C 2 4i ] 
“ fhould be made ufe of, where foreigners are daily 
u coming in, and natives going out, but alfo thofe 
c< of the country ; that, by adding together the re - 
“ fults of each, the one may compenfate the other. 
M. Dupre, de St. Maur, of the French Academy, 
“ has begun this upon twelve country parifhes, and 
^ three of thofe of Paris : he was willing to com mu - 
ic nicate thefe tables to me to publifli them ; and I 
‘ c the more readily do it, becaufe they are the 
“ only tables, upon which the probabilities of the 
e< life of mankind in general can be eftablifh’d with 
<c any certainty,”. 
As for the tables, I refer for them to the work. 
§ 2. I am not at all concern’d for a defence of my 
table, which is fufficient to fupport itfelf ; but I am 
greatly furprifed, that a philofopher fhould condemn 
works, which he never either faw or read : for it is 
evident, M. de Buffon never faw my EJjays on politi- 
cal Arithmetic ; and that all, which he appears to 
know of it, is indeed very flightly drawn from M. 
Deparcieux’s work, who neverthelefs knew no more 
of it, as he himfelf makes it appear, than what he 
found in the Bibliotheque raifonnee for the fir ll three 
months of the year 174.3, Tom. 30. This extract 
happens unluckily not to be made by an able hand ; 
but, on the contrary, very fit, by its confufion, and 
the irregularities, which run thro’ it, to lead into 
errors. The corrections, that were made in the fecond 
part of the fame 30th Tome, are not even fufficient 
to fecure the reader from miftakes. 
Neverthelefs M. de Buffon, without even reading 
the work, might have known more of it, though 
H h written 
