Essays on Mankind and Political Arithmetic Part 4

A.D. Burials Births In Ternaries of Years 1666 1,480 952 } 1667 1,642 1,001 } 4,821 2,979 1668 1,699 1,026 } 1669 1,666 1,000 } 1670 1,713 1,067 } 5,353 3,070 1671 1,974 1,003 } 1672 1,436 967 } 1673 1,531 933 } 5,073 2,842 1674 2,106 942 } 1675 1,578 823 } 1676 1,391 952 } 4,328 2,672 1677 1,359 897 } 1678 1,401 1,045 } 1679 1,397 1,061 } 4,624 3,202 1680 1,826 1,096 } 24,199 14,765 24,199 14,765 The medium } or 15th }1,613 984 1,613 984 part whereof } is }

TABLE C.

THE PARISHES OF DUBLIN A.D. A.D., 1670-71-72 1671. at a medium Families Hearths Births Burials St. Katherine's 661 2,399 161 290 and St. James's St. Nicholas Without 490 2,348 207 262 St. Michan's 656 2,301 127 221 St. Andrew's with Donnybrook 483 2,123 108 178 St. Bridget's 416 1,989 70 100 St. John's 244 1,337 70 138 St. Warburgh's 267 1,650 54 103 St. Audaen's 216 1,081 53 121 St. Michael's 140 793 44 59 St. Kevin's 106 433 64 133 St. Nicholas Within 93 614 28 34 St. Patrick's Liberties 52 255 21 44 Christ Church and Trinity College, per estimate 26 197 - 1 3,850 17,500 1,013 1,696

Houses built between 1671 and 1681, per estimate 150 550 4,000 18,150

A WEEKLY BILL OF MORTALITY FOR THE CITY OF DUBLIN, Ending the x.x.x day of x.x.x 1681.

PARISHES' NAMES.

St. Katharine's and St. James's St. Nicholas Without St. Michan's St. Andrew's with Donnybrook St. Bridget's St. John's St. Warburgh's St. Audaen's St. Michael's St. Kevin's St. Nicholas Within St. Patrick's Liberties Christ Church and Trinity College Totals

[The columns for the table are: Births, Males, Females, Burials, Under 16 years old, Plague, Small Pox, Measles, Spotted Fever. In the book there are no figures in the table at all.--DP.]

A QUARTERLY BILL OF MORTALITY, Beginning x.x.x and ending x.x.x for the City of DUBLIN PARISHES' NAMES.

St. Katharine's and St. James's St. Nicholas Without St. Michan's St. Andrew's with Donnybrook St. Bridget's St. John's St. Warburgh's St. Audaen's St. Michael's St. Kevin's St. Nicholas Within St. Patrick's Liberties Christ Church and Trinity College Totals

[The columns for the table are: Births 1.; Marriages 2.; Buried under 16 years olds; Buried above 60 years old; Measles, Spotted Fever, Small Pox, Plague; Consumption, Dropsy, Gout, Stone; Fever, Pleurisy, Quinsy, Sudden Death; Aged above 70 years old; Infants under 2 years old; All other Casualties. In the book there are no figures in the table at all.--DP.]

AN ACCOUNT OF THE PEOPLE OF DUBLIN FOR ONE YEAR, Ending the 24th of March, 1681.

PARISHES' NAMES.

St. Katharine's and St. James's St. Nicholas Without St. Michan's St. Andrew's with Donnybrook St. Bridget's St. John's St. Warburgh's St. Audaen's St. Michael's St. Kevin's St. Nicholas Within St. Patrick's Liberties Christ Church and Trinity College Totals

[The columns for the table are: Number of person; Males; Females; Remarried Persons; Persons under 16 years old; Persons above 60 years old; Protestants of above 16 years old; Papists of above 16 years old; Of all other religions above 16 years old; Births; Burials; Marriages. In the book there are no figures in the table at all.--DP.]

CASUALTIES AND DISEASES.

Aged above 70 years Epilepsy and planet Abortive and still-born Fever and ague Childbed women Pleurisy Convulsion Quinsy Teeth Executed, murdered, Worms drowned Gout and sciatica Plague and spotted fever Stone Griping of the guts Palsy Scouring, vomiting Consumption and French bleeding pox Small pox Dropsy and tympany Measles Rickets and livergrown Neither of all the other Headache and megrim sorts

A POSTSCRIPT TO THE STATIONER.

Whereas you complain that these observations make no sufficient bulk, I could answer you that I wish the bulk of all books were less; but do nevertheless comply with you in adding what follows, viz.:

1. That the parishes of Dublin are very unequal; some having in them above 600 families, and others under thirty.

2. That thirteen parishes are too few for 4,000 families; the middling parishes of London containing 120 families; according to which rate there should be about thirty-three parishes in Dublin.

3. It is said that there are 84,000 houses or families in London, which is twenty-one times more than are in Dublin, and yet the births and burials of London are but twelve times those of Dublin, which shows that the inhabitants of Dublin are more crowded and straitened in their housing than those of London; and consequently that to increase the buildings of Dublin will make that city more conformable to London.

4. I shall also add some reasons for altering the present forms of the Dublin bills of mortality, according to what hath been here recommended--viz.:

1. We give the distinctions of males and females in the births only; for that the burials must, at one time or another, be in the same proportion with the births.

2. We do in the weekly and quarterly bills propose that notice be taken in the burials of what numbers die above sixty and seventy, and what under sixteen, six, and two years old, foreseeing good uses to be made of that distinction.

3. We do in the yearly bill reduce the casualties to about twenty- four, being such as may be discerned by common sense, and without art, conceiving that more will but perplex and imbroil the account.

And in the quarterly bills we reduce the diseases to three heads-- viz., contagious, acute, and chronical, applying this distinction to parishes, in order to know how the different situation, soil, and way of living in each parish doth dispose men to each of the said three species; and in the weekly bills we take notice not only of the plague, but of the other contagious diseases in each parish, that strangers and fearful persons may thereby know how to dispose of themselves.

4. We mention the number of the people, as the fundamental term in all our proportions; and without which all the rest will be almost fruitless.

5. We mention the number of marriages made in every quarter, and in every year, as also the proportion which married persons bear to the whole, expecting in such observations to read the improvement of the nation.

6. As for religions, we reduce them to three--viz.: (1) those who have the Pope of Rome for their head; (2) who are governed by the laws of their country; (3) those who rely respectively upon their own private judgments. Now, whether these distinctions should be taken notice of or not, we do but faintly recommend, seeing many reasons pro and con for the same; and, therefore, although we have mentioned it as a matter fit to be considered, yet we humbly leave it to authority.

TWO ESSAYS IN POLITICAL ARITHMETIC, Concerning the People, Housing, Hospitals, &c., of London and Paris.

TO THE KING'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY.

I do presume, in a very small paper, to show your Majesty that your City of London seems more considerable than the two best cities of the French monarchy, and for aught I can find, greater than any other of the universe, which because I can say without flattery, and by such demonstration as your Majesty can examine, I humbly pray your Majesty to accept from

Your Majesty's Most humble, loyal, and obedient subject, WILLIAM PETTY.

AN ESSAY IN POLITICAL ARITHMETIC

Tending to prove that London hath more people and housing than the cities of Paris and Rouen put together, and is also more considerable in several other respects.

1. The medium of the burials at London in the three last years-- viz., 1683, 1684, and 1685, wherein there was no extraordinary sickness, and wherein the christenings do correspond in their ordinary proportions with the burials and christenings of each year one with another, was 22,337, and the like medium of burials for the three last Paris bills we could procure--viz., for the years 1682, 1683, and 1684 (whereof the last as appears by the christenings to have been very sickly), is 19,887.

2. The city of Bristol in England appears to be by good estimate of its trade and customs as great as Rouen in France, and the city of Dublin in Ireland appears to have more chimneys than Bristol, and consequently more people, and the burials in Dublin were, A.D. 1682 (being a sickly year) but 2,263.

3. Now the burials of Paris (being 19,887) being added to the burials of Dublin (supposed more than at Rouen) being 2,263, makes but 22,150, whereas the burials of London were 187 more, or 22,337, or as about 6 to 7.

4. If those who die unnecessarily, and by miscarriage in L'Hotel Dieu in Paris (being above 3,000), as hath been elsewhere shown, or any part thereof, should be subtracted out of the Paris burials aforementioned, then our a.s.sertion will be stronger, and more proportionable to what follows concerning the housing of those cities, viz.:

5. There were burnt at London, A.D. 1666, above 13,000 houses, which being but a fifth part of the whole, the whole number of houses in the said year were above 65,000; and whereas the ordinary burials of London have increased between the years 1666 and 1686, above one-third the total of the houses at London, A.D. 1686, must be about 87,000, which A.D. 1682, appeared by account to have been 84,000.

6. Monsieur Moreri, the great French author of the late geographical dictionaries, who makes Paris the greatest city in the world, doth reckon but 50,000 houses in the same, and other authors and knowing men much less; nor are there full 7,000 houses in the city of Dublin, so as if the 50,000 houses of Paris, and the 7,000 houses in the city of Dublin were added together, the total is but 57,000 houses, whereas those of London are 87,000 as aforesaid, or as 6 to 9.

7. As for the shipping and foreign commerce of London, the common sense of all men doth judge it to be far greater than that of Paris and Rouen put together.

8. As to the wealth and gain accruing to the inhabitants of London and Paris by law-suits (or La chicane) I only say that the courts of London extend to all England and Wales, and affect seven millions of people, whereas those of Paris do not extend near so far. Moreover, there is no palpable conspicuous argument at Paris for the number and wealth of lawyers like the buildings and chambers in the two Temples, Lincoln's Inn, Gray's Inn, Doctors' Commons, and the seven other inns in which are chimneys, which are to be seen at London, besides many lodgings, halls, and offices, relating to the same.