Mainspring

Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. For sixty known centuries this planet that we call the earth has been inhabited by human beings not much different from ourselves. Their desire to live has been just as strong as ours. They have had at least as much physical strength as the average person of today and among them have been men and women of great intelligence.<br><br>But down through the ages most human beings have gone hungry and many have always starved.<br><br>The ancient Assyrians, Persians, Egyptians and Greeks were intelligent people, but in spite of their fertile lands, they were never able to get enough to eat. They often killed their babies because they couldn't feed them.<br><br>The Roman Empire collapsed in famines. The French were dying of hunger when Thomas Jefferson was President of the United States. As late as 1846 the Irish were starving to death and no one was particularly surprised, because famines in the Old World were the rule rather than the exception.