Chapter 2

A.D. 97 Parishes. 16 Parishes. Out Parishes. Buried in Besides of Christened. all. the Plague. 1665 5,320 12,463 10,925 28,708 68,596 9,967 1666 1,689 3,969 5,082 10,740 1,998 8,997 1667 761 6,405 8,641 15,807 35 10,938 1668 796 6,865 9,603 17,267 14 11,633 1669 1,323 7,500 10,440 19,263 3 12,335 1670 1,890 7,808 10,500 20,198 11,997 1671 1,723 5,938 8,063 15,724 5 12,510 1672 2,237 6,788 9,200 18,225 5 12,593 1673 2,307 6,302 8,890 17,499 5 11,895 1674 2,801 7,522 10,875 21,198 3 11,851 1675 2,555 5,986 8,702 17,243 1 11,775 1676 2,756 6,508 9,466 18,730 2 12,399 1677 2,817 6,632 9,616 19,065 2 12,626 1678 3,060 6,705 10,908 20,673 5 12,601 1679 3,074 7,481 11,173 21,728 2 12,288 1680 3,076 7,066 10,911 21,053 12,747 1681 3,669 8,136 12,166 23,971 13,355 1682 2,975 7,009 10,707 20,691 12,653

According to which latter table there died as follows:—

THE LATTER OF THE SAID TWO TABLES.

_There died in London at the medium between the years_—

1604 and 1605 5,135. A. 1621 and 1622 8,527 B. 1641 and 1642 11,883 C. 1661 and 1662 15,148. D. 1681 and 1682 22,331. E.

Wherein observe, that the number C is double to A and 806 over. That D is double to B within 1,906. That C and D is double to A and B within 293. That E is double to C within 1,435. That D and E is double to B and C within 3,341; and that C and D and E are double to A and B and C within 1,736; and that E is above quadruple to A. All which differences (every way considered) do allow the doubling of the people of London in 40 years to be a sufficient estimate thereof in round numbers, and without the trouble of fractions. We also say that 669,930 is near the number of people now in London, because the burials are 22,331, which, multiplied by 30 (one dying yearly out of 30, as appears in the 94th page of the aforementioned observations), maketh the said number; and because there are 84,000 tenanted houses (as we are credibly informed), which, at 8 in each, makes 672,000 souls; the said two accounts differing inconsiderably from each other.

We have thus pretty well found out in what number of years (viz., in about 40) that the city of London hath doubled, and the present number of inhabitants to be about 670,000. We must now also endeavour the same for the whole territory of England and Wales. In order whereunto, we first say that the assessment of London is about an eleventh part of the whole territory, and, therefore, that the people of the whole may well be eleven times that of London, viz., about 7,369,000 souls; with which account that of the poll-money, hearth-money, and the bishop’s late numbering of the communicants, do pretty well agree; wherefore, although the said number of 7,369,000 be not (as it cannot be) a demonstrated truth, yet it will serve for a good supposition, which is as much as we want at present.

As for the time in which the people double, it is yet more hard to be found. For we have good experience (in the said page 94 of the aforementioned observations) that in the country but 1 of 50 die per annum; and by other late accounts, that there have been sometimes but 24 births for 23 burials. The which two points, if they were universally and constantly true, there would be colour enough to say that the people doubled but in about 1,200 years. As, for example, suppose there be 600 people, of which let a fiftieth part die per annum, then there shall die 12 per annum; and if the births be as 24 to 23, then the increase of the people shall be somewhat above half a man per annum, and consequently the supposed number of 600 cannot be doubled but in 1,126 years, which, to reckon in round numbers, and for that the aforementioned fractions were not exact, we had rather call 1,200.

There are also other good observations, that even in the country one in about 30 or 32 per annum hath died, and that there have been five births for four burials. Now, according to this doctrine, 20 will die per annum out of the above 600, and 25 will be born, so as the increase will be five, which is a hundred and twentieth part of the said 600. So as we have two fair computations, differing from each other as one to ten; and there are also several other good observations for other measures.

I might here insert, that although the births in this last computation be 25 of 600, or a twenty-fourth part of the people, yet that in natural possibility they may be near thrice as many, and near 75. For that by some late observations, the teeming females between 15 and 44 are about 180 of the said 600, and the males of between 18 and 59 are about 180 also, and that every teeming woman can bear a child once in two years; from all which it is plain that the births may be 90 (and abating 15 for sickness, young abortions, and natural barrenness), there may remain 75 births, which is an eighth of the people, which by some observations we have found to be but a two-and-thirtieth part, or but a quarter of what is thus shown to be naturally possible. Now, according to this reckoning, if the births may be 75 of 600, and the burials but 15, then the annual increase of the people will be 60; and so the said 600 people may double in ten years, which differs yet more from 1,200 above-mentioned. Now, to get out of this difficulty, and to temper those vast disagreements, I took the medium of 50 and 30 dying per annum, and pitched upon 40; and I also took the medium between 24 births and 23 burials, and 5 births for 4 burials, viz., allowing about 10 births for 9 burials; upon which supposition there must die 15 per annum out of the above-mentioned 600, and the births must be 16 and two-thirds, and the increase one and two-thirds, or five-thirds of a man, which number, compared with 1,800 thirds, or 600 men, gives 360 years for the time of doubling (including some allowance for wars, plagues, and famines, the effects thereof), though they be terrible at the times and places where they happen, yet in a period of 360 years is no great matter in the whole nation. For the plagues of England in twenty years have carried away scarce an eightieth part of the people of the whole nation; and the late ten years’ civil wars (the like whereof hath not been in several ages before) did not take away above a fortieth part of the whole people.

According to which account or measure of doubling, if there be now in England and Wales 7,400,000 people, there were about 5,526,000 in the beginning of Queen Elizabeth’s reign, A.D. 1560, and about 2,000,000 at the Norman Conquest, of which consult the Doomsday Book, and my Lord Hale’s “Origination of Mankind.”

Memorandum.—That if the people double in 360 years, that the present 320,000,000 computed by some learned men (from the measures of all the nations of the world, their degrees of being peopled, and good accounts of the people in several of them) to be now upon the face of the earth, will within the next 2,000 years so increase as to give one head for every two acres of land in the habitable part of the earth. And then, according to the prediction of the Scriptures, there must be wars, and great slaughter, &c.

Wherefore, as an expedient against the above-mentioned difference between 10 and 1,200 years, we do for the present, and in this country, admit of 360 years to be the time wherein the people of England do double, according to the present laws and practice of marriages.

Now, if the city double its people in 40 years, and the present number be 670,000, and if the whole territory be 7,400,000, and double in 360 years, as aforesaid, then by the underwritten table it appears that A.D. 1840 the people of the city will be 10,718,880, and those of the whole country but 10,917,389, which is but inconsiderably more. Wherefore it is certain and necessary that the growth of the city must stop before the said year 1840, and will be at its utmost height in the next preceding period, A.D. 1800, when the number of the city will be eight times its present number, 5,359,000. And when (besides the said number) there will be 4,466,000 to perform the tillage, pasturage, and other rural works necessary to be done without the said city, as by the following table, viz.:—

A.D. Burials. People in People in London. England. 1565 2,568 77,040 5,526,929 As in the 1605 5,135 former table. 1642 11,883 1682 22,331 669,930 7,369,230 1722 44,662 1762 89,324 1802 178,648 5,359,440 9,825,650 1842 357,296 10,718,889 10,917,389

Now, when the people of London shall come to be so near the people of all England, then it follows that the growth of London must stop before the said year 1842, as aforesaid, and must be at its greatest height A.D. 1800, when it will be eight times more than now, with above 4,000,000 for the service of the country and ports, as aforesaid.

Of the aforementioned vast difference between 10 years and 1,200 years for doubling the people, we make this use, viz.:—To justify the Scriptures and all other good histories concerning the number of the people in ancient time. For supposing the eight persons who came out of the Ark, increased by a progressive doubling in every ten years, might grow in the first 100 years after the Flood from 8 to 8,000, and that in 350 years after the Flood (whereabouts Noah died) to 1,000,000 and by this time, 1682, to 320,000,000 (which by rational conjecture are thought to be now in the world), it will not be hard to compute how, in the intermediate years, the growths may be made, according to what is set down in the following table, wherein making the doubling to be ten years at first, and within 1,200 years at last, we take a discretionary liberty, but justifiable by observations and the Scriptures for the rest, which table we leave to be corrected by historians who know the bigness of ancient cities, armies, and colonies in the respective ages of the world, in the meantime affirming that without such difference in the measures and periods for doubling (the extremes whereof we have demonstrated to be real and true) it is impossible to solve what is written in the Holy Scriptures and other authentic books. For if we pitch upon any one number throughout for this purpose, 150 years is the fittest of all round numbers; according to which there would have been but 512 souls in the whole world in Moses’ time (being 800 years after the Flood), when 603,000 Israelites of above twenty years old (besides those of other ages, tribes, and nations) were found upon an exact survey appointed by God, whereas our table makes 12,000,000. And there would have been about 8,000 in David’s time, when were found 1,100,000, of above twenty years old (besides others, as aforesaid) in Israel, upon the survey instigated by Satan, whereas our table makes 32,000,000. And there would have been but a quarter of a million about the birth of Christ, or Augustus’s time, when Rome and the Roman Empire were so great, whereas our table makes 100,000,000. Where note, that the Israelites in about 500 years, between their coming out of Egypt to David’s reign, increased from 603,000 to 1,100,000.

On the other hand, if we pitch upon a less number, as 100 years, the world would have been over-peopled 700 years since. Wherefore no one number will solve the phenomena, and therefore we have supposed several, in order to make the following table, which we again desire historians to correct, according to what they find in antiquity concerning the number of the people in each age and country of the world.

We did (not long since) assist a worthy divine, writing against some sceptics, who would have baffled our belief of the resurrection, by saying, that the whole globe of the earth could not furnish matter enough for all the bodies that must rise at the last day, much less would the surface of the earth furnish footing for so vast a number; whereas we did (by the method afore mentioned) assert the number of men now living, and also of those that had died since the beginning of the world, and did withal show, that half the island of Ireland would afford them all, not only footing to stand upon, but graves to lie down in, for that whole number; and that two mountains in that country were as weighty as all the bodies that had ever been from the beginning of the world to the year 1680, when this dispute happened. For which purpose I have digressed from my intended purpose to insert this matter, intending to prosecute this hint further upon some more proper occasion.

A TABLE SHOWING HOW THE PEOPLE MIGHT HAVE DOUBLED IN THE SEVERAL AGES OF THE WORLD.

Periods of doubling A.D., after the Persons. Flood. In 10 years 1 8 10 16 20 32 30 64 40 128 50 256 60 512 70 1,024 80 2,048 90 4,096 100 8,000 and more. 120 16,000 In 20 years 140 32,000 In 30 years 170 64,000 200 128,000 40 240 256,000 50 290 512,000 60 350 1,000,000 and more. 70 420 2,000,000 100 520 4,000,000 190 710 8,000,000 290 1,000 16,000,000 in Moses’ time. 400 1,400 32,000,000 about David’s time. 550 1,950 64,000,000 750 2,700 128,000,000 about the birth of Christ. 1,000 3,700 256,000,000 300 In 300 / 1,200 4,000 320,000,000

It is here to be noted, that in this table we have assigned a different number of years for the time of doubling the people in the several ages of the world, and might have done the same for the several countries of the world, and therefore the said several periods assigned to the whole world in the lump may well enough consist with the 360 years especially assigned to England, between this day and the Norman Conquest; and the said 360 years may well enough serve for a supposition between this time and that of the world’s being fully peopled; nor do we lay any stress upon one or the other in this disquisition concerning the growth of the city of London.

We have spoken of the growth of London, with the measures and periods thereof; we come next to the causes and consequences of the same.

The causes of its growth from 1642 to 1682 may be said to have been as follows, viz.:—From 1642 to 1650, that men came out of the country to London, to shelter themselves from the outrages of the Civil Wars during that time; from 1650 to 1660, the royal party came to London for their more private and inexpensive living; from 1660 to 1670, the king’s friends and party came to receive his favours after his happy restoration; from 1670 to 1680, the frequency of plots and parliaments might bring extraordinary numbers to the city; but what reasons to assign for the like increase from 1604 to 1642 I know not, unless I should pick out some remarkable accident happening in each part of the said period, and make that to be the cause of this increase (as vulgar people make the cause of every man’s sickness to be what he did last eat), wherefore, rather than so to say _quidlibet de quolibet_, I had rather quit even what I have above said to be the cause of London’s increase from 1642 to 1682, and put the whole upon some natural and spontaneous benefits and advantages that men find by living in great more than in small societies, and shall therefore seek for the antecedent causes of this growth in the consequences of the like, considered in greater characters and proportions.

Now, whereas in arithmetic, out of two false positions the truth is extracted, so I hope out of two extravagant contrary suppositions to draw forth some solid and consistent conclusion, viz.:—

The first of the said two suppositions is, that the city of London is seven times bigger than now, and that the inhabitants of it are 4,690,000 people, and that in all the other cities, ports, towns, and villages, there are but 2,710,000 more.

The other supposition is, that the city of London is but a seventh part of its present bigness, and that the inhabitants of it are but 96,000, and that the rest of the inhabitants (being 7,304,000) do cohabit thus: 104,000 of them in small cities and towns, and that the rest, being 7,200,000, do inhabit in houses not contiguous to one another, viz., in 1,200,000 houses, having about twenty-four acres of ground belonging to each of them, accounting about 28,000,000 of acres to be in the whole territory of England, Wales, and the adjacent islands, which any man that pleases may examine upon a good map.

Now, the question is, in which of these two imaginary states would be the most convenient, commodious, and comfortable livings?

But this general question divides itself into the several questions, relating to the following particulars, viz.:—

1. For the defence of the kingdom against foreign powers.

2. For preventing the intestine commotions of parties and factions.

3. For peace and uniformity in religion.

4. For the administration of justice.

5. For the proportionably taxing of the people, and easy levying the same.

6. For gain by foreign commerce.

7. For husbandry, manufacture, and for arts of delight and ornament.

8. For lessening the fatigue of carriages and travelling.

9. For preventing beggars and thieves.

10. For the advancement and propagation of useful learning.

11. For increasing the people by generation.

12. For preventing the mischiefs of plagues and contagious. And withal, which of the said two states is most practicable and natural, for in these and the like particulars do lie the tests and touchstones of all proposals that can be made for the public good.