This set provides a definitive scholarly variorum edition of Malthus' An Essay on the Principle of Population. The edition is based on the second edition of 1803, the work upon which Malthus' repuation as a population theorist and political economist was first built. It shows those parts of the work that incorporated the first edition of 1798, and gives all the variations introduced by Malthus in each of the subsequent editions (1806, 1807, 1817 and 1826). In addition to revealing the nature and extent of Malthus' changes, whether by expansion or excision, the edition reprints the important Appendices added in 1806 and 1817, giving answers to his critics. The work is introduced by the editor and contains a complete bibliography of all the authorities quoted by Malthus, together with extensive explanatory notes. Paricia James has previously edited Robert Malthus' travel diaries (1966) and written an authoritative biography of Malthus, Population Malthus: His Life and Times (1979).
