520 General Deductions from the Bk. ii. 



diminished population of France, which has before 

 been noticed, is an instance very strongly in point. 

 The tables of Sussmilch afford continual proofs of 

 a very rapid increase after great mortalities ; and 

 the table for Prussia and Lithuania, which I have 

 inserted,* is particularly striking in this respect. 

 The effects of the dreadful plague in London, in 

 1666, were not perceptible 15 or 20 years after- 

 wards. It may even be doubted whether Turkey 

 and Egypt are upon an average much less popu- 

 lous for the plagues which periodically lay them 

 waste. If the number of people which they con- 

 tain be considerably less now than formerly, it is 

 rather to be attributed to the tyranny and op- 

 pression of the governments under which they 

 groan, and the consequent discouragements to 

 agriculture, than to the losses which they sustain 

 by the plague. The traces of the most destructive 

 famines in China, Indostan, Egypt, and other 

 countries, are by all accounts very soon oblite- 

 rated 5 and the most tremendous convulsions of 

 nature, such as volcanic eruptions and earth- 

 quakes, if they do not happen so frequently as to 

 drive away the inhabitants or destroy their spirit 

 of industry, have been found to produce but a 

 trifling effect on the average population of any 

 state. 



It has appeared from the registers of different 

 countries, which have already been produced, that 



* See p. 500. 



