ignifies indigence or want of riches, and has been the lot of a large portion of men in every age. Whether, on the whole, it has been productive of good or bad consequences, has been disputed. In a moral view, perhaps it has been, on the whole, useful, as adversity is in general more conducive to virtue than prosperity, which too often leads to luxury and vice.—Sometimes, however, poverty has had a baneful effect upon the mind, and has prompted men to commit very inhuman actions; but this in civilized communities very seldom occurs. In a political view, poverty is thought by some to be hurtful: Raynal thinks it is a check to population (see his History, vol. vi. p. 471.); and Dr Smith so far agrees with him; for though he affirms, and indeed proves, that poverty is no check to the production of children, he allows it to be very unfavourable to raising them. See Political Economy; and also Smith's Wealth of Nations, vol. i. p. 119, &c.