling-house, gaming-tables, \&c., might be brought also to
throw light on the subject. The author quotes the table constructed by
Mr.\ Babbage of drunkards brought before the police of London in 1832;
from this table (as far as it can be relied upon), we may set down the
female tipplers of London to the males as being two to three, a dreadful
conclusion against the morality of the lower classes of women.\footnote{``It
requires to have been long an inhabitant of London,'' says M.\ Quetelet,
``and to be well acquainted with its peculiarities, to be able to draw
the proper conclusions from such numbers as these.'' The remark is of great
importance. In the case before us, the numbers quoted are those of the
two sexes respectively \textit{taken up} for drunkenness by the police.
These embrace only the more profligate class, who are abroad in the streets
at undue hours; and of these, the number of men and women are probably in
somewhere about the ratio above given. Without the knowledge of this fact,
a very false inference would be drawn from the cipher.}
In directing inquiry to the industry and productive faculties of a nation,
any defect in positive information might be supplied from a consideration of
the value of its revenues, the nature of the taxes, the imports and exports,
the price of land, and the rate of wages; and, above all, the state of the
population. From these sources it appears, that France, as compared with
England, is less peopled, has fewer inhabitants of cities, and fewer
manufacturers. The revenue of England is double that of France, and its
exports, population for population, three to one. In Europe, Russia excepted
(and Ireland also), the numbers employed in agriculture are per square mile
nearly equal throughout; the surplus production of each nation must therefore
indicate the state of its manufacturing industry, or nearly so.
The statistics of charitable institutions form a branch of this inquiry,
but the author was compelled to pass it over, for want of the necessary
documents.
Under the head of Moral Developement, Mons.\ Quetelet places his
observations on suicides and duels. There is to be remarked (says our
author, commenting upon the tables he produces, relative to these acts),
a fearful agreement in the results of different years; and this uniformity
extends to all crimes in general. He notices, however, in a note, the
tendency of imitation to produce temporary changes in the modes of suicide.
The same observation might likewise be applied to all actions that are
attended with extraordinary circumstances; of which the offence of Burking
affords a remarkable instance.
As might be expected from what has been said of mental alienation, the
summer season is marked by an increase in suicides. According to Dr.\
Casper, the suicides in cities are to those in the country, \textit{c\ae teris
paribus}, as 14 to 4. In Berlin, the male suicides were to the females as
5 to 1. According to the `Recherces Statistiques de Paris,' the ratio is
nearly as 2 to 1. These deviations from a common average, are too wide to
allow of any general deduction, except that of referring them to a difference
in the moral condition of females in the different cities.
From M.\ Fairet's work the author deduces, that of male suicides (we
presume in Paris), the largest number are bachelors; of female suicides, the
larger number are married, which may be justly explained by the greater number
of evils which sexual errors bring with them in society on the female. Of
suicides under fifteen years of age, the females double the number of males.
With reference to the means of destruction, the males prefer the pistol and
the knife; women prefer poison, voluntary falls from elevated places, and
suffocation by charcoal.
Chapter III.\ treats of the general nisus to crime. In this chapter
Mons.\ Quetelet goes over a great deal of ground which we have already
discussed with our readers in our review of Mons.\ Guerry's `Essai sur la
Statistique Morale de la France.' It may however be necessary to state,
that Mons.\ Quetelet's first work on the Statistics of Crime appeared before
the publication of this Essay. Supposing men to be placed in equal
circumstances, the greater or less possibility of their committing crime
constitutes this nisus. Mons.\ Quetelet's object is to determine the
influence of the seasons, of climate, sex, and age, upon this datum. In
a note (p. 164) he quotes an article on the statistics of crime, by M.\
Adolphe de Candolle, of Geneva, which states the disposition to crime to
be composed of the relative morality of the individual---the temptation to
which he is exposed---and the facility attendant on the commission of the
specific offence: of these, he says, the first belongs to the individual,
and the other two to externals. The distinction may have its value in
certain points of view; but even individual morality is derived in part
from society, as well through precept as through example. All the world
is aware of the sudden and appalling degradation which follows the
incarceration of young offenders among the veterans in crime.
In judging the general disposition to crime from the returns of criminal
tribunals, it is scarcely necessary to state, that the constancy of the
ratio between known and undiscovered offences, must be taken for granted.
This will, of course, vary in different states of society, and under
different judicial arrangements. It must differ also with respect to
different crimes; for all do not provoke an equal vigilance on the part of
society to repress them. With respect to the same country, and civilized
condition, however, these elements may be taken as constant, and therefore
may be disregarded: of the safety of overlooking them, the constancy of
the results hitherto obtained is an additional guarantee.
In France, it appears from the \textit{Comptes g\'en\'eraux de
l'administration de la Justice}, that during four years preceding 1830, there
was an average of one accusation in 4,463 inhabitants. Of 100 accused,
there were 61 convictions; and, as these averages have, on repeated
observation, been found to be remarkably constant, it becomes highly
probable that they very nearly represent the true state of criminality
of the country, and that safe indications may be drawn from them, as to
what may be expected in the future.
This possibility (Mons.\ Quetelet feelingly remarks) of assigning
beforehand the number of accused and condemned, which any community may
expect, is a matter of very serious reflection, since it involves the
fate of thousands of individuals, who are impelled, in a manner that may
be called irresistible, upon the tribunals and scaffolds that await them.
The reflection applies alike to individuals and to legislative bodies:
over both, the horrible notion of public vengeance still holds too powerful
a sway; and the sentiment which inspires it is the more carefully to be
guarded against, because it is instinctive,--- a part of those brute
instincts, which require all the instincts of reason to keep in check:
the wise alone are truly merciful.
Subsequently to the author's writing the chapter under consideration,
two more volumes of the 'Comptes Rendus' of the French tribunals have
appeared, including the years 1830,1. After giving, in a note, the general
result of this additional information, Mons.\ Quetelet remarks upon it, that
the revolution has made but a trifling difference in the numbers of accused.
The number of acquitted is a little increased; and the same alteration has
occurred likewise in Belgium, where institutions have been equally popularized.
In comparing the criminal returns of France and Belgium, a circumstance
is mentioned worthy of observation. In the trials for offences against
property in Belgium, the acquittals are to the condemnations as 16 to 84,
or 1 to 5 nearly; while in France they were as 39 to 61, or nearly 3 to 5.
In France, the trials are before a jury: in Belgium, before judges. The
probability, therefore, is that the want of skill of jurymen\footnote{The
operations of the jury in France are not yet conducted with all that
\textit{tact}, which a long experience has given to the jurymen of England.
It is probable, likewise, that the forced unanimity of English juries tends
to produce a salutary rigour, where the punishments are not disproportioned
to the offence. We, ourselves, at least, are inclined to believe, that there
exists among Frenchmen a sickly sentimentality on the subject of estimating
evidence against the accused, which is not manifested in the verdicts of
Englishment.} in sifting evidence may explain a part of this great difference:
but it is probable that a superior caution in admitting accusations on slight
probabilities, may also go for something.
In examining the question of the influence of professions, education,
\&c., on crime, a relative table of crimes against person and property in
France for the years 1828--9 is quoted, distinguishing four degrees of
education from zero to the highest. The result shows, that the educated
commit more crimes of violence, in proportion to their offences against
property, than the illiterate: the difference being respectively
$\frac{1}{2.6}$ and $\frac{1}{3.2}$. It does not, however, appear, whether
this should be taken as an inference against education, or, what is infinitely
more probable, as a consequence of the few offences against property committed
by the upper and middle classes of society. Want of space precludes our
following the author through the very interesting details with which he
pursues this inquiry.
The discussions into which M.\ Quetelet enters respecting the influence
of race, afford little or nothing for extract. Of all the different causes
which operate on social life, that is, perhaps, the one most difficult to
trace, with any practical effect; the populations of modern Europe being
so mixed and amalgamated, that little of positive can be concluded concerning
them.
On the influence of the seasons on crime (in France), M.\ Quetelet
gives the following \textit{r\'esum\'e}---
The epoch of the maximum of crimes against persons coincides nearly with
that of the minimum of crimes against property---namely, during the summer:
in winter, the order is precisely reversed. In January, the offences against
property are nearly four times as numerous as those against the person; in
June, they are only as 2 to 3. This may be explained by the consideration
that, in winter, distress and destitution are the most severely felt; whereas,
in summer, the passions are in a state of excessive exaltation.
As to the influence of sex, it appears that, in France, there are
twenty-six accusations against females in every hundred for offences against
property; in those against the person, the proportion is $\frac{16}{100}$: and
it is further to be noted, that this ratio of 16 to 26 is that which subsists
between the physical forces of the two sexes. The particular inferences
derivable from such general statements must, however, be subjected to a nice
scrutiny in weighing all the details of difference in position, temptation,
and defence, which surround the two sexes. The same weakness and social
dependence of the female on the male, and the same circumvallation of forms
and etiquettes, which have a tendency to preserve a woman in the bosom of
society from the commission of crimes, tell against her in causing an
exaggeration of criminality, when once she has been driven to break through
its lines, and becomes an outcast.
Of all the causes which influence the nisus to crime, age is the most
considerable. The physical forces---the passions---the reason of man (the
three elements which are most closely connected with the age of the subject),
taken as data, will alone nearly suffice to determine at every epoch of life,
what may be expected relative to the criminality of the population attaining
to it. The entrance into the career of criminality is naturally about the
epoch at which the youth is compelled to assume self-dependence. The
corruptions, however, of the capital have advanced that epoch, for the
children of the extreme poor and the abandoned: we therefore suspect that
tables, modelled upon French society, would not coincide with those of London,
and of the manufacturing districts of England.
The proposition, so generally received, that poverty begets crime, Mons.\
Quetelet observes, requires modification. The poorest provinces are often
the most moral. In confirmation of this, we can state, that dishonesty is a
rare crime among the starving population of the south of Ireland. This, in
part, arises form the absence of the matter of criminality; and, in part,
from the means of secreting and exchanging the stolen property. A certain
degree of movement in society is necessary to the prevalence of certain
offences.
In the fourth book, Mons.\ Quetelet enters upon his r\'esum\'e of the average
e man---that is, on the philosophy of the facts contained in the three
preceding books. The subject is not, he observes, a matter of mere idle
speculation, since this ideal abstraction is the centre of gravity, on which
the movement of society turns.
In reference to the arts and literature, the consideration of the average
man of the particular epochs and nations which afford the subjects of study,
is a matter of known importance. How false are those productions in which
the author has overlooked the colouring and costume of the times, or the
common attributes which distinguish one nation from another; and how
necessary, on the other hand, is it to rise above these considerations, and
to know what remains to average humanity, when all such local and temporary
attributes are abstracted, in order that the protagonist, (placed under what
circumstances he may,) shall still exhibit the feelings and passions of a
man. Of the necessity of referring to the average man in matters of art, we
may refer to an article `On Certainty in Taste,' in the \textit{Athen\ae um}
(No.\ 366), in which our correspondent has adopted some of the opinions of
the author now before us. In the development of art and literature, mankind
have hitherto been content with such vague generalities, as are included in
Horace's Art of Poetry; and even these have not always been made the most of.
The love-sick heroes of the French tragedy are at total variance with the
average man of Greece and Rome, which they are meant to represent. We
cordially agree with M.\ Quetelet, that, in the interest of art, there can
be no harm in giving a greater precision to our ideas on this subject; but
we are still inclined to think, that precision of knowledge is less a
\textit{desideratum} in the present state of the arts, than discrimination
in applying what is known. The arts deal principally in generalities; and
we doubt whether statistics will add materially to the resources of the
Wilkies and the Walter Scotts.
The value of statistical tables for determining the average man in
relation to the natural and medical sciences, is self-evident. All medical
theories repose upon the supposition of such an abstraction; as all medical
practice turns on the observation and calculation of the several divergencies
from it, peculiar to each individual patient. Hitherto the determination of
the several attributes in health and in disease, of this ideal being, has
been too vague and general, and medical theory consequently has been, and
is, subject to endless and vexatious uncertainty and variation.
Considering the average man in relation to the moral and intellectual
attributes, Mons. Quetelet examines many points concerning the difference
between the average man of a peculiar type and country, and the average
type of humanity, with a view to determining in what particulars man is a
stationary, and in what a perfectible, being. This section of the work is
full of curious and ingenious remark, and it will well repay the perusal.
In the following opinion, however, we cannot exactly agree. ``If,'' it is
observed, ``an individual at any given epoch of society possessed all the
qualities of the average man, he would represent all that is great, good,
or beautiful.'' We question whether, in such a being, the springs of action
would not be so accurately balanced as to neutralize each other. The machine,
we imagine, would want momentum, and its symmetry would want character.
Our conception of the great, good, and beautiful, we rather think, contains,
in a certain degree, the idea of excess; so that it is no play upon words to
say, that the ``homme moyen'' would be a mediocre personage. ``but,''
continues our author, ``this perfect identity cannot exist for individuals;
they only resemble the average man in a few points;'' and the reason, as it
appears to us, is, that certain attributes in their perfection are physical
and moral incompatibles. Is not a certain degree of physical insensibility
necessary to the \textit{beau id\'eal} of courage?---a certain indifference
to externals necessary to the power of profound generalization?---a certain
defect in the power of considering things in their unity, necessary in the
power of noting and imitating individual details in the arts, \&c.? The idea
of perfection, then, is not, we think, to be sought in an uniformity of
individuals, but in their endless variety, and in the balancing of their
several attributes in social co-operation. In this sense, there is some
truth in the remark of Mons.\ Cousin, quoted by our author, where he says,
or seems to say, ``a great man is the result of an harmony between a particular
and a general nature.''
Mons. Quetelet next shortly examines the average man in reference to
politics, and concludes his work by a chapter on the ulterior progress to
be looked for, in this branch of science, and a review of the means requisite
for giving perfection to an inquiry, which is, at present, only in its
infancy. It is obvious, from the perusal of M.\ Quetelet's work, that in
giving the scanty and imperfect observations which hitherto have been made
on the statistics of our moral and intellectual nature, his great object
is to solicit public attention to a neglected subject; and to awaken
curiosity to the mass of latent knowledge that is within the reach of
exploitation. The zeal with which this new science has been taken up,
promises a rapid accumulation of facts; but the progress of the science
will mainly depend upon the critical sagacity which shall be brought to
their appreciation. If speculative philosophy must gain by the use of
statistical tables, the tables will, on the other hand, require all the
lights of philosophy to interpret. The formulation, therefore, of a sound
critical canon is a primary desideratum; and it is to a writer of Quetelet's
elevated intellectual character, that the public will naturally look for
such a work. To a certain extent, the volumes before us may serve as a
guide to the subject; but the subject is scarcely more than sketched; and
the author cannot better follow up his publication than by a formal discussion
of this branch of his subject.
We have bestowed more space upon M.\ Quetelet's highly-important
``Essay'' than comports perhaps with the general interests of our journal;
yet, at every step of our very imperfect analysis, we have been cribbed and
confined by the quality of the matter, and compelled to leave untouched much
that is valuable and curious. To the zeal and perseverance of the author,
the science is deeply indebted for much of the progress it has made, and for
much of the importance it has recently acquired in the eyes of philosophical
Europe. We consider the appearance of these volumes as forming an epoch in
the literary history of civilization.
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