Page:A Vindication of Natural Society - Burke (1756).djvu/41

 ciety. I charge the whole of these Effects on Political Society. I avow the Charge, and shall presently make it good to your Lordship's Satisfaction. The Numbers I particularized are about 40 Millions. I suppose a Thousand times as many killed in Battles. But I must make another Addition not less than the former, for the Consequences of Wars, in Skirmishes, Massacres, the contagious Disorders, and the Famine which attend them, more destructive than Battles themselves. So that allowing me in my Exuberance one way for my Deficiencies in others, I rate the Destruction caused by War, at Eighty Thousand Millions. I think the Numbers of Men now upon Earth are computed at 500 Millions at the most. Here the Slaughter of Mankind, on what you will call a small Calculation, amounts to 160 times the Number of Souls this Day on the Globe. A point which may furnish matter of Reflection to one less inclined to draw Consequences than your Lordship.