Tuesday, December 18, 2007

Chesterton and Christmas, Part II

Explanation in my last post.


18 December

When, in "[A] Christmas Carol," Scrooge refers to the surplus population, the Spirit tells him, very justly, not to speak till he knows what the surplus is and where it is. The implication is severe but sound. When a group of superciliously benevolent economists look down into the abyss for the surplus population, assuredly there is only one answer that should be given to them; and that is to say, "If there is a surplus, you are a surplus." And if anyone were ever cut off, they would be. —Charles Dickens

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes i always say the over-populationers should kill themselves to help the situation! You can imagine how well received that is! God bless & a blessed Christmas..

John Jansen said...

MJPMJ—

Yea, verily.

My friend and co-worker Eric Scheidler touched upon this issue in a post on our work blog earlier this year titled "Babies Are Eating the Planet".

Happy Christmas to you and yours too!