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greater enemy to population, than a bloody war would be, fuppofing it even to be perpetual. What an enormous tax is Britain thus fubjected to for fupporting her capital! The rearing and educating yearly for London 7 or 8000 persons, require an immense fum.

In Paris, if the bills of mortality can be relied on, the births and burials are nearly equal, being each of them about 19,000 yearly; and according to that computation, Paris fhould need no recruits from the country. But in that city, the bills of mortality cannot be depended on for burials. It is there univerfally the practice of high and low, to have their infants nurfed in the country, till they be three years of age; and confequently those who die before that age, are not inlifted. What proportion thefe bear to the whole is uncertain. But a guefs may be made from fuch as die in London before the age of three, which are computed to be one half of the whole that die (a). Now giving the utmost allowance for the healthinefs of the country above that of a town, children from Paris that die in the country before

(a) See Dr Price, p. 362.

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before the age of three, cannot be brought fo low as a third of thofe who die. On the other hand, the London bills of mortality are lefs to be depended on for births than for burials. None are inlifted but infants baptized by clergymen of the Englifh church; and the numerous children of Papists, Diffenters, and other fectaries, are left out of the account. Upon the whole, the difference between the births and burials in Paris and in London, is much lefs than it appears to be on comparing the bills of mortality of these two cities.

At the fame time, giving full allowance for children who are not brought into the London bills of mortality, there is the highest probability that a greater number of children are born in Paris than in London; and confequently, that the former requires fewer recruits from the country, than the latter. In Paris, domeftic fervants are encouraged to marry: they are obferved to be more fettled than when bachelors, and more attentive to their duty. In London, fuch marriages are difcouraged, as rendering a fervant more attentive to his awn family than to that of his mafter. But a fervant attentive to his own family

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family, will not, for his own fake, neglect that of his master. At any rate, is he not more to be depended on, than a fervant who continues fingle? What can be expected of idle and pampered bachelors, but debauchery and every fort of corruption? Nothing reftrains them from abfolute profligacy, but the eye of the mafter who for that reason is their averfion ; not their love. If the poor-laws be named the folio of corruption, bachelor-fervants in London may well be confidered as a large appendix. And this attracts the eye to the poor-laws, which indeed make the chief difference between Paris and London, with refpect to the present point. In Paris, certain funds are established for the poor, the yearly produce of which admits but a limited number. As that fund is always pre-occupied, the low people who are not on the lift, have little or no profpect of bread, but from their own induftry; and to the induftrious, marriage is in a great meafure neceffary. In London, a parish is taxed in proportion to the number of its poor; and every perfon who is pleafed to be idle, is entitled to maintenance. Moft things thrive by encouragement,

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ragement, and idlenefs above all. Certainty of maintenance, renders the low people in England idle and profligate; efpecially in London, where luxury prevails, and infects every rank. So infolent are the London poor, that scarce one of them will condefcend to eat brown bread. There are accordingly in London, a much greater number of idle and profligate wretches, than in Paris, or in any other town in proportion to the number of inhabitants. Thefe wretches, in Doctor Swift's ftyle, never think of pofterity, becaufe pofterity never thinks of them: men who hunt after pleafure, and live from day to day, have no notion of fubmitting to the burden of a family. These causes produce a greater number of children in Paris than in London; tho' probably they differ not much in populoufnefs.

I fhall add but one other objection to a great city, which is not flight. An overgrown capital, far above a rival, has, by numbers and riches, a diftreffing influence in public affairs. The populace are ductile, and cafily milled by ambitious and defigning magiftrates. Nor are there wanting critical times, in which fuch magiftrates,.

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magiftrates, acquiring artificial influence, may have power to disturb the public peace. That an overgrown capital may prove dangerous to fovereignty, has more than once been experienced both in Paris and London.

It would give one the spleen, to hear the French and English zealously difputing about the extent of their capitals, as if the profperity of their country depended on that circumftance. To me it appears like one glorying in the king's-evil, or in any contagious diftemper. Much better employ'd would they be, in contriving means for leffening these cities. There is not a political measure, that would tend more to aggrandize the kingdom of France, or of Britain, than to fplit its capital into feveral great towns. My plan would be, to confine the inhabitants of London to 100,000, compofed of the King and his household, fupreme courts of justice, government-boards, prime nobility and gentry, with neceffary fhopkeepers, artists, and other dependents. Let the reft of the inhabitants be diftributed into nine towns properly fituated, fome for internal commerce, fome for foreign. Such a plan would.

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