Page:William Petty - Economic Writings (1899) vol 1.djvu/43

Rh music at Gresham College, and at the time of the Fire he had become "an opulent merchant of London, of great weight and consideration in the city ." So much, in large part but inference, it is still possible to collect concerning the earlier career of John Graunt, citizen and draper. It is, however, to his "Observations upon the Bills of Mortality," first published in 1662, that Graunt owes whatever posthumous reputation he has attained, and the merit of that book is great enough to entitle him to wider fame than he has achieved.

Why Graunt began his examination of the London Bills, or when, we can but conjecture. He himself speaks of his studies with a certain lightness. Having engaged his thoughts, he knew not by what accident, upon the bills of mortality, he happened to make observations, for he designed them not, which have fallen out to be both political and natural. Thus does Graunt insist, somewhat over-elaborately, upon the casualness of studies which must, in fact, have demanded both time and patience. In the appendix to the third edition, however, after the recognized success of the "Observations" had established their author's position in the scientific world, he speaks with more assurance of his "long and serious perusal of all the bills of mortality which this great city hath afforded for almost four score years ." This is certainly in strong contrast not only to the apologetic air of the original dedication, but also to the care with which, in the preface to the first edition, the tradesman-author excused himself, as it were, to the philosophers of Gresham College, for his presumption in invading the field of scientific investigation. He had observed that the weekly bills were put by those who took them in to little use other than to furnish a text to talk upon in the next company ; and he "thought that the Wisdom of our City had certainly designed the laudable practice of taking and distributing these Accompts for other and greater uses... or at least that some other uses, might be made of them." It is probably to the latter suggestion, supplied perhaps by his friend Petty, and perhaps by Graunt's own "excellent working head," rather than to his belief in the prescience of the corporation of London that we owe the writing of the "Observations."