had given the world the males then between

If any of our monkish historians rational estimates of the numbers of the ages of 16 and 60 [from the military returns] . . . we might now easily by the help of what we have from the Observator on the Bills of Mortality conclude, what the entire number of the people then was. [Page 91.]

'Tis very remarkable that in the Code Louys which he [Louis XIV] published in April, 1667, he made some ordinances with great care for the registring the christenings and marriages and burials, in each Parish . . . having perhaps been informed by his ministers that many political inferences, as to knowing the number of people and their encrease in any state, are to be made from the bills of mortality, on the occasion of some such published about 3 years before by the Observator on the Bills of Mortality in England. [Page 249.]

...

It must be acknowledged that the thanks of the age are due to the Observator on the Bills of Mortality for those solid and rational calculations he hath brought to light, relating to the numbers of our people but such is the modesty of that excellent author that I have often heard him wish that a thing of so great publick importance to be certainly known, might be so by an actual numbering of them. . . . Mr. James Howel... saith, that in the year 1636 . . . the Lord Mayor of London . . . took occasion to make a cense of all the people and that there were of men, women and children, above 7 hundred thousand that lived within the barrs of his jurisdiction alone . . . and . . . more now. . . . But I am to suspect that there was no such return in the year 1636 . . . and do suppose that Mr. Howel did in that point mistake. partly because I find it mentioned by the curious Observator on the Bills of Mortality, p. 113 and 114 [of the 1676 ed.] that anno 1631, ann. 7 Caroli I. the number of men, women and children in the several wards of London and liberties . . . came in all to but 130178, and finally because the said curious Observator (for that name I give the author after My Lord Chief Justice Hales [sic] hath given or adjudged it to him in his Origination of Mankind) having by rational calculations proved that there dyes within the Bills of Mortality a thirtieth part, or one in thirty yearly, and that there dies there 22000 per annum If there were there according to Howel a million and a half people, it would follow that there must dye but I out of 70 per annum. [Pages 112-113.]

In these passages from Pett two peculiarities need to be explained. The first is the omission of Petty's name. If Pett

regarded Petty as the author of the Observations, why should he consistently omit to mention him here as "Sir W. P."- a form of reference which he repeatedly uses when speaking elsewhere of Petty's other works?1 The second fact to be explained is Pett's manifest desire to avoid mentioning by name "that excellent author," "the most curious Observator." It certainly is not by chance that Pett, whose laborious book is a medley of duly credited extracts from almost all English and classical literature, instead of mentioning the author of the Observations, here carefully took refuge behind a quotation — or rather a misquotation 2- from Sir Matthew Hale. I believe that Pett's peculiar course at this point can be best explained on the assumption that he considered Graunt the author of the work. He was attempting, at a time when Oates' absurd stories of the popish plot were still heartily believed, to vindicate Anglesey from the charge of leaning towards Roman Catholicism. He was therefore careful not to betray any sympathy with the Romanists. Now according to Wood, when Graunt had been a major two or three years, he

then laid down his trade and all public employments upon account of religion. For though he was puritanically bred, and had several years taken sermon-notes by his most dextrous and incomparable faculty in short-writings and afterwards did profess himself for some time a Socinian, yet in his later days he turned Roman Catholic, in which persuasion he zealously lived for some time, and died.3

May not this explain Pett's obvious unwillingness to praise the author of the Observations, Graunt, by name? Pett does not afford demonstration, but he furnishes corroboration.

1 Pp. 92, 106, 122 192, 193, 245, and p. 1 of the preface.

2 Hale's Primitive Origination of Mankind considered and examined according to the Light of Nature, published in 1677, the year after his death, was probably written before 1670. The passages (pp. 205, 206) which allude, with warm praise, to the Observations, do not, so far as I can see, give or adjudge the name of Observator to the author at all. Hale quotes the title of "this little book," but makes no mention of its author.

3 Concerning the disadvantages to which Graunt was subjected on account of his faith, and concerning the misfortunes of his later years, Fitzmaurice's Life of Petty (pp. 232-235) gives new details.

II.

The second group of arguments includes all those, whether advanced by supporters of Petty or of Graunt, which appeal to internal evidence. Here, again, the supporters of Petty shall speak first. They point out many and striking similarities between passages in the Observations and parts of Petty's acknowledged writings published at the same time, or soon after. These similarities constitute, in the opinion of Dr. Bevan,1 "an effective way of testing" this question of authorship. In view of the inaccessibility of the books, and the importance of the test, I will here reprint all the obvious and important passages discovered by previous writers, together with a few parallels which I have myself chanced upon. They are a formidable array.

OBSERVATIONS (1676 ed.). PAGES 27, 28: The vast number of Beggars, swarming up and down this City, do all live, and seem to be most of them healthy and strong; whereupon I make this question, Whether, since they do all live by begging, that is, without any kind of labour; it were not better for the State to keep them, even though they earned nothing? that so they might live regularly. . . . Some may Object, That Beggars are now maintained by voluntary Contributions, whereas in the other way the same must be done by general Tax; and consequently, the Objects of Charity would be removed and taken away. To which we Answer, That in Holland, although no where fewer

TREATISE (1662 ed.).

PAGE 12: When all helpless and impotent Persons were thus provided for [in "Receptacles for the aged, blinde, lame &c. in health; Hospitals for . . . Diseases. . . Orphans . . . found and exposed Children "], and the lazy and thievish restrained by the Minister of Justice, it follows now, that we finde out certain constant Employments for all other indigent people, who labouring according to the Rules upon them, may require a sufficiency of food and raiment. . . . It will be

...

asked, who shall pay these men? I answer, every body.

PAGE 13 Now as to the work of these supernumeraries, let it be with out expence of Foreign Commodities, and then 'tis no

1 Bevan's Petty, p. 44.