 This was the doctrine of bellum omnium contra omnes.Matthew Hale in "The Primitive Origination of Mankind, Considered and Examined According to the Light of Nature" (1677) described the struggles of hunter and prey animals.Anticipating Malthus, he proposed that a wise Providence made periodic Reductions in excessive numbers of animals, as with human population "to keep it within such bounds as may keep it from surcharging the World" so that "by these Prunings there may be a consistency in the Numbers of Mankind, with an eternal succession of individuals."