M O R 
M O R 
MOR'TAL, adj. [mortalis, Lat. mortel, Fi\] Subject 
to death ; doomed fome time to die.—This corruptible 
mult put on incorruption, and this mortal mult put on 
immortality, i Cor. xv. 53. 
The day thou eat’ft thereof, my foie command 
Tranlgrefs’d, inevitably thou flialt die ; 
From that day mortal; and this happy Hate ? 
Shalt lofe. Milton's Paradife Lojl. . 
Heavenly powers, where lhall we find fuch love! 
Which of ye will be mortal to redeem 
Man’s mortal crime, and juft, the unjuft to fave? Milton. 
Deadly ; Deftruftive ; procuring death.—Some circum- 
ftances have been great difcouragers of trade, and others 
are abfolutely mortal to it. Temple. 
Which of ye will be mortal to redeem 
Man’s mortal crime, and juft, the unjuft to fave ? Milton. 
Bringing death: 
Safe in the hand of one difpofing power. 
Or in the natal or the mortal hour. Pope. 
Inferring divine condemnation ; not venial.—Though 
every fin of itfelf be mortal, yet all are not equally mortal; 
but fome more, fome lefs. Perkins. —Human; belonging 
to man.—No one enjoyment but is liable to be loft by 
ten thoufand accidents, out of all mortal power to prevent. 
South. 
The voice of God 
To mortal ear is dreadful; they befeech, 
That Mofes might report to them his will, 
And terrour ceafe. Milton. 
Extreme; violent. A low word. —The birds were in a 
mortal apprehenfion of the beetles, till the fparrow rea- 
foned them into underftanding. L'Ejlrange. 
The nymph grew pale, and in a mortal fright, 
Spent with the labour of fo long a flight; 
And now defpairing, call a mournful look 
Upon the ftreams. Dryden. 
MOR'TAL, f. Man ; human being.—Warn poor mor¬ 
tals left behind. Tickell. —This is often ufed in ludicrous 
language: 
I can behold no mortal now. 
For what’s an eye without a brow ? Prior. 
MORTALITY, f. [from mortal .] Subjection to death ; 
ftate of a being fubjeft to death.—I point out miftakes 
in life and religion, that we might guard againft the 
fprings of error, guilt, and forrow, which furround us in 
every ftate of mortality. Watts's Logiclt. 
When I faw her die, 
I then did think on your mortality. Carciv. 
Death : 
I beg mortality 
Rather than life preferv’d with infamy. Shakefpeare. 
Power of deftruftion: 
Mortality and mercy in Vienna 
Live in thy tongue and heart. Shakefp. Meaf. for Meaf. 
Human nature.—A Angle vifion fo tranfports them, that 
it makes up the happinefs of their lives ; mortality cannot 
bear it often. Dryden. 
Take thefe tears, mortality's relief; 
And, till we Ihare your joys, forgive our grief. Pope. 
Frequency of death.—The rife of keeping thofe accounts 
[the bills of mortality] firft began in the year 1592, 
being a time of great mortality. Graunt. 
Bills of Mortality, are accounts or regifters fpecify- 
ing the numbers born, married, and buried, in any parifli, 
town, or diftriCl. In general they contain only thefe 
numbers; and, even when thus limited, are of great ule, 
by fhowing the degrees of healthinefs and prolificnefs, 
and the progrefs of population, in the places where they 
are kept. It is therefore much to be wilhed, that fuch 
19 
accounts had been always correClly kept in every king¬ 
dom, and regularly publiflied at the end of every year. 
We fliould then have had under our inlpeftion the com¬ 
parative ftrength of every kingdom, as far as it depends 
on the number of inhabitants, and its increafe ordecreafe 
at different periods. But fuch accounts are rendered 
more ufeful, when they include the ages of the dead, and 
the diftempers of which they have died. In this cafe they 
convey fome of the moft important inftruftions, by fur- 
nifliing us with the means of afcertaining the law which 
governs the wafte of human life, the values of annuities 
dependent on the continuance of any lives, or any fur- 
vivorlhips between them, and the favourablenefs and 
unfavourablenefs of different fituations to the duration 
of human life. 
The ancients do not appear to have kept any exaft 
mortuary regifters; at leall no account of any regifters 
of that kind, with the ages of the deceafed, have come 
down to us ; and although, in the Roman cenjus, firft 
eftabliflied by Servius Tullius, both the ages and fexes 
of the people were diftinguiftied, we have no exaft account 
of thefe particulars in any one of their enumerations. 
Indeed, the principal objeft of the cenfus among that 
warlike people, was the levying of men and money for 
the purpofes of conqueft : the duration of human life 
appears to have occupied very little of their attention ; 
and their proficiency in the fcience of quantity was not 
fuflicient either to Ihow them what the neceffary data, 
were, or to enable them to draw juft inferences from 
them, had they been in their poffeflion. A good account 
of what the ancient Romans did in this way, with refer¬ 
ences to the original authorities, may be found in the 
Italian tranllation of Demoivre’s Treatife of Annui¬ 
ties on Lives, by Gaeta and Fontana, which was pub- 
lifhed at Milan, in the year 1776. 
The keeping of parilh-regifters commenced in England 
in the year 1538, in confequence of an injunction iffued 
in that year by Thomas lord Cromwell, who, after the 
abolition of the pope’s authority in this kingdom, in the 
reign of Henry VIII. had been appointed the king’s 
vicegerent in ecclefiaftical affairs. See Bills of Mor¬ 
tality, vol. iii. 
Parilh-regifters in Germany appear to have commenced 
with the fixteenth century; and in the Gottliche Ord- 
nung of Suffmilch, we are informed, that at the time of 
lord Cromwell’s injunClion, they had already old regifters 
of that kind, both at Auglburgh and Breflaw. However, 
the extrafils he has given from the Auglburgh regifters 
do not go back further than the year 1501, nor thofe for 
Breflaw beyond 1555. About the beginning of the feven- 
teenth century, fuch regifters appear to have been ella- 
blilhed in moft parts of Europe; but it was not until the 
year 1662 that they began to attrafil public notice here, 
and to be confidered as the fources of valuable and in- 
terefting information. In that year, John Graunt, a 
citizen of London (afterwards an officer in the trained 
bands of the city, and a fellow of the Royal Society), 
publilhed his “ Natural and Political Obfervations on the 
Bills of Mortality,” principally thole for London. The 
London bills, or accounts of baptifms and burials, appear 
to have been occafioned by the plague, and to have been 
begun in the year 159a, a time of great mortality. They 
were afterwards difcontinued; but were refumed in 1603, 
after the great plague of that year. See the article Lon¬ 
don, vol. xiii. p. 601. They have ever fince been con¬ 
tinued weekly ; and an annual bill alfo has been regularly 
publilhed. In 1629, the number of deaths by the dif¬ 
ferent difeafes and cafualties were firft inferted in them, 
alfo the diftinfilion of the fexes; and thefe have been 
continued ever fince. But it is in the totals only of the 
baptifms and burials that the fexes are diftinguilhed in 
thefe bills. They do not Ihow how many of each lex 
died of each difeale ; neither have they, fince 1728, when 
the diftinfilion of the ages of the dead was firft introduced, 
Ihown how many of each fex died in fuch interval of age, 
but only the total number of both fexes. 
a This 
