"A man who is born into a world already possessed, if he cannot get subsistence from his parents on whom he has a just demand, and if the society do not want his labour, has no claim of right to the smallest portion of food, and, in fact, has no business to be where he is. At nature's mighty feast there is no vacant cover for him. She tells him to be gone, and will quickly execute her own orders, if he does not work upon the compassion of some of her guests. If these guests get up and make room for him, other intruders immediately appear demanding the same favour. The report of a provision for all that come, fills the hall with numerous claimants. The order and harmony of the feast is disturbed, the plenty that before reigned is changed into scarcity; and the happiness of the guests is destroyed by the spectacle of misery and dependence in every part of the hall, and by the clamorous importunity of those, who are justly enraged at not finding the provision which they had been taught to expect. The guests learn too late their error, in counter-acting those strict orders to all intruders, issued by the great mistress of the feast, who, wishing that all guests should have plenty, and knowing she could not provide for unlimited numbers, humanely refused to admit fresh comers when her table was already full."
— Malthus T.R. 1798. An essay on the principle of population. This controversial passage only appears in the second edition. Later editions omit it completely.
They removed their shoes and sat on the edge of the riverbank, allowing their feet to slide into the cool water as they ate. Albus pointed out the silvery trout that drifted under the river's surface like submarine ghosts. Occasionally the trout would nibble at their toes, causing a gentle tickling sensation. Gellert flicked breadcrumbs into the river, and each time the trout would go into a brief frenzy, competing for the food, breaking the river's surface into a mess of expanding ripples.
Albus took a bite of his sandwich and paused, allowing the flavours to fill his mouth. There was a strange feeling in the pit of his stomach, not the fear or anxiety he was used to, but something strange: a kind of light, sweet happy feeling that made him want to burst out laughing. It took him a while to understand: it was a kind of happiness.
"I'm glad I met you," he said quietly, in the river's direction. He was too embarrassed to look at Gellert.
Gellert grunted in response.
"These sandwiches are good," Gellert said matter-of-factly.
Albus nodded. Everything was good. The world was good, now that Gellert was beside him.
"Should you be drinking that much wine?" he asked.
"You are not my nanny, are you?"
"No, gods forbid. I'd hate to think what your nanny would've had to put up with."
Gellert chuckled.
"You need not worry about that. My family was too poor to have a nanny. My own mother had to put up with me."
Albus was silent. This was the first he'd heard of Gellert's family being poor. He wasn't sure what to say. Somehow he knew that Gellert would react poorly to pity.
"It's sad," Gellert said thoughtfully, after a moment of silence. "My mother came from a line of pure German blood, going back to the Germanic chieftains. But so many German people today are poor. Our country is rich in natural resources, and we were once the jewel in Europe's crown. But now our wealth is being taken over by foreigners who come into our country. They set up their businesses and take advantage of our kind nature to spread like weeds. The Jew, the Turk, the Gypsy, and so on."
"Don't say that, Gellert," Albus said. "Why blame others for your problems? If Germany is suffering from poverty, perhaps the fault lies with the German people. It is too easy to shift the blame. This world is big enough and rich enough for us all to live in peace, if we only act with wisdom."
Gellert leaned back on his elbows, stretching his legs out in the water. The trout darted away from his calves in alarm before slowly returning and resuming their sleepy drifting.
"I see you belong to the same blindly idealistic school of thought as my great-aunt. It is sad when intelligent people allow their reason to be clouded by some pacifistic ideology. There are laws in Nature that cannot be resisted."
"Which laws are you referring to?" Albus said nervously. He thought he had an inkling of what Gellert was talking about.
Gellert fixed him with a direct look.
"You are English. Surely you are familiar with the Theory of Evolution."
"Of course."
"Good. Now, this theory has been well established in England due to your Muggle naturalists Mr Darwin and Huxley. It is also widely accepted in Germany due to our Muggle naturalist Mr Ernst Haeckel. Of course, this theory was not entirely new. Being Muggles, the naturalists were not capable of affording any truly new insights into the functioning of the universe. But by drawing upon older wizarding sources they established a Theory which explains the function of the biological world. Have you read Malthus?" This last question was accompanied by another piercing glance.
"Yes," said Albus faintly. He felt himself beginning to be caught up in Gellert's spell again, and he tried to resist, to keep a clear head. Gellert was obviously passionate about this subject, because he was beginning to radiate that intensity of speech and gesture that was so powerfully persuasive. "And I'm pleasantly surprised to learn that you've read Malthus, as well as Haeckel and Huxley and Darwin. I love Haeckel's artistic renditions of the various classes of organism, especially in his treatise Kunstformen der Natur, a copy of which I keep in my bookshelf. His sketches are truly beautiful. They are works of art quite apart from their value to natural philosophy. But these are all Muggle writers, Gellert. I'm so pleased that you recognise the importance of their scholarship. So many wizards, even the most learned researchers, completely ignore the contributions that Muggles have made to our understanding. Simply because Muggles know nothing about magic does not mean they are ignorant of other things." Despite himself, Albus was getting caught up in the conversation now. Without being aware of it, he had twisted to face Gellert and was speaking very earnestly, accompanied by emphatic gestures and an imploring expression, his eyes focused on Gellert's. "In fact, as I argued in an article for the Daily Prophet entitled What We Can Learn From Muggles, I believe that Muggle knowledge exceeds ours in many important areas, as their lack of magic has forced them to compensate by exerting themselves in many other disciplines. Whereas our access to magic has made us intellectually lazy and complacent in many ways, discouraging us from pursuing alternate knowledge. Sadly, that article received very little interest and no one really paid attention except for a few Squibs – I beg your pardon, magically-challenged individuals – who thanked me for bringing attention to the fact that magical knowledge is not the only worthwhile kind." Albus sighed in remembered disappointment.
"Oh," said Gellert, waving a hand dismissively, "of course they were Muggles, but most of their ideas came originally from wizards. They merely were rewriting and interpreting them again."
Albus frowned.
"That's not true, Gellert. Won't you give them credit for their life's work, even now when you admit how important their work is?"
"Well, they were quite good, for Muggles," Gellert said grudgingly, "but let us not get stuck with that now. I asked had you read Malthus. If you had read his Essay on the Principle of Population, then surely you must know his observation that the population of mankind increases geometrically, whereas the Nature's capacity to provide resources increases only arithmetically, so that if mankind's population were allowed to grow unchecked, it would lead to the complete destruction of society."
"Yes…"
"Fortunately there are checks and balances on the human population in the form of death, disease, famine, plague, war and so on."
"Fortunately!" Albus burst out. "What a thing to say!"
"Yes, fortunately. For were it not so – were it not that the human population was limited – then all resources would have been destroyed long before now, and there would be no society, no wealth, no education, no culture. We would be reduced to mere beasts fighting for the scraps of remaining resources."
Albus could not argue with the logic of that.
"True. Yet all the same, it seems wrong to say 'fortunately'… ""
"So it follows that all living creatures are competing for limited resources. Now, also consider that all organisms have certain characteristics, both physical and mental. And within each population there is variation of these characters. Some are tall, others short, some fair, others dark, some quick witted, others dull, some magical, some Muggle. These characters are inherited, or to be passed on to one's offspring.
"Also, it can be seen that some of these characteristics make organisms better for survival than others. So over time, the organisms with the superior characteristics become more prevalent in the population, while the weak and unfit are eliminated. Are you following me thus far?"
"Yes, I suppose so. But what does this have to do with Germany?"
"It has everything to do with Germany. You see," Gellert said, his eyes shining, "the German people have made two great mistakes that have caused our society to suffer. Firstly, they subscribe to the false belief of utopia. That is, they believe that society will always improve if we leave things as they are and hope for the best. This belief is shared by yourself and my great-aunt. Because of new technology and new developments, if we just educate the population and act with wisdom, in your words, everyone in society can live a happy and healthy life.
"Malthus shows us that is a lie. There are only limited resources. So when conditions are good and people live in wealth, the population will slowly increase to the point that there are not enough resources for everyone. The strain on resources will then stretch them thin and condemn everyone to poverty.
"Secondly, all the human race are not equal. We are all in competition for these fixed resources. Some races of human are better suited than others to survive in this struggle. The Germanic or Nordic race, which evolved in Northern, Western and Central Europe, is gifted with superior intellect, morals, beauty, perfection and physical power. By the laws of Nature, the Germanic race should triumph and spread throughout the world, while weaker races are eliminated.
"If left to her own devices, Nature would ensure the Germanic race will survive. But something bad is happening in our society. We have begun working against Nature. The upper classes of the Germanic race is having fewer children. Also we support the poor, the retarded, the mentally ill and the disabled by paying our taxes to support them, instead of spending that money on fit and healthy people who deserve it. When a sick and deformed child is born, we spend thousands of deutchmarks prolonging its painful, miserable existence. Think of how that time and money could be better used. And even more terrible, we allow the lower races like the cunning and crafty Semite with his hooked nose, the brutish Negro with his black skin, and the sly Mongol with his slitted eyes to invade our society. Instead of defending our borders, the pure homeland of the Germanic race, we allow these invaders to come in without a fight! And some traitorous Germans," Gellert's face twisted as he spat the words, "even marry the lower races! They mix their pure German blood with ugly and animal-like untermenschen, creating monstrous mongrel children that are offensive and against Nature.
"So you see, our society is becoming degenerate and near to collapse. The rich pay to support the masses of poor children, cripples and freaks, not realising that they are only paying the poor and unfit to make even more children. The Germanic race is determined to commit suicide and allow the lower races to take over. Everything is being ruined."
There was silence as Gellert finished.
"Well?" he asked Albus.
Albus shook his head slowly.
"I don't know where to begin," he said. "What a sad, cruel and dark way to view the world. Do you really see all humankind as fighting each other, having to wipe each other out to survive?"
"There is no point saying it is cruel or whatever. That is an appeal to emotion. It does not refute anything I have said. It may be cruel, but that does not mean it is false. In fact, I do not believe it is cruel. My way is kinder than yours. Do you know how much pain a mentally disabled child is in? Do you know how wretched and miserable the existence of the poor and lower classes are? Life will not get better for them, it will only get worse. It were better they were never born at all. We are doing them a kindness by putting them out of their misery."
"If a person is miserable, surely the thing to do is to improve their life, not kill them!"
"Why are you shouting? There is no need to become hysterical. You don't like it when I talk about this, do you? But it is precisely people like you and my great-aunt who need to hear this, because you are allowing our society to become degenerate with your irrational well-meaning ideology. I thought you were intelligent enough to think about complex issues without resorting to shouting or irrationality."
"But what you're saying is quite unspeakable. You're saying we should – please tell me I misunderstood – you're saying the solution for a stable society is to control population by killing all those who are "unfit"; that is, the poor, sick, disabled and racial minorities."
"Not necessarily killing them. It depends on the severity of the overpopulation crisis. In some cases mere sterilisation would be sufficient to prevent them from reproducing and passing on their inferior characteristics."
Albus felt cold, and sick to his stomach. Slowly he rose to his feet.
"Excuse me, Gellert," he said. "I would like to go home now."
Gellert stared at him for a few moments. Was there a disappointed look in his eyes? Albus didn't know, nor did he much care at that moment.
Gellert shrugged.
"Fine then," he said. "Go. I will pack up the things. I will see you later."
Albus turned and walked away, his stomach churning.
Author's Note:
Hi everyone. I have quite a serious announcement to make. I just learnt that my mother has very serious breast cancer. It's a very hard time for our whole family.
I'm not going to stop writing the story. I want my life to remain as normal as possible, which means I'm still going to uni, studying and writing when I have time. But I have some hard times coming up, so please be extra understanding when I can't update. You've all been very supportive so far, so thanks again.
Very late replies (sorry)
MikkaAmaya: I haven't read the Hunger Games yet. I've heard good things about it, and the movie is out now, so I'm hoping to read it some time soon.
The Erumpent Horn: Thanks for the kind review. I will take you up on your offer if I need it. Sometimes I find it easier talking to strangers on the internet because anonymity makes it easier to share and open up. In person I'm more private and reserved. And talking about depression and articulating things is definitely very helpful in my experience.
Next Update: Aiming for Wednesday 11 April.