iSo ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. Book IV. 



ture. — No argument to he drawn from the increafe of great toiDns* 

 — W'llduN. of ^leen Elifabeth and her mlnijlers^ who deliberated 

 about refraining the growth of London^ 



WHETHER the numbers of people in England be increaGng 

 or decieafing, cannot be made a quellion of faCl or of arith- 

 metic. For that purpofe, it would be neceiTary to have an exa6l nu- 

 meration of the people in fome pafl: time ; and alfo an enumeration 

 of them in the prefent year. Now, as there is no ceufus^ or nume- 

 ration, kept in England, it would be quite impollible to determine 

 what the numbers of people were at any given time paft, even if we 

 were not to go fo far back as Mr Howlet goes in his calculation, 

 that is 48 years : And even to number the people in the pre- 

 fent year, would be a work of great trouble, difficulty, and expence ; 

 for, though I do not believe that it would be attended with any 

 curfe from God, like David's numbering the people of Ifrael, yet, I 

 i^m perfuaded, it would only ferve to publilli, to all Europe, our 

 weaknefs in that important article, and how much inferior we are 

 to two kingdoms mentioned by Dr Price in the Effay above men- 

 tioned, the kingdoms of Sweden and Naples, both of w^hich, by 

 a furvey of them taken for three years, have been found to be in* 

 ereahng in numbers. 



As, therefore, we cannot determine this grand queflion upon 

 any accurate furvey of the population of the whole country, and i(S 

 make a queflion of fad of it, we muft try whether we cannot invef- 

 tigate it in its caufes. And if we can difcover it in that way, it will 

 be much more fatisfadory than if we could diicover it the other 

 way ; becaufe, at the fame time that we afcertain, what I apprehend 



