Page:PettyWilliam1899EconomicWritingsVol2.djvu/164

Rh It is here to be Noted, That in this Table we have assigned a different Number of Years for the time of doubling the People in the several Ages of the World, and might have done the same for the several Countries of the World, and therefore the said several Periods assigned to the whole World in the Lump, may well enough consist with the 360 Years especially assigned to England, between this Day, and the Norman Conquest; And the said 360 Years may well enough serve for a Supposition between this time, and that of the Worlds being fully Peopled; Nor do we lay any stress upon one or the other in this disquisition concerning the Growth of the City of London.

We have spoken of the Growth of London, with the Measures and Periods thereof, we come next to the Causes and Consequences of the same. |26|

The Causes of its Growth from 1642 to 1682, may be said to have been as followeth, viz. From 1642 to 1650, That Men came out of the Countrey to London, to shelter themselves from the Outrages of the Civil Wars, during that time; from 1650 to 1660, The Royal Party came to London, for their more private and inexpensive Living; from 1660 to 1670, the Kings Friends and Party came to receive his Favours after his Happy Restauration; from 1670 to 1680, The frequency of Plots and Parliaments might bring extraordinary Numbers to the City; But what Reasons to assign for the like Increase from 1604 to 1642, I know not, unless I should pick out some Remarkable Accident happening in each part of the said Period, and make that to be the Cause of this Increase (as Vulgar People make the Cause of every Mans Sickness to be |27| what he did last eat) wherefore, rather than so to say quidlibet de quolibet; I had rather quit even what I have above-said to be the Cause of London's Increase from 1642 to 1682, and put the whole upon some Natural and Spontaneous Benefits and Advantages that Men find by Living in great more than in small Societies; and shall therefore seek for the Antecedent Causes of this Growth, in the Consequences of the like, considered in greater Characters and Proportions.