ABSTRACT
Thomas Robert Malthus’ Essay on the Principle of Population contemplated human sexual passion as a matter of public interest. The social policies he advocated, however, were predicated on privatization-the speculative investment of both monetary and sexual resources to maximize returns for the ownership class. Other population theorists, including William Godwin, William Hazlitt and William Cobbett, attempt to counter Malthus’ economy of scarcity by positing an economy of abundance. Even so, when their writings and their lives bring them face-to-face with what they deem the fearsome otherness of flesh-and-blood women, these men have a tendency to retreat into the safety of their private imaginings.
