have but very little reason to admire the great Wisdom or superfine Politicks of those great Men the Cardinals de Richelien and Mazarin Louvois Colbert and others who did not perceive those palpable and gross abuses or which is worse had no inclination to Reform them If any Man say that the respect they had for Religion did hinder them that 's a mighty reflection upon their understanding for how could they ascribe to the Christian Religion and its great Author such follies and extravagancies which are not attended with the least Profit and are so much against common sense so scandalous and contrary to equity and charity and tending visibly to the ruine of States and Nations Besides 't is well known that those Persons cared but little for Religion and that they did not regulate themselves by a superstitious Bigottery nor was it the difficulty of Reforming such extraordinary abuses that did deterr them from it for the thing was easie to be done especially under a Prince of so much Authority as Lewis the XIV and all the Nation would have been glad of it because it would have eased them considerably therefore it 's plain it was for no other reason but that they wanted a due elevation of mind and zeal for the Publick good Nothing was dear to them but their own Interest and how they might satisfie their Ambition and Covetousness and attain their desire to enrich and raise their Families This is some part of the Political Mischiefs that the Romish Religion is the cause of and every Body may learn from hence that all the Popish States who are not inclined to shake off the Pope's Yoke think it their Interest to endea your to reduce those who shook it off under the same again to deprive them of those great advantages they enjoy above themselves and therefore Protestant States ought to be at all times upon their Guard as well to preserve their Religion as their Civil Government I make bold to say that I could demonstrate here if it were convenient that the pretended Religion of the Church of Rome hath caused a prejudice to the Kingdom of France of above 200 Millions of Livers one year with another for a long time Certainly any man will be convinced that the Doctrines of the Pope's Supremacy and Transubstantiation and some other of the same sort make but a small compensation to France for the great Losses she endures by them and that if so be there had been any true solidity of Judgment or any spark of Generosity in those great Politicians before named they would have avoided such a ruine by contenting themselves to acknowledge the Authority of Christ and his Word without charging themselves with such ruinous and monstrous Opinions One would think that Men who have so little regard to reasons drawn from the Holy Scriptures against Popery ought to be so much the more affected with those which Temporal Interest affords So that for the Reasons above mentioned and others that might be named I think the abolishing of Popery in England is worth to this Kingdom at least 8 Millions Sterling Yearly which it spares by it one way or other and proportionably to Scotland but much less to Ireland because Popery Reigns still there too much with most of the disorders which I noted before Here it is fit to observe that I do not reckon amongst the 200 Millions of Livers which France loses every Year one with another by Popery the ordinary Annual Revenues which the Clergy get either from the Real and Personal-Estates or by their Cheats and Tricks for all that they get by those things is not lost to the Kingdom seeing they must live I understand only the damages that are caused by the Principles of Popery and their necessary consequences Nor do I mean that France loses at present so much Yearly as 200 Millions per Annum by Popery at present because of the Kingdoms decay in its Revenues But it may be affirmed with reason that for a very long time till the days wherein we live it lost above 200 Millions or the equivalent every year one with another This must be understood since Silver and Gold became more common in France for 200 hundred years ago all the Revenues of France were not worth 100 Millions It is easie to demonstrate that if Popery were abolished in France which is not to be expected in this Reign and tho' the Government were as at present in respect of Taxes yet the King of France might easily get an hundred Millions of Livers more from the Kingdom than Lewis the XIV does without the Peoples being Taxed any more than at present 19. France is not so conveniently situated for Trade as England which is incompassed almost round by the Sea and has four times as many good Ports as France and no body can deny that this is a great advantage for to make a Nation both populous and rich 20. France has no such Mines as England has of Tin Copper and Lead which do inrich the Land and furnish Subsistence to an incredible number of People as well as the Coal-pits we have of which none almost in France 21. The Copse-Woods do take up great part of the ground in France whereas the English Coal-pits take up very little ground whence there is so much the more Ground for Tillage and Husbandry which serves to maintain a greater quantity of People 22. The Vines of which the Expences are so great and their Revenue so uncertain since they fail commonly more than once in three Years take up also a great deal of Ground in the Kingdom of France whereas the Corn or ordinary Mault wherewith we make our Drink in England fails more seldom and costs much less either for cultivating of it or getting it from other places So that 't is rare that the price of Beer increases 23. 'T is observed also that Corn Lands in France fail oftner than in England which Observation if it be true as I believe it is must proceed either from a greater fruitfulness of the Soil in England or from a more equal temperature of the Air or from this Reason that the English are better provided with good Cattle and Men and all other necessaries for Husbandry or from all those Reasons together Which I think to be very true and is most certain We have shewn already that the Land is more populous and the Cattle is more numerous also and better fed than in France because there is generally more Hay and better pastures in England and by consequence their Cattle as well as Men who are better fed can work better Besides their Cattle make more Dung and better than that of France for the Dung of good and lusty Cattle is better than that of weakly and lean Cattle and Hay-dung is better than Straw-dung 'T is known there is almost no Hay in several Provinces of France So that the Horses wherewith they Plow and Till the Ground
feed only upon Straw with some Oats and for that reason they cannot keep Cows nor Oxen. In other Provinces where they keep such Cattle they mix Straw with Hay for their food and as I said before the Young Calves being deprived in Lent and other Fast-days of the Milk of the Cows because the Boors live upon Milk at those times this hinders the Cattle from growing lusty and strong But further the extream poverty of Farmers and other Country-people does not permit them to do their Work so well as it ought to be done nor to be supplied with such good Cattle and other necessaries However 't is certain that tho' England is not so well peopled nor the ground so well managed as it should be 't is certain I say it sends abundance of Corn to Foreign Nations Holland Flanders Spain Portugal have vast quantities from hence which confirms it further that England is more populous than most People think especially when we consider that London consumeth such a prodigious quantity of Corn and that commonly at a good rate if compared with the ordinary price of it at Paris tho' not much above half so big as London and which is situated in the midst of several Provinces abounding with Corn and enjoys several Rivers fit for carriage which do all fall into the River Seine at Paris 24. A Country fit for Pasture and Breeding of Cattle can maintain a greater number of People than one which is destitute of that advantage because the Cattle feeding in the Fields work for Men in their absence and they can in the mean time go about their business Besides Cattle supplies many Manufactures as I said before as are those of Wooll Leather Horns Butter Cheese Tallow c. Moreover a little Meat with Bread nourishes better than 3 times as much Bread without Meat That 's the Reason why the English People eat generally less Bread than those of France and withal are stronger and fatter 25. Victuals are commonly cheaper in England than in France which wonderfully helps to the encrease of People when not occasioned by scarcity of Money as 't is now in France 't is mightily advantagious to Tradesmen Manufacturers Merchants who can Victual their Ships at a better rate than others can do and they may by that means as well as Tradesmen and Manufacturers afford their Commodities cheaper to Foreigners and Natives and so undersell all others 26. Woollen-cloath which is the ordinary Cloathing of Mankind Coal-fowel Salt Candle Common-Sope Shoes are cheaper in England than in France which is a great help to Propagation for the less it costs people to maintain themselves and their Family the more are they inclined to marriage 27. The Fishing also in the English Seas and the great plenty of Oysters Crabs Muscles Langosts Cockles and other such things do maintain and nourish many more People both Fishermen and others in England than in France and consequently make it a great deal more populous 28. England has also several great Rivers naturally better furnished with Fresh-water Fish than those of France Besides Lent and other Fish-days as well as great numbers of Monks who are forbidden to eat Meat at any time have exhausted all the Rivers of France of Fish to that degree that very few is to be found in them as I insinuated before and the Rivers of England have moreover a long Tide and Ebb so that the Sea-Fish is always at a good rate because it can be carried by that means very easily and cheap and conveyed to all parts of England which is generally nearer the Sea than France is 29. The stupendious multitude of Soldiers in the French Service which the King keeps even in times of Peace who are for the most part Unmarried as I already said and what 's worse do mightily vex and disturb the other Subjects are a great impediment to France's being so populous as England 30. They do not take so great care of relieving poor Families in France as they do in England 31. There dyes without necessity that is to say for meer want much more People in Hospitals and poor Families in France than in England as I have demonstrated 32. The method of raising Taxes and Impositions in Lewis the XIV Reign has also contributed much towards depopulating the Kingdom As for example the Taille the Gabelle or Excise upon Salt the Utensile and some other Impositions are raised by Collectors who are obliged in Solidum to pay one for another and for all the Parish where they are established Collectors to pay I say and answer for all insolvent persons Such Collectors have commonly no Wages nor Sallary for their pains as they have in England so that they are obliged to spend all their time therein without any indemnity and as the People is ruined if the Collectors have any thing to lose they lose it also infallibly I have known several Peasants who had 30 years ago a Stock of five or six or ten thousand Livers who in two or three years time have been totally ruined by being made Collectors There is none of 'em at present in the Country that are worth any thing so that they cannot lose it but they are continually busie running from place to place in the Parish to get Payment and lose absolutely all their time in that unlucky Office There are at least four of them for the Taille in every Parish and four for the Gabelle or Imposition upon Salt every year in some Parishes there are more Moreover the Collectors of the former years to whom something is owing of the old Taxes which they paid for other lose also their time about recovering their due running from House to House and for all this because 't is often impossible to them to pay the Receivers being not paid themselves they are frequently Imprisoned and must perish in the Goal it intangles them besides in many Suits at Law wherein they and their Adversaries lose Money and Time And so in all other Impositions and Taxes besides what the King has for his share which is always very excessive and what the Farmers general and particular and their wretched Tools get or extort for themselves upon the Nation they put the poor People to vast Charges by the Suits at Law unjust Confiscations Imprisonments losses of Time and many other oppressive Ways So that the Vexations of the People of France are inexpressible Any body may judge what damage and prejudice it causes to a Kingdom if it were nothing else but the loss of Time The thing is not only so in relation to the Excise upon Salt and that called the Taille and some others raised by Collectors but also in relation to several hundreds of other Taxes which are not gathered by Collectors but by other Men Commissioned and Imployed therein by the general and particular Farmers of the Imposts One cannot imagine the Vexations and Robberies they commit upon the People nor the incredible multitude of unjust Suits
THE Desolation OF FRANCE DEMONSTRATED OR Evident Proofs that one Half of the People of that Kindom are destroyed Two Thirds of its Capital Stock consumed And the Nation Reduc'd to such a Condition that it cannot be Restored to the Flourishing State it was in Thirty Years ago in less than Two hundred Years and not then neither except the whole Frame of their Government be new Modell'd By a Person of Quality a Native of FRANCE LONDON Printed for John Salusbury at the Rising-Sun in Cornhill 1697. THE Epistle Dedicatory To the Right Honourable Charles Mountague Esq one of the Lords Commissioners of His Majesties Treasury and Chancellour of the Exchequer SIR BEING a Foreigner and by consequence standing in need of a great Patronage I presume to beg yours not only as being a Personage of an Elevated Station but because you are yet more considerable for your surprizing Penetration of Mind and your incomparable Activity and Zeal for the Good of your Country by which you have merited those Honourable Posts that you do so worthily fill and which I have reason to-hope are but the earnest of greater Advancements But the chief Reason why I make bold to trouble your Honour with this Dedication is that amongst the many Persons of Quality who have done me the Honour to peruse this Book in Manuscript and to testifie their Approbation of it there was none who did so much encourage me to render it Publick as your self So that if it be any ways useful to the Nation as I hope it may they will be obliged to your Honour for it I confess Sir that my first intention was to Dedicate it to His Majesty as tending very much to the Glory of England and by consequence of his own Royal Diadem but the meanness of my present Condition abated my Confidence to sollicit Access to that great Prince and therefore Sir seeing you were always pleased out of your Zeal to the Publick welfare to give me a favourable Reception notwithstanding the narrowness of my Circumstances I resolved upon this Dedication to your self as one of His Majesties most faithful Ministers which I beg you would accept as a Token of the singular Esteem and profound Respect of Sir Your most Humble and most Obedient Servant De Soulignè Grandson to Monsieur du Plessis Mornay THE PREFACE TO THE READER I Have observed several times when in Company of Ingenious Men both English and Refugees that neither of them did know the State of this Kingdom nor that of France and that they did all judge England to be less populous rich and potent and France to be much more populous and rich than really it is and that they had no right Notions of the present condition of France and of her Ruine I observed also that several of the Refugees did long eagerly after their return into France not thinking the Nation to be destroyed to that degree that it really is fancying that she may be restored easily to her former Condition in a few years and having in a manner forgot the Cruelties and Prefidiousnesses of the Popish Church towards them I observed likewise that several English and French who have lent Money to the Publick or to whom some may be owing otherwise do vex themselves by fancying the Affairs of the Kingdom to be in a worse Condition than they really are because of the present scarcity of Money That the Jacobites and other Enemies of the Government do harden themselves in their obstinacy thinking the Kingdom not able to maintain the War any longer and France to be still potent enough to dispossess K. VVilliam by this War and restore the late K. James which makes them still to adhere to that Faction and is partly the cause of their frequent Conspiracies against the King's Life and of several other disorders France and her adherents in this Country deceiving themselves mutually by making one another believe that they are stronger than they are and fancying that England is ruined which has been perhaps hitherto one of the causes of France's delaying to make Peace because she seems to be always in great hopes of some fatal stroke and revolution in this Kingdom I confess I have also been often-times incensed against the French Court as being the Causers of so many mischiefs and having reduced that flourishing Kingdom to nothing by Cruelties and Treacheries as well against their Neighbours as their own Subjects and of so much Blood shed every-where in Europe Those Reasons did oblige me about a year ago to take the Pen in hand in Order to undeceive so many People which may be a Service to this Nation the Allies Refugees and all the World by shewing them plainly that France never was what they took her to be even in the height of her Prosperity and that she is utterly ruined now which is evident enough from the great Efforts Advances and Offers that she makes notwithstanding her pride towards obtaining a Peace Whereas England is still in a hopeful Condition notwithstanding the present scarcity of the Coin After I had made a considerable progress in the Work being dubious whether or no I should publish it I thought fit before I determined any thing to shew it to a Person of great Merit that did Communicate it to several other Persons of Quality in the Government who after the perusal of it did exhort me to make it Publick as being like to be useful to the World and to my self So that I did look upon those Encouragements and particularly those that I had from the Honourable Person that I Dedicate this Book to to whom I owe my Life for had it not been for him I might have starved I say I did look upon those Encouragements as Orders which I was obliged to obey because they came from Persons who had a right to command me Since that time I have added to it what the continuation of the War has added to the Desolation of the Kingdom of France and some Events which have happened since and made some other small Alterations I question not but those of the Contrary party will oppose it for fear it should prejudice their Faction and that some of my Country-men amongst others will for that reason do me all the ill Offices they can I have been accustomed to those things of a long time I consider France in all respects and in relation to all Orders and Ranks of People which are in it I shew plainly the great disorders of the French Government which are such that there was perhaps never any Nation amongst those that are called Christians so ill Governed In the several manners of considering France I am obliged to make use of Repetitions but always with some diversity and never but when the things are not common but important and which the Reader might let slip My design being rather to instruct and to be useful than to tickle the Ears or divert those wits who love trifles So that I
at Law which they raise wherein they are both Judges and Parties and the loss of Time they cause as well as of Goods which they occasion to the Subjects is very considerable Neither are they the only Gainers by it the Officers of Judicature have also a share in it but as for the Time lost and several other disorders and losses it occasions to the Nation no body gets any thing by it I dare say that before this War the Unjustice and Violence of those Men did beget more wranglings at Law all over the Kingdom every year by the occasion of Taxes alone than there are in Spain every year upon what Subject soever 33. England enjoys yet another advantage over France which is this that the Air is more temperate being neither so cold nor so hot as 't is in the coldest or hottest parts of France by reason of the Vapours of the Sea which allay the severity of the cold and the heat of the Sun which makes England to be fitter for Propagation and Multiplication both of Men and Cattle and from thence it is that 't is so plentiful in Cattle and all sorts of Grass Roots and Herbs 34. As for its Situation besides that it is compassed almost round by the Sea which makes her in some sort a Neighbour to all the parts of the Universal World by means of Navigation and Trade It has these further advantages over France that its Sea-ports are far better and more in number as I insinuated elsewhere and that it may be said with truth that it is much nearer the most trading parts of Europe and even of the whole World since on the East it faces Holland and Flanders and the most trading parts of Germany And on the North and East it is nearer the Countries from whence all Materials necessary for Navigation and Shipping are to be gotten viz. Norwegive Denmark Swede Poland Prussia Liefland and the most Northern parts of Germany On the South it faces the best and most trading part of France and as for the rest of the World the great number of its Ships and the good Convoys it furnishes them with sets it as I have said already in the Neighbourhood of the remotest parts of the World 35. We must not forget another great advantage that England has above France viz that by its situation which has procured to it the Naval Power it enjoys England cannot be easily invaded by Neighbouring Nations as we see it commonly practised amongst other Nations that are contiguous one to another and as we have seen lately the French King invading Spain Germany Flanders Savoy c. which has occasioned the ruine and depopulation of part of those Countries as did also formerly the Spaniards and other Neighbours when they invaded France So that the People of England is more free from that danger and dishonour than any other People whatsoever 36. We ought also to reckon this to be a great advantage that England has above France and other Nations viz. that by the interposition of the Sea between England and them we are not so much in danger of being tempted to invade other Nations which saves England abundance of precious Blood whereas France by reason of its situation sheds floods of her People's Blood at random and in vain which has brought that unhappy Kindgom into the miserable condition it is in at present For tho' the English Maritime Forces do put them in a condition to enterprize upon the Neighbouring Nations and to land Armies in their Country as it is well known they often did formerly having almost conquered all that great Kingdom insomuch that some of our Kings were Crowned Kings of France at Paris altho' I say this Nation be more able than ever it was especially under a King so Wise and Valliant as the present King to enterprize things of that Nature if it were thought fit yet it must be confessed that there is much more difficulty in transporting into an Enemies Country great Armies with many Horses and all other Equipage by Sea than by Land especially having no Sea-port nor place belonging to us in the Land that is to be attacked since a handful of Men standing upon their guard can hinder their Landing or at least the taking of footing there and that we are to depend continually upon the Capricio of that unconstant and dangerous Element and seeing one Storm can frustrate all our Designs We cannot but believe that in the course of one Age this advantagious situation of England does save us yet in that one respect many thousand People Had France been in such circumstances as to that point she might have spared many Millions of Subjects 37. For this same Reason we are less obliged than other Nations are to be concerned in the quarrels that the Countries contiguous one to another are liable to in the main Land unless they have or may have some influence upon our Trade and may enable any of our Neighbours to dispute us by degrees out of the Dominion of the Sea or to do us any mischief by the increase of his Naval Power it cannot be imagined how many People this thing does also save to England And besides we are in a greater capacity to cross and disappoint the designs of several potent Nations than they are to disappoint ours I mean by the strength and nimbleness of our Naval Forces which can keep them always in allarm and oblige them to guard all their Maritime Places and Coasts with Soldiers which is very chargeable to ' em 38. By all these reasons it appears also that there is no necessity for us to keep on foot such vast numbers of Forces in time of Peace as our Neighbours are obliged to do because there is not commonly much reason to fear their Invasions when England is well united in it self I confess there is always need of a good Fleet but it 's less cost and trouble to the Nation than one or two hundred thousand Men and besides is very useful to our Trade Add to this that other Nations are not free neither notwithstanding the great number of their standing Forces from the necessity of maintaining either great or small Fleets as well as England 39. The Places and Towns which the French King has kept so long in the Dominions of other Princes and States did drain away the Coin from France besides several thousands of Families As for example Cazal and Pignerol where great Garrisons were kept and all their Provisions were bought from Piedmont and Montferrat with French Money Those 2 places I say besides the Fortifications augmented changed and altered now and then did not cost less than a Million of Livers yearly and so many other great Garrisons and Fortifications made in the Netherlands and elsewhere did exhaust the Money of the Kingdom 40. How many thousands of the French People did leave their Native Country to retire themselves into the new Conquests as I insinuated elsewhere and
where they were less oppressed with Taxes and it was supposed 15 years ago that above 200 thousand Souls had left France to transplant themselves into the said Conquests I could proffer several other reasons but these are enough I desire it may be observed that in all this I do not mention any thing that hath happened since this War nor even the last horrid Persecution of the Protestants the loss of so many People of the Manufactures of Trade and of so much Money they carried along with them nor do I say any thing of the last Mortality nor of the French King 's keeping 4 or 500 thousand Men in Arms c. So that 't is easie to perceive from all those reasons and others that may be adduced that England ought not only to be more populous which is the thing I did more particularly undertake to prove but by necessary consequence richer also and more potent than France ever was proportionably to the respective bignesses of both Kingdoms Some may perhaps object against all my Reasons and say if so be the Nation is so populous how does it come to pass that it is not richer and more potent for an Island such as England is of that extent and so well situated with all the other advantages above mentioned if populous must needs be also extreamly rich and powerful and if it be rich and powerful whence does it come that the King's Revenues in time of Peace are so small and nothing near so considerable as those of the French King and his Court so much inferiour to that of France in splendor magnificence and number of Courtiers and that his Palace in the Head-City viz. Whitehall is so little comparable in sumptuousness to the Louvre I answer first That England had neither so much People nor so much Revenue as it might and ought to have had considering all the advantages it possesses either from the bounty of Nature or the form of its Government compared to that of France I know very well the reasons of it which 't is not sit to mention here I say secondly That tho' England is more populous and rich than France ever was proportionably to its Extent that yet the number of all the People of France and the Revenues of that Kingdom I do not say only of the King 's but the whole Kingdoms taken in general did always exceed those of England by reason of the greater extent of the Territory as I have often said tho' I believe England at present out-does France very much as well in the Revenue of Real and Personal Estates and in the Profits of the Industry of the People as also in Number of Men fit for Work Manufactures Arts and Trade England I say out does France now in all those things I do not mean comparatively with reference to their respective Bigness or Extent but absolutely yet there may be more People in France reckoning the Women and Children and so by this reason though the French King should not have over charged his Subjects so horribly as he hath done he ought always to have had formerly more Revenue than the King of England As for the other Points it was never a sign or an effect of Poverty in the Nation that the Revenues of the Kings of England their Court and their Palace were comparatively so small for if the Kings and Parliaments had judged it fit they might easily have altered things and put them upon another foot the Nation being Wealthy and abounding much more in rich Nobility and Gentry than France who can plentifully subsist of themselves without the Places and Benefits of the Court whereas the Nobility of France is generally so poor that it cannot subsist otherwise and it is this that makes the French Court so much frequented by the Nobility as well as by great numbers of the general Officers of the Forces which that King maintains even in time of Peace which exceed always two hundred thousand Men and mightily vex and crush the People if things stand otherwise disposed in England 't is an effect of the Genius and Form of that Government which has produced that admirable effect which we see that whereas France is utterly and irrecoverably destroyed by the Absolute Power of her Monarch the King of England on the contrary finds in the heart and good affection of his Subjects who live plentifully all Subsidies necessary to supply the Wants of the Government and support the War as long as will be found convenient Some perhaps who cannot contradict the Reasons which I have offered to prove that England ought to be more populous even at present than France ever was will perhaps dispute the matter of Fact and say that it has been depopulated by the Colonies in Ireland the Plantations in the West-Indies by the Civil Wars both in England and Ireland by the great Massacre in the latter and by the Plague which did carry off so much People To which I answer That there is no comparison between the Loss of Men in England by the Civil War and the Loss of Men in France upon the same account for I dare say France has lost ten to one But I answer further That it does not in the least invalidate the Proofs from matter of Fact which I have produced and need not repeat here which prove demonstratively that England is really more populous than France ever was I grant however that if it were not for the things objected England should be more populous than it is And I am of that Opinion in particular that the Plantations in the West-Indies have done a great prejudice to England in that respect But I affirm also that the Civil Wars in France which lasted much longer than they did in England the violent and frequent Persecutions for Religion not without general and particular Massacres the Plague and Mortality of which it has not been free neither its Plantations in America also and so many great and long Wars abroad without necessity have depopulated France much more But especially the enormous Impositions of France the Methods of raising them the stupendious multitude of Soldiers that have been kept of long time the great multitude of Lawyers and other innumerable Civil Officers that of the Maltotiers that is to say a great Army of Rascals and Thieves subservient to the Farmers of the Impositions and so many other things some of which I mentioned before All those things I say are enough to convince any rational and unbiassed person that France could not be so populous thirty years ago as England is even now But above all I desire that what I proposed above concerning the fatal effects of Popery in that Kingdom might be well weighed Let us conclude then that England is and ought to be more populous than France ever was in the time of its greatest splendor So that there is a great Paradox well proved The World is full of such gross mistakes but I hope
part of the People themselves and should put an end to the War by advising the King to make Peace and denying Subsidies if they found them ruinous or unnecessary to the Nation Some simple People especially Foreigners are apt to think sometimes when they see the Parliament spend time in deliberating upon Ways and Means to raise Money to carry on the War with vigour that 't is a sign that the Nation is exhausted and that they do not know what to do but it is a gross mistake 'T is so in France indeed when they are long in their Deliberations about the Impositions 't is a sign of great Misery in that Kingdom for they have no regard to nor commiseration of any body nor of any condition of People the Despotical Authority cuts in pieces tears and devours all without distinction It is a military Government without Compassion But here in England they do not do all that they could do for if they had France would have been very low long before this but they do what is most proper and convenient and most agreeable to the humours dispositions or interests of the People in general and of every Province and Town nay we may almost say of every individual Person like an impartial Father in his Family There are some Impositions practised in all other Nations with great Success which the Parliament of England has always forborn through a tender indulgence to the People as for example the general Excise which would bring in many Millions as well as many particular Excises upon several things which are established in all other Nations even in time of Peace to a high degree but especially in France where they amount sometimes to above twice the value of the Excised Commodity And the truth is that there are a hundred Ways and Means which might be practised in England as they are in all other Nations if it were not for the great Lenity of the Government towards the People But for all this it is true that the Shop-keepers Handicrafts and other Work-men have suffered especially in London as has also the Army for want of Payment and those who lent Money to the King or the Banks because of the scarcity of the Species which made every one to keep up what Money they had and to look upon it as much more precious than before insomuch that they would not part with it But all those Tradesmen Shop-keepers and others who had put their Money in the Exchequer or Banks had either Credit or some Real or Personal-Estates and pay either but small Taxes or none at all or had some Money left them whereas in France that sort of Men especially Handicrafts and Labourers have nothing at all not so much as a Bed to lye upon and are besides over-laden with Taxes and have been forced for the most part to serve in the Armies and perish there as for those who lent Money to the French King there is no hopes of their recovering their Due neither Principal nor Interest for all the Stocks of the Kingdom are consumed whereas in England those who lent their Money to the King have all the Nation for their security so that they will not lose a Farthing There are but few Tradesmen and Handicrafts in England but have some pieces of Plate or other which they could sell if they had been truely in want and I dare say there is scarce one in two hundred who has sold it tho' they did not fail of crying out against the Taxes the scarcity of Money and want of Trade because they are not used to suffer in the least In France those sort of Men are not only without Plate but the most part of the wealthiest of the Kingdom who had abundance on 't formerly have none at all now and those who have any yet left have but very little for a great many of them had sold it even before this War to supply their wants because of the decay of all their Estates As to the scarcity of the Coin in England I believe if a narrow enquiry were made into that Affair which would be quickly done in another Nation it would be found that there is perhaps as much Money in England at present reckoning Gold-Coin and Plate as ever there was of all those Species before the War For though it cannot be denied but that great Sums of Money either in Species or in Bills which is all one is conveyed out of the Kingdom as well for maintaining our Army in Flanders as for some of our Allies 't is probable also that as much at least is returned from Holland and Flanders and other Countries for the Commodities which they take from us in greater quantity than they did before the War which causes all the Products of England to sell well Without mentioning what we spare from France in time of War for it is known we were over-ballanced by them in Trade by several Millions Sterling which with the Travels of our People into their Country did Decrease us of vast Sums Yearly and we have now all their Manufactures settled here by the Refugies by the occasion of this War and a better Trade with Scotland and Ireland and all the rest of the World It 's plain that our Trade to the Spanish-Netherlands is greater than ever for a great part of that Country being Untilled by reason of the War the Inhabitants who formerly lived upon their own product are now for the most part supplied from England as are also the 150000 Men extraordinary which are every Year in those Countries belonging to the several Armies besides what we furnish them in Horses Cloathing and Fewel And if there is less Silver-Coin in England 't is likely there is more Gold and Plate than before the War What I say as to the Plate must not be taken as a Paradox for this reason viz. that most of the Clippings were converted into Plate for the number of Clippers both Men and Women was so great in the Kingdom that it cannot be doubted but that the most part of them sold their Clippings to the Goldsmiths who were privy to their Crime at any easie rate and that they got Plate from them for part of the payment and Unclip'd Money for the other part and the Goldsmiths did turn the Clippings over again into other Plate It cannot be otherwise unless we will suppose that all those Clippers were eminent Trading-men who did convey the Silver-Ingots to Foreign Countries which is against Experience for the most part of those Clippers were of the vulgar sort and this cannot be practised by such kind of People and especially by those who do not live in London I remember that upon this Subject I have heard some honest Gold-Smiths complain that they were every day obliged against their will to sell their Plate to several People who paid them in Money horribly Clipped which they could not refuse because it was currant and that oftentimes the
in violent Diseases or as the Anchora sacra of the Heathens which was cast only when they thought the Ship was ready to be Shipwrack'd without it And this would be so much the more injurious to the French King that he has engaged in this War without necessity and that when he is pleased to give satisfaction to King William and to his Allies as to what he hath taken from them the Peace may be concluded easily The English indeed ought to spend their Estates and Lives to the last Man in such a War as this because their Religion Liberties Estates and Lives lye at a stake but the French K. has no such thing to fear from the Allies they desire nothing from him but what belongs de jure to ' em We must acknowledge that Absolute Authority is a dangerous Weapon even to those who make use of it for you may see to what extremities and shifts it has brought not only the Kingdom of France but also the King himself We must grant also that 't is an admirable Ressource if so be it could last long but 't is like a vehement Feaver and Burning which gives strength for a little while to the Body which is agitated by it and causes the person to make astonshing Efforts but wasts him away in a little time Or like the Possession of some Persons possessed by Evil Spirits who will go an hundred Leagues in less time than others can go ten but at the Journey 's end find themselves so bruised that they can never recover again This Arbitrary Power as 't is exercised at this day in France has the same apparent advantage for a little time over a wise and moderate Government as to Pride and Ostentation as a Spendthrift who devours all his Stock has over another who may be as rich or richer than he but is contented to spend less than his ordinary Revenue and lays part of it by for future emergencies and making good the losses that may befal him It is ordinary for the Vulgar to speak of and admire the former much more than the latter and that the former may do and many times really does extraordinary things in comparison of the other ho' very often below the vast Expences and the great Efforts that he makes But all this glory which he purchases by it is but of a short duration and the applause he gets too is only from Fools whereas the praise of a good Husband endures for ever The first ruines his Family and will be infallibly hated and detested by all wise Men even when he makes the greatest noise in the World and thinks himself to be the most admired and at last also by the vulgar People who admired him at first when they see Himself and his Family ruined by his Vanity and Folly And all Posterity will make the same Judgment of him If a Soveraign employs his Despotical Authority to destroy and lay waste his People by Tyranny and his Neighbours by War he is like to incurr the same fate which we have observed in several great Wranglers at Law in France who being born with a considerable Estate and some Vigour of Mind did raise unjust Suits against all their Neighbours because they were well provided with Knavish and Skilful Atturneys and understood the wranglings and formalities of Justice themselves They had an incomparable Talent to prosecute and make all other People mad and to attain their own ends Every body was surprized to see them charged with so many Suits at once and that they got the best in almost all of them tho' their Causes were unjust and that some of their Adversaries had as much skill and wit as they had themselves So that they carried now a Farm and then a House or a Field from their Neighbours and were loaden with all their Spoil But it came to pass at last that after some years the said Wranglers were utterly ruined and reduced to beggary tho' they did as yet appear to be in possession of some Lands and Houses but they were over-whelmed with debts then those who had lost their Estates with them at Law did find ways to recover them because the Wranglers had not wherewithal to support their Unjustice any further The reason why they gained all their Causes was not only that they had very skillful Atturneys and at the same time great Knaves who could forge false Titles but that they spared no cost to bribe and corrupt those of the other side and placed their glory in conquering so by any means whatsoever tho' the Expences did very much exceed the value of the thing in question Whereas their Neighbours tho' as wealthy and more prudent than they trusting to the Justice of their Causes contented themselves to defray the ordinary Charges of Law-Suits and made use of no means but what were honest and lawful being unwilling to incommode their Affairs and ruine their Families and besides they could not believe that their Adversaries would make use of such tricks which would cost them very dear and were able to ruine them and that for a trifle sometimes which was the ground of their Debates Every body did commend the honesty of the latter tho' they lost their Cause and did curse the conduct of the unjust Wrangler except some ill Men as unjust as himself or some who got advantage and profit by his Unjustice and the Monks and Priests to whom he made Presents and did enter himself into their Fraternities to the end they should speak well of him and made them believe that when he brought an Action against such a one and such a one to get their Lands from them he did it with intent to bestow the same upon the Church Such Wranglers have often been seen in France who ruined themselves in that manner amongst whom there was one that did all those things that I have mentioned and to repair in some manner his Reputation did think fit to make himself a Priest at last Another gave the little remnant he had kept of his Estate to the Monks depriving his Family of it that he might at least be commended by them and did apply himself to the persecuting of the Huguenots which gain'd him the hearts of the Clergy while all the honest among the Papists themselves detested him more and more I am assured whatever the Friends of France and the Foes of England may think on 't that if so be the French King did govern in England with the same Authority he does in France which God forbid he could raise more easily 25 Millions Sterling in it Yearly during some years than he can 16 at present in France My reason is that England is worth much more now than France as I have already said But some will ask how the French King with all his Authority could find such Sums Yearly in England seeing there is not so much Money in the Nation and that 't is impossible to find Money where there
is none I answer he would find out ways enough to make People to get it tho' there was none I have said already that Money was wanting in France 5 years ago seeing he commanded the Plate to be carried to the Mint and forced every one to carry their old Coin to be Stamped a-new and then raised the value of it This has been done twice in 6 years time as was said before and yet he finds Money still tho' there has been abundance conveyed out of the Kingdom every year as 't is easie to conceive for Horses from Germany and other Countries for Naval-Stores for Corn in the year of the great Famine for the Turks for the Pope and all the Court of Rome for Denmark and Sweden for the Switzers and for the French Army in Piedmont which has carried out of France abundance of Money that will never return besides what has been carried out for Foreign Fish and other necessaries and for all their Correspondencies abroad c. 'T is one of those Miracles of Absolute Power of which I spoke already that they have found out in that Country the way to multiply the Money without increasing the quantity of it by causing it to pass by a quick and violent circulation twenty times a year thro' the King's hands Which is thus There are as is well known a thousand sorts of Impositions and Taxes both Publick and Private in France as soon as one or a quarter of one is paid by the People 't is presently distributed for the use of the War or to pay some Pensions or Rents one way or other and as soon as 't is in the People's hands 't is got out of them again in some Weeks Days or Hours by another Imposition and so continually from one end of the Year to the other There is scarce any other Circulation of Money in the Kingdom In this consistsalmost all its Trade People fancy when they hear of so many great Squadrons of Men of War as the News tell us are equipped in France that the King must have vast Sums of Money in his hands and that Money must be plentiful in the Kingdom because they think that things are governed there as they are here where we have but a small number of general Impositions regulated all at once by the Parliament and very moderate in respect of what they are in other Nations as also in respect of the Wealth of the Kingdom and which are raised in a gentle way without great charge to the Subject But in France the Taxes are without number they are not only General and Publick but Particular and Private upon Private Corporations Orders and Ranks of Men and private Persons and upon all those in general who are presumed to have Money or some considerable Estate who many times are forced to pay to the King not the 100th or 200th penny but the third part or the half of all their Stock and sometimes all that they have Formerly they were all regulated at the beginning of the Year but at present they are set up every Month Week Day and Hour of the Year according to the wants of the Court and when one falls short of what they expected then presently comes out another or some new Offices are created and some hundreds or thousands of Men forced to buy them whether they have Money or no or many thousands of other private Persons are forced to pay the Taxes of easie i. e. wealthy Men gens aises as they call them tho' they be already ruined But nevertheless I must confess that I think there was more Money in France 30 years ago than there was in England and this for several reasons The great Impositions upon the People in France and the great severities practised against the insolvent obliged the People to live frugally and to work hard and to gather up Money for the said Taxes as fast as they could by all means which caused the Money to remain in the Kingdom and made the People very industrious for some forty or fifty years having a great Trade with England and Holland and did draw in Money from Foreign Countries Besides there were many more Men that hoarded up Money in France than in England where because of the great Trade of the Nation it is most in the hands of Merchants Goldsmiths and Trading-people and goes from hand to hand very quick for Money did always circulate much more in England than in France because of the great Trade and that the Nation commonly lays out prodigious Sums of Money in Foreign Commodities So that there is at all times an incredible quantity of imported Goods in Store-houses that drains the Money from England and especially for French Commodities in time of Peace for 't is easie to conceive that such a Nation as this in such a rich and plentiful Country and under such an indulgent Government and paying almost nothing for the maintaining of it is apt to spend in Foreign extravagant Dresses Delicacies Baubles and Trinkets and in all their Travels into France and any where else what Money other Nations are used to pay to their Government and especially the French Nation oppressed continualy with Taxes for the maintaining of their K's splendid Court and of his numerous Armies For altho' the King of France did convey yearly abundance of Money out of his Kingdom upon his Intrigues Alliances and Correspondencies abroad yet his People drew in a great deal more Money from England and other Nations than they spent a long time For they suffered very few Commodities to be imported into their Kingdom especially from England charging their Commodities with horrid Impositions So that they did pay to their Customs very near half the value of the Commodity as I could justifie when at the same time England was glutted with an infinite quantity of dear superfluous vain and noxious things from France So that by those ways England was over-ballanced by several Millions Sterling Yearly in their Trade by the French who did plunder us and other Neighbouring Nations who were not wise enough in that respect And then that Money by the circulation did pass thro' the hands of an infinite number of thrifty and frugal People in France who did hoard it up If the English Nation had forborn all those excesses in Importations especially from France and kept good Order and Discipline in that and other things Money would have been much more plentiful in England and much less in France for this and the continual Travels of the English Nobility and Gentry into that Country did very much contribute to raise France Another cause of their rise and first-growth was the Establishment of the Republick of Holland for after it was settled and the Peace made with the Spaniards the States finding themselves very rich in People and Money by the great multitudes that had retired thither from the Spanish Netherlands for shelter against the D. of Alba's Tyranny and seeing the Land
was not able to furnish them with Victuals nor to improve their Money they betook themselves to the French Trade and by degrees became the general Carriers of France which obliged the French to Till their Ground better than they had done before and finding the sweetness of Foreign Money they were by degrees brought also to Cultivate all sorts of Manufactures which the Dutch did carry likewise over all the World till at last the French taking advantage of the Weakness of the Neighbouring Princes they imposed Laws upon their Subjects Before that great Revolution France and her Kings were very poor and the English much too strong for them and had for the most part the advantage of them in all the Wars so that it has been a great mistake in the Politicks of France to declare War against these two Nations who did enrich her so prodigiously and could easily ruine her being United together But the Court of Rome became in these last Times mightily afraid of the French King's Power therefore she thought necessary to give it a Diversion and as that Court does watch for opportunities to make advantage of all things and to bring down even the Popish Princes when they begin to be afraid of them and influencing them all by secret Ways Springs and Wheels especially by their Confessors they have made use of the Jesuits who pay a blindfold Obedience to their General as he does to the Pope to put the French King whom they knew ambitious upon the design of subverting the Protestant Religion in England Holland France c. as the most glorious thing he could ever undertake thinking that either he should succeed in it and bring all those People under the Pope's Yoke or else that he should break his Neck in that design and ruine his Kingdom whose Power was terrible to the Court of Rome because of the King 's prodigious Authority as also because he had threatned the Popes several times And the truth is that all the honest Men of the Roman Religion in France had for a long time great hopes that he should have shaken off that Yoke The Power and Riches of England do not depend upon such Casualties as those mentioned before I mean such a Revolution as fell out in Holland and the Weakness of Neighbouring Princes or the like for the Power of England is settled on a solid and constant Basis that is the advantages of her Soil Situation Religion and Government far above all the advantages of France Insomuch that as often as England had any good King or Queen it did always make France to tremble and England might be a great deal more powerful and rich if some impediments and clogs to its Power and Strength which are meerly contingent and easie to take away were removed but I dare not mention them as yet Those People whom I said did Treasure up Money in France did it for several reasons First To pay the great Publick and Private Taxes that they are liable to now and then which failing they are in danger to be ruined or to lose all their Credit Secondly To buy some Offices if they had none or more considerable ones if they had any Thirdly To be admitted Farmers of the Impositions where ready Money was absolutely necessary and the Profits unspeakable Fourthly To buy the Estates of Noblemen c. at an easie rate for the Nobility have ever been at a low Ebb under this Reign liable to a thousand Vexations and forced to sell their Estates cheap to pay their Debts and get Money to live Fifthly Because of the Ruine of the Nobility and Gentry saving Men did keep their Money up in their Coffers because they could find no good security to lend it upon for those reasons I say there was much Money hoarded up in France Sixthly A great many desired to purchase Nobility for Money Others to be rehabilitated in their Nobility which they had forfeited by Merchandizing or otherwise And others saved Money to buy some Governments or Offices in the Militia c. which Lewis the XIV has found means to bring out by his violent and extraordinary Impositions and Extortions since the beginning of this last War If the French King should conquer England as I said before which God forbid he would work Miracles here and cause Money to be found where there is none and all the whole form of the Nation would be suddenly and absolutely altered He would convert the Luxury Licentiousness and all the several sorts of Debauchery in the Nation into Money by Taxing the guilty Persons He would suffer little or no Importation of Goods from any other place but France And by that means the Nation would be able to pay him greater Impositions and Taxes All the fine Cattle with which England doth so much abound would be transported and sold for Money as also their Plate Jewels Houshold-goods Ships c. The Nation would not be suffered to spend so much in Cloathing in Silks fine Linnen Delicacies and Wines of all sorts All their fine Woollen-cloath Stuffs Leather c. would be applied to his own use and converted into Money And it may be he would appropriate to himself the Mineral Grounds as belonging to the Soveraign as the Gold and Silver Mines are commonly judged to be The Common-people should not be suffered to feed any more upon good Meat but upon Roots and Whey and the Blood and Livers of Oxen Brown-bread and Water instead of Beer and Ale Wooden-shoes instead of Leather course Canvas instead of fine Linnen The Money would be only imployed in maintaining great Armies and multitudes of Priests and Monks And in a word he would pursue the same methods of Government that he does in France But some may object again that since the beginning of this War we hear nothing but a parcel of idle Stories about the ill State of Affairs in France and we see notwithstanding the French King holds out still and is as powerful as ever This is just like the Opinion that People do commonly entertain of a Man that lives high and eats up his Stock That Man for example may have two thousand Pounds Sterling per Annum and spends five thousand every Year The understanding Men who know his Estate say that he ruines himself Other People who hear them say so and yet see him continuing to live at the same rate for ten or twelve Years together will say this Man holds out still and we see that he is a Man of good sense who manages his Expences well and therefore they conclude he is richer than he is commonly reported So that they cannot be undeceived in the matter till they see him in the Goal The Extravagant Notions which most People have of the French King's Power are such that if so be things did anser their fancy that Kingdom ought to be ten or twelve times bigger than England have ten or twelve times as much People be ten or twelve times
more fruitful better situated and fitted for Trade and richer also than England 'T is a hard matter to convince such People of their errour who have neither any true Idea of France nor of England but only some prejudicated Opinions which have no other ground but the good Esteem they have of their own sense without any solid or distinct principle and who do never reflect upon experience nor upon what hath happened before their own Eyes Have we not seen that since the War which the French King declared against the Dutch in 1672. the Land-Estates in France have been continually decaying more and more as I insinuated already because of the great Efforts the Kingdom did make at that time and of the interruption of Trade But what was that War compared to this which had been besides preceded by a general and cruel Persecution of the Protestants over all the Kingdom which had disturbed all the Trade of it Do not they remember what the Spaniards when alone in War with France did about fifty years ago when they laid under Contribution the very Suburbs of Paris and did often carry away the Citizens of that Place Prisoners Have they forgot that the Germans about 20 years ago did take several Towns from the French in Alsatia and that they Defeated part of the Arrier-Ban of France in Lorrain and that the Duke of Zell took the Town of Treves from the French after he had Routed the Mareschal de Crequy 'T is certain France did make very great Efforts then since which she never could recover her self and that she was much richer and more populous then than she is now How came it to pass that she could not then resist such small Armies Have they forgotten also how that the Dutch alone made several Provinces of France to tremble when they Invaded the Isse of Narmoutier whereby all their Coasts were kept in Alarm about 20 years ago Since that time have we not seen in this War the Germans to take Bonne and Mentz who can believe that that Kingdom is richer now and more populous than it was then And what if they should continue yet two years longer with greater forces than they have done hitherto must we believe therefore that they are in a better condition Have we not seen the French chased away from Ireland some years ago meerly because of their Weakness and want of Power we cannot say that they did not care to maintain themselves there how came it to pass then if France be really so powerful that it did not make greater Efforts to keep that Kingdom for it had been a fatal Blow to England and to all the Confederacy un coup de partie as the French call it But instead of shewing their great Power there their Forces were not paid and they were obliged to Coin Copper-Money instead of Silver and did plunder and ruine the Papists of Ireland their best Friends Any body conversant in History knows that the Spanish-Power was for a great time Superior to the French which obliged the Kings of France to desire the assistance of the English insomuch that in order to endear themselves to them they all required to be Knights of the Garter from Lewis the XII to Henry the IV. and no body is Ignorant that for many years they paid a kind of Tribute to the Kings of England and had it not been for the Dissentions of the English at home which brought their Forces away from France 't is probable they should have Lorded over France to this very day 'T is also well known that even long after the Discovery of America by the Spaniards and the opening of their Gold and Silver Mines H. the IV. did never get from his People above 20 Millions of Livers and Lewis the XIII about 70 tho' the oppression of the People was then very great and that Lewis the XI tho' a great Tyrant could not get above 4 Millions Yearly from his Subjects And if we may judge of the Revenues of France by that of Lewis the XIth's Expences they were small enough at that time for there was found a reckoning in the Chamber of Accounts at Paris of 2 s. for new Sleeves to his old Doublet and three half pence for Liquor to grease his Boots Unless People will fancy that France grows richer and gets strength by this War Horat. Duris ut ilex caesa bipennibus Per saxa per ignes ab ipso Ducit opes animumque ferro But if it be so how comes it to pass that she sets all her wits at work to procure a Peace She who did always boast that she gave it to all the World How is it that since some years we have seen many Conspiracies against King William's Life How is it that we hear from all parts that all her People is reduced to the last gasp Not to repeat what I have said already of their Plate converted into Coin many years ago by the King's Command and of the Coin raised twice since the War There are many severe and violent Impositions and Publick and Private Taxes which cross and destroy one another As for example they have sold some thousands of Offices to People who were unwilling to buy them and when the Court had received their Money they were abrogated under pretence that they were chargeable to the Kingdom as indeed they were and some Months after they forced others again to buy them They have done the same by several thousands who were forced to buy Letters of the Nobility and when the Money was delivered some time after there was a Declaration from the King That all those who had been made Nobles within this last hundred years should pay the same Sum for their Confirmation which they paid before They have done many such things these five or six years last which shews that they are put to the last shifts Such practices were never heard of in any other Nation under the Sun Here is another remarkable example There are several People who died since the Capitation was set up now all their Friends are forced to pay the said Poll-Tax for the dead whether they left any Estate or no. There are many French People here in England who confirm this In short I desire no more from those who will needs entertain such a great Opinion of the Riches and Power of France but that they would answer the reasons by which I shew evidently that England is and ought to be more populous and rich proportionably to it's Extent than France ever was and consequently much more than it is at present or that they should bring any solid reason to oblige me to call in question what I advanced upon that Subject They must not alledge against me what I acknowledged before viz that I think there was more Money in France than in England and that for a considerable time they had all the advantage of the Trade with us and Imposed Laws upon the rest
of any considerable Sum because the same Farmers 20 and 30 years ago did give more Interest for it sometimes 10 and 12 or 14 per cent 'T is well known that whosoever has any Money in France now does conceal it 'T is certain also and confirmed from all parts that they force all Men for the War and that they want Horses and must get them from Foreign Countries We have many amongst us who are in relation to France very near of the same humour with the Soldiers who besiege a strong Place They heard in the beginning of the Siege that the Engineers assured that the Place could not hold out beyond such a certain time when they have been a month or some time longer before the Place without carrying the Out-works and that they see the Enemies make vigorous Sallies they say The Engineers do impose upon us we shall never take the Place the Garrison is too numerous it appears by their vigour that they suffer no want Thus they speak tho' the Besieged at the same time want all things and the Place is turned to an heap of Rubbish by the Canon Bombs and Carcasses and the Garrison half destroyed But notwithstanding the great distress the Besieged are in they set a good face on their sad condition and make Sallies more vigorously than ever they did to try whether by an extraordinary Effort they can get themselves out of that trouble and create in the Enemy a good Opinion of their condition and oblige them to Raise the Siege or in order to make a more Advantagious Capitulation The Soldiers indeed would thereupon be of Opinion that the Siege should be Raised but the General and Engineers who best know the condition of the Place and of the Garrison go on with their Attacks vigorously and it comes to pass that soon after the Garrison being exhausted in Sallies capitulates and every body is amazed to find both the Place and the Garrison in such a desolate condition and admire how they did hold so long Those who said six or seven years ago that France would not be able to resist the Allies were much in the right for they understood it in a rational sense but not absolutely that is to say their meaning was that it could not resist them without the utter Ruine of the Kingdom for otherwise in point of Political Prudence and Government of Nations 't is not a commendable Resistance but a meer folly to destroy a Nation rather than to beg Peace and yield something or restore what the Enemy justly demands It was supposed that those who Ruled in France had some Prudence and that they would suspend their Design of the Universal Monarchy to another time or at least not expose their Glory and the Kingdom so much for a small point of Honour and a little Interest which certainly will not turn to their Honour at last whereas there is no State in Europe and I dare say there is no Example in Ancient or Modern History of any Nation that has so long and without necessity sustained a War so disproportionate to its own Strength and so ruinous as this will be to France before the Peace is made The French must needs have some mighty Hopes of a great Revolution in this Kingdom whereby they expect a conjunction of its Power with theirs to accomplish their great Designs of obtaining the Universal Monarchy and overturning the Protestant Religion But so as we see that Court governs now it may maintain the War two years longer do yet abundance of mischief and astonish all the World by their great Efforts because they are absolute Masters of all the Estates and Lives of the Subjects and have no more regard to them than to so many Dogs Tho' there has been but little Corn this year in France and almost no Wine nor Cider and but little Salt Silk and Olives Yet the Pope and the Jesuits who foment the War do not care for that they lose nothing by it for they reckon that they cannot fail of being very great and potent however things succeed for if the French King and K. James prevail they will be Masters of England if France succumbs they hope to be more Absolute and Potent in that Kingdom than ever and that they shall have nothing to fear hereafter from it CHAP IV. How and in what manner the French King has devoured three-fourths of all the Capital Stock of the Kingdom of FRANCE FIRST The Lands and Houses taken in general thro' the Kingdom are not one with another worth above the third part of what they were worth 30 years ago in clear Money repairs and amendments being allowed and all other Expences discounted and even that third part is ill paid For altho' it is perhaps well paid in some parts of the Kingdom and that Estates about the Frontiers may not have diminished in value because the Corn and other Fruits sell well there by reason of the Armies and Garrisons notwithstanding if we consider the great number of Lands untilled and of Houses forsaken the Interruption of Trade Scarcity of Money and especially the Destruction of above half the Working-Men which is the cause of the want of Farmers and Husband-Men I say if we duly consider all this we cannot but believe that Real-Estates are fallen at least two-thirds as to the Rent and that if one had a mind to sell the Gâ—…nd it would not yield the sixth part of what it was worth formerly So that 't is a true position that the King has devoured above three quarters of the Stock He has also consumed the three fourths of all the Woods for Timber belonging to his Subjects except those that pertain to the Clergy because the Extream Poverty they have been reduced to by the Government has forced them to sell them for the payment either of Taxes or Debts or for their own Maintenance The French King has likewise consumed the three-quarter parts of the Coined Money in the Kingdom conveying it out of the same by hundred different ways He has likewise wasted the three-quarter parts of all the Plate and Jewels in the Kingdom He has done the same in respect of Houshold-Goods for altho' there may be almost as much as formerly except Cattle Plate and Jewels their Species being not properly destroyed or conveyed out of the Kingdom nevertheless if they were to be sold they are not worth the fourth part of what they were formerly because none wants them Money and People being gone Men being destroyed and Land-Estates forsaken it follows necessarily that Lewis the XIV has also devoured the greatest part of the Cattle and indeed there is no need of them upon a forsaken Land where there is no people for to what purpose and who should take care of them Moreover 't is certain that where there is yet some Cattle they are not in the same quantity nor so good as formerly and suppose there were still great multitudes of Cattle in
desire that the Things and Reasons may be pondered rather than the VVords There have been diverse things writ both in French and English for several years past upon the Affairs of France but leaving those Papers to their own Merit I can say that I have borrowed nothing from them that my Method is new and I lay down several Principles which they did not and make a deeper search into things As for the Stile I know several Gallicisins will be found in it and other Faults because I was obliged to Compose it my self being not in a Condition to pay a Translator But yet understanding Men will find it plain and intelligible The simplicity of it I shall not accuse because it agrees with the simplicity of the Matter as also with the Method which is a kind of Political Arethmetick And I hope the importance of the Subject the strength of the Reasons and the multitude of Thoughts will make amends for the Imperfection of the Stile Some may be apt to ask How I can pretend to be so well informed of the present condition of France since I have been so long absent from it because of the Persecution I answer That I had a competent knowledge of the Affairs of that Kingdom of its Government and of the State of the People before I left it and that since that time I have taken special care to observe all the alterations that have happened But further any sensible Man who reads my Book may easily perceive that I build all my Positions upon Universal Plain and certain Principles fitted to the meanest Capacity from which I draw my Consequences which I submit to any Man's Judgment I am confident that several of my Country men will think it strange that being of a noted Family in France having some Interest to manage in that Kingdom and being uneasie in England that I should expose my self thus seeing the Peace seems to be in a great forwardness by Publishing such a Book which cannot but highly provoke the Rulers in France who are informed of all things and soon or late will revenge it one way or other I foresee all this as well as they but I think my self obliged to do it in Conscience and Honour I do not see any Reason why it should not be as lawful to me as for several French Generals and other Officers among the Refugees who are in the Service of this Nation and other Confederates to do what I can for the Service of those Nations who have generously sheltered us against those who instead of being our Fathers and Protectors have behaved themselves towards us in the most barbarous manner against all Laws both Divine and Humane The same Motives which influence those good Refugees of whom I spoke just now induce me to this If so be they deserve to be commended for what they do I hope I am not to be blamed for this It would be a gross mistake to think that one may not as usefully and lawfully serve a Nation with his Pen as with his Sword since we deal with Men who may be persuaded by Reason and that we can thereby give advise at once to Millions of People of what they are to do expect or fear A poor Man has sometimes saved a whole Nation by his good Counsel If there be any Man so unreasonable as to fancy that because I am a French man Born I ought out of Conscience to abstain from the displaying the weakness of France as I do he would be guilty of a gross errour to believe that a Prince or a Nation may trample under foot all the Duties of humane Society and Religion in Relation to their Subjects and that the Subjects notwithstanding should not be allowed to make complaints and publish the Folly and Excesses of their quondam Rulers even when they are delivered from under their Bondage and that the same Subjects should not be permitted to serve according to their Ability their Benefactors under whose Protection they live quietly and worship God according to his Word and the light of their Conscience to whom moreover they have sworn Allegiance and Fidelity to serve 'em I say against those who have behav'd themselves towards 'em like so many Cruel and Ravenous Wolves both as to the Affairs of Body and Soul and behave themselves still in the same manner towards their Brethren in France and seem besides to be the Universal Enemies to Mankind Some may be apt to think that I writ this Book out of Passion and Revenge I confess that never any Resentment was so well grounded as this might be But yet I profess that tho' I abhor their conduct and wickedness 't is not from a Spirit of Revenge that I writ this and I have already given an Account of the true Motives which induced me to it Any Body may observe there is no Nation to which my Book might be so useful as to France if she would be pleased to follow my Advice I represent only the Mischiefs which her People groans under but I do her none but on the contrary all that I say tends naturally to the healing of her diseases if so be she thinks fit to make use of the Remedies which I propose If any Man say that I take a delight in her Calamities and that I aggravate them I declare here in all sincerity That I think they are greater than what I say and that I wish earnestly and with all my Soul that they would repent And if France ever comes to her self there is no reward so great but I may deserve it at her hands for the good Advices I give her I am sure that all the honest People of that Kingdom will thank me for it and 't is better to please one honest Man in doing my Duty than a Million of ill Men by neglecting it 'T is true I reprehend the Excesses of the French Government as I think my self obliged to do in Conscience and from the principle of Love which I bear to Mankind and I am of Opinion that if it is commendable to give good Advice to a private Person by discovering his Faults to others and himself it is a thousand times more commendable to give Advice to a great State which may be serviceable to millions of Souls and sometimes to all the World By this Treatise the Court of France will be better informed than hitherto of the Affairs of England for it would seem that they flattered ' emselves as if the strength of this Kingdom had been exhausted which is far from the truth seeing the Nation if it will may be in a better condition than ever It may also be observed that I speak good of France without partiality as well as evil and that I take the Liberty to reprehend the Faults and Defects of our best Friends for in general I hate disorder and would have all things go on in their proper course It will be also found that I have wholly
followed a new Method in displaying by Reasons purely Political the falsehood of the Romish pretended Religion by its Natural and Perpetual Opposition to the good of States the repose of People and good Morals which alone is enough to render it detestable to all those who love Order Justice and the Prosperity of Nations tho' there were nothing to be said against it from the Word of God I hope that equitable Persons who shall be convinced of my good intention and of the usefulness of my labours will grant me an easie pardon for all the Errours Defects and Imperfections which they may perhaps meet with such things being common to all Mankind ERRATA PAge 3. line 21. read are decreased p. 11. l. 2. r. hole by p. 16. l. 31. r. Oppression p. 17. l. 28. r. three parts of four p. 19. l. 29. r. 70. p. 47. l. 27. r. as p. 50. l. 13. r. Day-labourer p. 52. l. 20. after day add for Food Dyet and Cloaths ibid. l. 22. after expence r. for the Food alone and l. 28. after wherewithal r. to Cloath and p. 68. l. 2. r. 21. p. 108. l. 21. r. of which p. 180. l. 8. r. 340. p. 206. l. 1. r. the p. 224. l. 26. r. the three parts in four p. 226. l. 12. r. in the Provinces p. 232. l. 22. r. Linnen-cloaths p. 247. l. 12. r. per pound p. 252. l. 5. dele of THE CONTENTS CHAP. 1. pag. 1. The Desolation and Ruine of France demonstrated c. Chap. 2. pag. 26. A more punctual and particular Account of the present Condition of France Chap. 3. pag. 65. That England is and ought to be more populous proportionably to its bigness than France was even before the War Chap. 4. pag. 174. How and in what manner the French King has devoured the three-fourths of all the Capital Stock of the Kingdom of France Chap. 5. pag. 193. A particular Account of the Depopulation of France together with the Effects of a Depopulation Chap. 6. pag. 223. Prognosticks which may be drawn from the depopulation of France Chap. 7. pag. 254. A List of the principal Impositions and Taxes that are in the Kingdom of France THE Desolation and Ruine OF FRANCE Demonstrated c. CHAP. I. THE Ruine and Desolation of France is now become the common Theme of Discourse and the most ordinary Subject of Conversation especially amongst the Refugees in all Countries where they are dispersed but none of those that I have heard discoursing about it seem to have any just Notion of the degree of Oppression which that Kingdom labours under but all their Ideas are very much below the reality This together with my desire to serve the Publick hath obliged me to examine the matter thoroughly and I make bold to say That I have made deeper enquiries into this Matter than any body else has done and shall now submit my Discoveries to the Judgment of the publick I begin with the Diminution of the People of that Kingdom which I am sure is much greater than is commonly judged to be 't is the chief and most important part of the desolation of France and the great cause of all those Evils and Calamities under which it groans The better to convince the World of the truth of this I will make use of a Supposition already granted which I think the most reasonable that can be made upon that Subject viz. That there might be in the Kingdom of France about 14 Millions of Subjects 30 years ago when it was in its most flourishing condition there are 27 thousand Parishes in that Kingdom and it is probable there might be 500 Souls in each Parish one with another which makes 13 Millions and a half I do not here include the Conquests because they do not properly belong to the Kingdom and 't is like they will be returned to those to whom they justly belong The Computation which I make of there having been 13 Millions and a half of People in France is confirmed by the proportion which there is between the Extent of France and that of England as also between the number of Parishes in the two Kingdoms France contains 82 Millions of Acres and England 30 Millions There are in France 27 Thousand Parishes as has been said already and in England about 10 thousand Now if it be the common estimation that in the 30 Millions of Acres and the 10 Thousand Parishes in England there are not above 6 Millions of People 't is not probable that there could be in the 82 Millions of Acres and the 27 thousand Parishes in France above 13 Millions and a half by reason that a Popish Nation under an Arbitrary Government cannot be supposed to be so well peopled as a Protestant Nation under a Mild Government besides several other Reasons which I intend to produce hereafter So that the Parishes in England may reasonably be computed to be a sixth part more populous than those in France So that if the Parishes in England have but 600 Souls one with another those in France could never exceed the number of 500 one with another In its most flourishing condition 'T is probable that the French King's Subjects decreased at least a third part in number and an half in strength and value I mean That tho' the Diminution does not perhaps exceed the Third part as to the number reckoning the generality of Men Women and Children yet it cannot be less than a full half in value in respect that the Adult Men are much more diminished in number than Women Now it is the number of Men who without contradiction makes a People valuable since 't is they who Cultivate the Land Trade by Sea imploy themselves in Manufactures and Arts pay Taxes and make War And the Decrease is so much the more considerable because the greatest part of the Men who have been destroyed were of that sort and not of those who are rather Burthensome than Profitable to a Nation of which I shall take notice hereafter Insomuch that reducing the 13 Millions and an half of Souls to 9 Millions at this day that is to the two thirds of what they were 30 years ago 't is reasonable to say That there being in this number many more Women and Children proportionably than Men the said 9 Millions are not at present worth 6 Millions 750 Thousand that is the half of the promiscuous Mass of the 13 Millions and a half which we supposed to have been in France 30 years ago because there were then many more Men proportionably than now especially of that sort who were imployed in Husbandry Manufactures Trade and Handicrafts of which sort if we consider what belongs to working and the usefulness of their labour one is worth two or three other Persons taken in general out of the Mass of Mankind At that time there might be near upon the like number of Men as of Women whereas now there is great reason to believe there are at least
Corn and Fruits turn Bankrupt every day I reckon that for lost And tho' there were a sufficient number of People fit to be Farmers yet as they see no prospect of an end to this War and that the Kings Emissaries are always upon the catch to take hold of all Money where-ever they can discover it they dare not take any thing in hand at this hard time but chuse rather to be looked upon as worth nothing at all And further tho' the Estates had not been realy Decayed so much as to the Revenue yet they must have Diminished as much in the real value and that so much the more that the great number of Women who Cultivate at present much Land and the small number of Men remaining Decreases every day by death without any hopes that their numbers should be filled up again by Generation for want of Marriages So that there will be a great want of People in that respect some years hence And altho' the Peace were made to day France must continually Decrease in its numbers of People till there be an equality between the number of Men and Women and that by an Universal Change of the severity of the Government they may be induced to marry as formerly they did and so Re-people the Kingdom by degrees So that I must be of Opinion oppose it who will that all the Lands and Personal-Estates in the Kingdom of France do not at this day yield in Revenues or Annual Profit above the third part of what they did formerly which amounts it may be to 130 Millions of Livers or there abouts whereas they might bring in 30 years ago about 400 Millions of Livers I am confirmed in this opinion by the Estimation made of the Revenue of the Real and Personal-Estates in England which I find to be 16 Millions Sterling per annum or 200 and eight Millions of Livers to which Estimation I adhere tho' I am of opinion that at present the Revenue of the said Estates may amount to above 18 Millions Sterling because the product is worth more now than 't was before the War that diverse improvements have been made for these several years past and that the Prosit of Personal Estates increase likewise daily Let us come now to the particulars of this Comparison There be as I said in the Kingdom of France 82 Millions of Acres and in England about 30 at the same measure that is to say there is almost 3 times as much Ground in France as in England since England is in respect to France but as 4 to 11. Of those 82 Millions of Acres which are in France about 16 Millions must be deducted as also about 6 Millions of the 30 in England which in both Kingdoms consist in Lands that may be called unprofitable because they produce little or nothing as Rivers Heaths High-Ways Rocks Sands Downs Banks of the Sea Rivers Morasses and other such Barren Grounds Those 24 Millions of Acres are valued in England at 8 Millions Sterling of yearly Revenue that is to say at 6 s. and 8 d. per Acre one with another by adding thereto the Lands called Unprofitable tho' they are not absolutely so I say that 't is not likely the Lands in France should have ever been worth so much even when they were most valuable as in England from the time that both Kingdoms were Peopled and have driven any Sea-Trade in Europe because Lands in France are generally more remote from the Sea than they are in England and consequently their Foreign-Trade and the exportation of their product is less because the English Government is also Milder than that of France and that the Popish Religion is extreamly contrary to the improvement of Lands and the welfare of a Nation as I shall demonstrate in its proper place Besides the Soil in France is generally less fruitful than in England nor is it so plentiful in Pastures which are the best of all Land-Estates There be in France few Coal-Pits no Tin Copper or Lead-Mines whereas there are many in England without mentioning that England has been always more populous than France as I shall justifie it and as follows naturally from the Reasons which I have produced already besides a great many others which shall find room in a more convenient place For those Reasons the Land-Estates must needs have always been more valuable generally in England than in France and I verily believe they never exceeded in France even in the time of their greatest Prosperity the value of 16 Millions Sterling of yearly Revenue Had they been worth as much proportionably as those in England where 30 Millions of Acres are valued as I have said at 8 Millions Sterling of yearly Revenue then the 82 Millions of Acres in France should have been worth 22 Millions Sterling of yearly Revenue According to that Estimation the Revenues of all the Lands in France can never have exceeded even in the best times 16 Millions Sterling or 208 Millions of Livers and I am willing to suppose they might amount to that Sum 30 years ago tho' I can hardly believe it But because for many years the Revenue of Lands hath been Decreasing and especially since this War I suppose it is not worth now above the third part of what it was worth 30 years ago and dare say that the said 82 Millions of Acres are not worth at present above 5 Millions and a half Sterling or 72 Millions of Livers yearly that is to say about 1 s. 8 d. per Acre one with another No body ought to be surprized at this Estimation seeing in Ireland where Land is generally better than in France and nearer the Sea where there is a free Trade and which is almost as populous proportionably as France is at this day since 't is probable there is not above the third part more People in France proportionably to its bigness than there are in Ireland as I shall shew in its proper place in Ireland I say the Acre of Land is not valued one with another a Shilling per Annum although it abounds with Pasture Grounds which are the most profitable of any and the most easie to be managed We ought to make the same Judgment of the Revenue of Houses in France proportionably viz. That it is also fallen two thirds and that so much the more because tho they be Uninhabited or fallen in their Rent the repairs are the same or greater than formerly but let us grant that their value holds the same proportion with the Houses in England as do the Lands of both Kingdoms respectively I shall not value them in particular here but shall joyn them to the Personal-Estates in conjunction with which they are Judged to be worth 8 Millions Sterling of Revenue or Annual Profit in England that is to say as much as the Lands They do not think for all they value them so that the Personal-Estates with the Houses are equal in worth to the value of
Lands as to the price of the Principal but they do value their Profits at that rate because the Interest of Personal-Estates is greater than that of the real In that manner by keeping the same proportion which we did in respect of the Lands of both Kingdoms I say holding the same proportion between the Houses and Personal-Estates in France and the Houses and Personal-Estates in England these ought to be valued in France at 5 Millions and a half as well as Lands But it must be confessed that tho' the Revenues of Houses should have decayed more than those of Lands yet the Revenues of Personal-Estates ought to be more diminished and withal that this sort of Goods was never worth near so much in France as in England which hath ever had in that respect a greater advantage over France than it had in respect of the value of Lands So that I give a great allowance to France when I value the Revenue of their Houses and Personal-Estates at 4 Millions and an half Sterling And indeed Personal-Estates consisting in Cattle of all kinds in Furniture of Houses Silver Coined and not Coined Jewels Merchandizes Ships c. any Man may easily see in running over all those Species that they are much less than formerly and that the Profits of them are also by consequence much less For First Cattle are much diminished there is none left in most places they having been sold to pay Taxes or Debts and the Farms have been abandoned afterwards and where there is any Cattle there is far from being enough and what they have is poor weak ill-fed and ill-taken care of for want of Servants and they are worth but little Money because of the want of Eaters and the want of Money too There are very few Horses left the War having destroyed almost all of 'em and the People being not able to bring them up by Reason of their Poverty 'T is true they are sold dear but that is an aggravation of the People's Misery seeing 't is their Scarcity which is the cause of it and that they cannot be wanted neither and yet the people are not able to buy them For this Reason several Lands are left Untilled viz. In all the Plain Provinces where they want Hay for Oxen and must needs make use of Horses or Mules who feed most upon Straw and Oats As to other Personal-Goods it is easie to conceive that 't is yet worse As for example As to Furniture of Houses and Houshould-Goods no body is now curious in them what is worse very few buy any New ones because there is such a quantity of Old that they may be had almost for nothing As for Money every body knows there is little in the Kingdom and consequently it brings no profit to them who keep it especially there being no Trade and if it be lent to the King or discovered by him any way then 't is lost There is but little Plate and Jewels left in the Kingdom for none but Great Persons such as Lords and Ladies have any As or Mercantile Commodities there are very few Made or Sold at present The Store-houses are all empty Manufactures Trade and Arts are all decayed and by Consequence the Ships bring no profit to their Owners neither so that 't is easie to conceive that the Revenue of those Personal-Estates is yet more fallen than that of Lands the Tillage and Product of which can much worse be spared than any thing else So that all the Revenue of the Kingdom of France both Real and Personal is not now worth above 10 Millions Sterling or 130 Millions of Livers whereas it was probably worth near 30 Millions Sterling or 400 Millions of Livers 30 years ago and so the Revenue of all Real and Personal-Estates of France must be worth less at present by 6 Millions Sterling or 72 Millions of Livers than the Revenues of the same Estates in England It must be observed by the way that the Clergy of France possesses the half of the Estates in the Kingdom that is to say about 15 Millions Sterling or 200 Millions of Livers of Revenue formerly and at present about the third part of that Sum or 65 Millions of Livers I do not question but many People will be surprized at this Computation whom I will endeavour to satisfie but I desire leave First To answer some Objections which may be made to some Points As for example Some may ask how I make it out that Houshold-Goods Silver Uncoined Jewels c. produce any Revenue or Profit I answer That the use which is made of them is accounted for as much Revenue because either they bring some Advantage or else are an Ornament to those who make use of them as a stately House is instead of a great Revenue to the Proprietor tho' he inhabits it himself because if he did lett it out to any other Persons he would get a great Rent for it and if he did sell it it would yield him a great Sum of Money which laid out at Interest or in Trade would afford him great Profit It is the same with the things in question and with Merchandize which are Judged to bring a good Revenue in the Store-Houses and in the Shop because when the time of Sale comes the Owner has a greater Profit by them than if he had lett out his Money at Ordinary Interest If any Man ask further why I have distinguished the Revenue of Lands from that of Houses and wattle since Lands are not worth any thing without Houses and Cattle it being impossible to cultivate them without those things I answer as to the first that I include with the Lands the Houses necessary for the Habitation of those who manage them and for the harbouring of their Cattle which cannot be lett a part it being known that the Houses of Husband-men Farmers and Gentlemen in the Country make part of the Farms and belong to them The Houses or the Revenue of Houses which I distinguished from those belonging to Lands are the Houses of Cities Towns and Borroughs and generally all those which are lett out without Lands I distinguish also the Revenue of Lands from that of Cattle because we see every day Lands lett to Farm without Cattle the Farmers themselves furnish Cattle and pay so much the less to the Proprietor For if so be the Farmer would not or could not do it it would be the Proprietor's part to do it in which case the Farmer must give more for the Land and Cattle together than they would have done for the Land alone Certainly there are very few Persons who do not know this But to return to our Subject I said that many will be surprized to see that we value the Revenues of France so little and that we prefer the present Revenues of England to them tho' it be not much above the third part of France in extent nay and according to some it is less than the third
part of France and does not exceed the Province of Languedock in Dimensions They will be amazed likewise to find that I value the Acre of Land at 1 s. 8 d. one with another or about 22 French Sols because they know some Lands elsewhere that were worth 10 20 or 30 times more Others may object other things or say That I have a mind to flatter the English Nation but I protest I speak according to my own Conscience every body knows I have little Reason either to admire my Lot in England or to flatter the Nation But I answer further That every one is free to think what he pleases concerning it I do not pretend that all that I Advance is Mathematical Demonstrations but only Probabilities extraordinary well grounded and I dare say That if they had examined things as narrowly as I have done and had exercised themselves as much as I have exercised my self in that kind of Study they would judge otherwise of the matter but the truth is few or none set their mind to those things or use to consider them in this method and we are naturally apt to oppose that which we do not understand or which is against our prejudicate Opinions So that I give leave to all such who are of that Disposition of Mind to value the present Revenues of France as much and the Revenues of England as little as they please I say further That it must be very unreasonable to disown but that France is extraordinarily Depopulated and that abundance of Lands and Houses have been forsaken and that all the other Calamities which I mentioned and are confirmed to us every week by several Letters and even by Persons who come from those Parts should be really true certainly at this rate all things might be called in question I think there can be no Dispute about the Desolation of France but only about the Degree of it But if it be certain as I advance that the 2 thirds parts of Men fit for work or at least the half have perished in the War or are dead for want of Necessaries as it seems very unreasonable to deny it that alone will prove more than I desire As to the Bigness and Extent of both Kingdoms I confess I have not measured them but they have been measured by others and I believe them so much the rather that I find upon the Maps that it is very Rational as well for the respective Quantity and Extent of both Kingdoms as for the proportion which I supposed to be between them and any Man who hath but eyes may measure upon the Geographical Maps the Extent of both and judge very near of the proportion of the one to the other As for what concerns the Estimate of the Acres in France which I value at 1 s. 8 d. one with another at present it is founded partly on the proportion which ought to be between the present and former value of the Estates in France and partly upon the Common Estimation of the Acre of Land in England which is of the same Measure with that in France and by comparison I conclude from the Reasons above produced which prove that England ought to have ever been Richer and more Populous and Fruitful than France and from all those which convince us that France is mightily Depopulated and hath lost the two thirds of all her Men fit for work I conclude I say from thence that the Acres ought in general to be near upon four times as much worth in England at present as in France It has been valued a long time ago at 6 s. 8 d. the Acre one with another I confess there may be many places in England where it is not worth 2 s. nor perhaps one but there are some also where it is valued at 30 and 40 times more In general 't is most valuable in all Countries near good Sea-Ports or Head-Cities or Navigable-Rivers And my Estimation must needs appear reasonable to all those who will be pleased to remember what I said above that the Acre in Ireland is not Farmed generally one with another at above 10 d. or 11 d. tho' the Acre is bigger there than in England and Ireland fruitfuller too and nearer the Sea than France and besides that injoyes liberty of Trade and pays almost no Taxes in comparison of what France pays But some may object again and ask How can your computation stand good as to the Revenues of France since you said That the French King alone did raise every year even in the time of Peace above 132 Millions of Livers upon his People besides the Casual or Extrordinary Taxes which did amount often to 30 40 and 50 Millions of Livers more and that the Officers of Judicature and other Civil Officers did get one with another every year at least 140 or 150 Millions of Livers from the People That the Farmers general and particular and other Exactors of the Impositions might cost the Nation besides 70 or 80 Millions more And that over and above all this the Church-men alone did possess near 200 Millions of yearly Revenue without mentioning what they cheated the People of besides and got cunningly by their Subtilties and driving a Trade of what they call Holy Things which I judge did amount to above 30 Millions of Livers more every year For answer to this I say first That as the King's Revenues so likewise the Revenues and Gains of all those sorts of People just now named did Circulate amongst all the Subjects as is usual for the Revenues and Profits of all those who compose a Nation and that as the King raised Sums upon the Officers of Judicature and other Civil Officers as also upon the Clergy and upon the Farmers and Exactors of the Publick Impositions by Ordinary and Extraordinary Taxes and that they had so much the less clear Money by it these People did also draw in to themselves the Money of those amongst whom the King in the course of his ordinary Expences diffused his Revenues I say they did draw it in according to their respective and usual Ways and Methods either by Suits at Law Exactions or Masses or in some other way It was the same Money which did Pass and Repass by the Week Quarter or Half-Year several times through the Hands of all those People therefore it does not follow that there were 5 or 600 Millions of Money in the Kingdom tho' there was more in it than in most other Countries neither did all this Money proceed from the Revenue of the Real and Personal-Estates but chiefly from the Revenue and Profits of the industry of the Subjects For as to the King's Revenues 't is known that a great part of the Impositions in France are not laid on the Real Estates but consist in Excises upon all things generally which the People consume as well for Diet and Cloathing as for other Uses and not upon the Real or Personal-Stocks only The Revenues did
consist also in Customs or Taxes upon all things Imported or Exported out of the Kingdom Provinces Cities and Towns c. As for the Subjects of the Kingdom the Profit of the People's industry diffused it self likewise amongst all People by the same Method of Circulation It must be known also that the Profits of industry in a diligent Nation and indifferently populous does amount almost to twice as much as all the Revenues of Real and Personal Estates I will make this Intelligible by a Familiar Example We have often seen in France and the same may be observed every where else by considering Men we have seen I say Lands Farmed at 3 or 400 Livers per Annum pay as much to the King for the Taille and Imposition on Salt and yet maintain both the Farmer 's Family and Servants It was not the Money which the Proprietor received of his Farm and which is properly the Revenue of the Land that payed the said Taxes maintained all those Persons and furnished them with all sorts of Necessaries but their Labour Here follows another Example They commonly value all the Corn spent in England at 10 Millions Sterling one year with another reckoning Wheat at 5 s. the Bushel and Barly at 2 s. and other Grains proportionably and yet the Revenue of all the Lands is valued only at 8 Millions Sterling and the Cattle and all other things consumed out of the Native Product are worth the double Now if the Labour of them who employ themselves only about Husbandry makes such a product how much more will the Labour of Mechanicks and Artists do it and yet the product of Manufactures and Mines is still greater but the profits of those who are Employed by Sea either in Fishing Coasting or a Forreign Trade is the greatest of all In a Populous and Trading Country the Revenue of Lands Industry and Profit ought to be greater than in other Places for these things hold a sympathy together the one helps the other for when Arts Manufactures and Trade thrive the Revenue of Real and Personal-Estates increases because Money becomes more Common and Currant the Countrey grows more and more Populous and more Provisions and other things necessary to Mankind are spent And likewise when Estates augment in Revenue the Manufacturers Artists Labourers c. are more Employed and every one has more whereupon to Live and the Country grows Richer and Richer To make Application of this to my Subject and to continue in the Comparison I made of the Real and Personal-Estates and of the Revenue of both the Kingdoms of France and England I will adventure to say That the Profits of Industry ever ought to have been greater in England than in France by Reason of the Protestant Religion which encourages Industry and Trade more than Popery which is destructive to them as I shall shew as also by Reason of the multitude of Mines which we have mentioned already the proximity of the Sea the Forreign Trade Fishery of which the Profits are very great and the Salary and Wages of those imployed therein being more considerable and their number much greater in England than in France For in Countries more remote from the Sea as France is generally compar'd with England there are not so many Men of this sort whose Labour and Time are so well rewarded for generally speaking those who work about building of Ships and all other things belonging to Shipping either for Men of War or Trading-Ships earn three or four times as much as Common-Labourers do It must be considered that there are above a hundred different Trades that relate to Sea whose Workmen get proportionably to the Profits made by Navigation Sea-Trade or Fishing There are in England four Men of that kind to one in France tho' France is as I have said often almost 3 times as big as England This Article alone makes a great difference between the Profits of Industry in the two Kingdoms For one cannot imagine the advantages which a Country near the Sea has over another that is far from it if it were but for the Trade and carriage of heavy Materials which are a notable part of the Trade and without which none can be managed at all as are Timber and Wood for Work or for Fire and Minerals Stones Chalk Sand Glass Bricks Earthen Pots wrought or unwrought Iron Coals Turfs Butter Cheese Hemp Flax Wool Salt Wine Beer Syder Corn Tallow c. For the Profit and Time of those who are imployed about carrying such things in a Country remote from Sea comes almost to nothing and yet the number of those who either transport and carry them or Trade with 'em is prodigious in such a large Country as France whereas in England the Proximity of the Sea makes the Trade of all those things to be very Profitable and Easie and the consumption of the same to be much greater because they are cheaper which is an encouragement to Propagation and then there are not so many imployed about carrying them proportionably as in France because of the facility of the carriage by Water which causes those imployed in them to get the more for their Labour and Time As to Manufactures tho' France had the advantage of England in regard of several Manufactures yet I dare say that that of Wool alone in England did imploy more People proportionably than did all those in France except that of Linnen-Weavers which is a work very unprofitable and besides that there are several other Manfactures also practised in England There 's another thing that may also convince us that the English People did in general get more Profit by their Industry than the French proportionably which is this that in London which is almost twice as Big and Populous as Paris the Capital City of a Kingdom 3 times as big as I have said often than England is in London I say Trades-men and almost all sorts of Workmen get in general twice as much Wages as they do at Paris The same will be evident also if we consider that in this Country which ought to have been at all times richer than France proportionably to their respective bigness the people pays ordinarily no Taxes or very small ones and consequently the Sums which are unprofitably imployed in France about maintaining great Armies of Soldiers and Exactors and many other such Caterpillers as before mentioned which are all idle and troublesom to the Working sort of People those sums I say are spent in England upon things which proceed from Man's Industry whether they be necessary or only for Ornament or Delight which causes the English Nation to spend more than any other Nation does therein and consequently Industry must needs be more profitable there than any where else Not to mention here the greater number of Holy-days which they have in France as also a great number of People useless for work of which I have spoke already c. But notwithstanding all this we must
confess there was a considerable time when the French Nation got very much by its Industry and by their Manfactures so much Desired of their Neighbours and for that reason very noxious to England in particular 't is true that time did not last above 40 or 50 years neither did the said Manufactures take always at the same rate during that time the French King did give Laws to his Neighbours and made all Christian Europe not the Mahometan to tremble under him till his Ambition has brought his Kingdom to that lamentable condition wherein it is at present and which grows every day worse and worse During those 40 or 50 years I do believe that the Revenue of the French Industry did go beyond the Revenue of the Real and Personal-Estates and that if the last did amount to 400 Millions the Profits of the Peoples Industry could be worth no less than 600 Millions of Livers So that 't is not so much to be wondred at if the French King and the rest of the Blood-suckers we spoke of before did raise the great Sums already mentioned in that Kingdom At present those Revenues and Profits of Industry are at least as much Decreased as those of their Real and Personal-Estates For there are but few Working-men left and no Work for them to do unless it be about the Manuring of a little Lands wherein there is not much to be got since the Arts Manufactures and Trade have Decreased so much So that there is reason to admire how that People can still subsist which I shall discover anon But I must first shew how we may come to the knowledge of the true Value of the Industry of a Nation To comprehend well the Effect and Profit of the Labour of a People the Number of Souls who compose a Nation the Revenue of all its Estates Real and Personal and the Yearly Expense of the whole People must be known For example we said that the Revenue of all the Estates Real and Personal in England were worth 16 Millions Sterling and 't is commonly supposed there are 6 Millions of Souls in it To make a due Computation of that People's Expense a Medium must be found of the Expense of each Soul one with another Then we must see to what the whole will amount and what goes beyond the 16 Millions Sterling will be the Revenue or Profit of the Industry and Labour of the Nation I think no better Rule can be found for it than that of the Expense of a Journey man in the Country Such a man's Salary is commonly 8 pence a day if he maintains himself or 4 pence if he be maintained and so his Food amounts to 2 shillings per week or 5 pound Sterling and 4 shill per annum For Cloaths Lodging and the rest no less can be reckoned than 36 shill seeing the Wages of the poorest Servant-Maid in the Country who gets no more than Food and Rayment is no less and She spends it for her Cloaths and Shoes in all 7 pound according to this all the Expense of the People of England will amount to 42 Millions Sterling So that the Profit of the Labour of the People at this rate will be 26 Millions Sterling which is almost the double of the Revenue of the Real and Personal-Estates which are valued only at 16 Millions Sterling Some perhaps will be astonished to see that we value at so small a rate the Yearly Expense of every Soul viz. 7 pound Sterling by reason that they see many who on their own Persons spend 15 nay 20 times more and that the People of England does in particular spend much more than any People whatsoever And I own that I have had some thoughts to put a higher Estimate upon the Expenses of each person one with another but after having well pondered and examined all things I found it best to adhere to the Opinion of a very understanding Man whom I follow upon that Subject and indeed whoever will consider how much the number of the Poor their Wives and Children does exceed that of the Rich and that often one of those poor Journey-men maintains a great Family by his sole Labour will judge that such a Journey-man's Expense may very well serve as a Rule and Standard for the Expense of a whole Nation taken in general Suppose then that the Proportion which we have laid down between the worth of the Real and Personal Estates of France and those in England be well grounded and that France may be still worth 10 Millions Sterling per annum as England is worth 16 without Men's Labour the same proportion may be also established between the Profits of the Labour of both Nations and as we reckoned the present Revenue of the Labour in England at 26 millions Sterling we may also reckon according to the same proportion the Profits of the Labour in France to 15 millions Sterling And in that manner all the Revenues of France at this day should amount still to 25 millions Sterling that is as well the Profit of their Labour as the Revenues of Real and Personal-Estates I profess I do not believe their Labour rises so high at this day and I dare venture to say 't is impossible they should because above two thirds of the Labouring Men are either Dead or in the Army and I am of Opinion that in strictness it cannot amount to 10 Millions Sterling but I am willing rather to allow them more than less According to these Positions the remaining People in France who are in number as we supposed about 9 Millions of Souls could not spend above 30 Livers per annum or there abouts one with another that is to say not so much as two pence every day If the Reader has been surprized that I did compute the English People's Expense to be only 4 pence every day one with another they will perhaps be much more surprized that I value that of the French People no more than 2 pence for every working day or 52 shill per annum upon which they must spare wherewithll to maintain themselves for more than a hundred days in the year viz. Sundays and all their Holy-days whereas the English-Man may work when he pleases except Sundays and a very few other Holy-days And yet I protest again in sincerity that I do not think the Profit of their Labour goes so far nor that it exceeds as I have said already 10 Millions Sterling at present but I was willing to indulge them rather than otherwise and so I leave them still at two pence a day 'T is the utmost we can put upon the value of the French People's Industry at this day for a great many Reasons which I shall reduce to some Heads 1. The Value of Lands and People's Work could never be so high in France as in England nor their Expenses by good consequence for the Reasons above-mentioned the Proximity of the Sea the Great Trade the Mildness of
the English Government the Protestant Religion c. And that the People of England spent always much more than those of France 2. The Fruits or Profits of the Labour of People could never be so great in France as in England as I proved before 3. Above the two thirds of the Working-Men in France have perished one way or other as I said before and must often repeat it and the excess of Misery under which that People groans cannot be expressed 4. There is no Trade within or without the Kingdom Arts and Manufactures are all decayed and a great part of the People are turned Beggars c. But because it seems to be impossible that the French People should Live and Subsist at so little Expense I must Discover how they do it 't is by consuming their Stock perhaps to the value of above 4 or 500 Millions every Year without reckoning the great and general Decay in all the Stocks and Revenues caused by the Depopulation which puts the Kingdom to the loss of more than 2000 Millions yearly during this War as I could easily demonstrate 'T is not so much by selling away Lands Houses and Offices that the People devours these 4 or 500 Millions of their Stock tho' they may perhaps sell some for the 10th or 12th part of their former value as 't is by selling away their Houshold-Goods Cattle and Timber-Wood their Plate and Jewels when there is any or lending to those who will never pay or by borrowing giving or taking to trust either their Money or Commodities Labour or Time by not paying their old Debts which is a general Disease in all the Kingdom and makes up a dreadful Article or by selling and quitting their actual Debts for much less than they were worth formerly and such other usual Ways by which they waste their Stock more and more and yet for all this a great many dye of Hunger every day To comprehend this matter the better let us suppose a Man who had 30 years ago 100 pound of Revenue and pays now the Taxes upon the Foot of the Ancient Revenue of his Land and not upon the Foot of the present for the Court Taxes all the Subjects now according to the Ancient Estimate that Man's Lands being fallen two thirds of their former Revenue if he pays only 30 pounds to the King Yearly which would be look'd upon now a days as a great moderation there is nothing left for him of his Revenue if he pays 50 or 100 l. as 't is usual now for they are Taxed in that proportion and worse sometimes how can he pay that Tax which is three times more than his Rent and live without wasting the Stock If as I said before all the Estates Real and Personal in the Kingdom are worth but 130 Millions of Livers and that the King alone raises 200 which comes into his Coffers free without that which is necessary to enrich the Farmers of Impositions and to maintain 30 or 40 thousand Men under them at the People's Charges called Gabeleurs and Rats de Cave c. and besides to maintain the Officers of Judicature and innumerable other Civil Officers as I said before without mentioning the Clergy who by their Subtilty and Craft do always Cheat and Plunder the People If I say this be the State of affairs in France we are obliged to believe that as the King and all those Ravenous Birds devour the Kingdom every one is also forced to live upon the Quick and devour his own Stock and that so much the more that the Clergy alone possess as I have said the half of the Real and Personal-Estates and do not contribute to the King proportionably as the other Subjects do and therefore their Stock does not Decay so much because they are not obliged to Devour it by reason that they can live very plentifully on their Rents especially considering that they may retrench the great numbers of their Monks and Priests without any inconveniency I did above mention the Common Taxes which swallow up the whole Revenue of the People and more What will it be then when the King forces People as he does continually to lend him Money or to purchase his new Offices and Titles or to take Augmentation of Wages if Officers or to give an Account of the Adminstration of some Imployments or Functions or when a Man or his Father or Grand-Father or any other to whom he may have some Relation is Accused and perhaps without any proofs of having robbed the King or the People and thereupon is condemned to pay the King the greatest part of all that he has A hundred such Methods are practised every day to the Ruine of the most Opulent Subjects all of a sudden It cannot be denyed that this is the Condition of France at this day and that there are but very few who do not consume their Stock except those who never had any thing and who help the King to destroy all I confess that as the French People live in the Country those poor Souls do not spend a penny a day in Food one with another The Country-People in Ireland feed much better than those of France the Irish eat their belly full of meat when they please nor don't want Butter Cheese Bread Potatos and in many places they have abundance of Salt and Fresh-Water-Fish Oysters Musles Crabs Langosts and Cockles for tho' they are very lazy the Land is plentiful in all those things and then they pay almost no Taxes and besides they smoak Tobaco Men Women and Children and notwithstanding all this Men of understanding who know that Nation perfectly and have Written concerning it assure us That they do not spend a penny a day one with another for their Dyet They own indeed that wearing commonly good Cloaths they may spend one with another including their Rayment about 2 pence per Diem or 52 shill per Annum whereas the Country-People in France spends very little in Cloaths at least two thirds less than the People in Ireland Those who are acquainted with the Condition of France know that most part of the Country-people did feed only upon Black-Bread before the War neither had they their Belly full of that and the best of their other cheer was some Fruits Herbs and Roots with sowr Milk without any Butter or Fat unless some stinking Oyl of Walnut or Rape-Seed except it may be in those places where Olive-Trees are plentiful they sold their Butter to pay the Taille and drank nothing but meer Water or Water which had past over the drained Grapes or Apples when the Wine and Syder had been pressed out of them their chiefest and almost only Food was Black-Bread or Rye-Bread baked with all the Bran commonly very bad that does not cost a Half-penny per Pound of which the Women and Children cannot eat three quarters of a pound a day one with another nor Men who are at present in small numbers double that quantity As
for their Cloaths Men Women and Children are generally cloathed with course Linnen such as they make Sacks of and wear Wooden-Shoes and even many of 'em are bare-footed If any Man ask why the 9 Millions of Souls which we suppose to be in France should not earn as much as the 6 millions of Souls supposed to be in England since the French work as much and as well as the English and since there ought to be as many Working-Men amongst the 9 Millions of French as amongst the 6 Millions of English I answer besides the reasons I already produced That more Money is to be got in a rich Place than in a poor One in a populous Country than in a depopulated One in a Land abounding with Mines and addicted to Manufactures Fishery and Navigation where there is plenty of Money than in another which enjoys not those Advantages and where the Government is Arbitrary Besides no body will deny but there is more gotten and spent in England than Ireland at London than in Wales and at Paris than in Bearn Nor is it true that there are as many men fit for Work amongst the 9 Millions of People in France as there are amongst the 6 Millions in England because as I have said often above two thirds of the Men fit for Work in France are perished and of the remaining part one half is unprofitable for Work and that those who are unprofitable for Work are three times more in number in France proportionably than they are in England So that whereas England maintains the present War with less than 5 Millions Sterling Yearly which does not make the third part of the Real and Personal-Estates of all the Kingdom leaving the Profits of the Labour of the People untouched which are almost double to the Revenue of all the said Estates In a word while England employs not above the 8th part of all its Revenues towards the War the French King raising one way or other about 200 Millions of Livers Yearly upon his People since this War draws from them above 70 Millions of Livers beyond the Revenue of all the Real and Personal-Estates of his Kingdom since they are worth but 130 Millions according to our Calculation Upon which it is to be observed that the Clergy being in possession of half of those Estates in the Kingdom whose Revenue consequently ought to amount yet to 65 Millions of Livers the Clergy I say does not pay one Year with another 10 Millions of those 200 which the King raises from whence it plainly appears that the rest of the Nation is beyond comparison much more oppressed than they are and so much the more that the Clergy is not so much vexed by the other Blood-suckers of the Nation as the rest of the Subjects are and that they are themselves of the number of the Leeches which devour the Substance of the Nation and by that means they enjoy yet above 55 Millions of Livers free besides the Profits and Gains they make upon the People by the Trade they drive of Holy Things as they call them and by a hundred cunning Tricks of their Art which makes their Revenue of Profits to amount to above 70 Millions of Livers yet So that there are still 70 Millions of Livers to be found for the King as we have seen just now above the 130 Millions which are the Value of the Revenue of all the Estates in the Kingdom For he must needs have no less than 200 Millions of Livers to maintain the War Yearly If you ask where we shall find them I answer Those 70 Millions of Livers must needs be raised upon the Profit of Men's Labour which we supposed might amount to 200 Millions of Livers Yearly and then the remainder will be only 130 Millions But then we must also deduce from those 130 Millions of the Profits of Industry the 55 Millions which we said the Clergy enjoyed besides what they gain by their cunning Tricks out of the half of all the Revenues Real and Personal of the Kingdom which we gave to the King in the former Paragraphs for the Clergy cannot be deprived of such vast Revenues seeing Cardinal Palavicini affirms that our Saviour's chief intent in his coming into the World has been to render the Clergy rich and happy according to the flesh felice secondo la Carne So that those 55 Millions must as I said be taken upon the said remaining 130 Millions coming from the Revenues of the Labour of the Nation So that the King and the Clergy having had their due share of all there remains no more than 75 Millions of Livers for the subsistence of all the rest of the Nation which may make about 8 Millions and 6 or 700 thousand Souls for I think that the Clergy with the Monks and Nuns and their Servants or Bastards may very well make up between 3 and 4 hundred thousand Souls which with the 8 Millions 6 or 7 hundred thousand Souls before will make in all the nine Millions of Souls which we supposed to be still remaining in the Kingdom of France If it be so then that no more remains than 75 Millions of Livers for the subsistence of the rest of the Nation what shall we do with all the Officers of Judicature Finances and Government and so many others of a new Impression what shall we do with the Farmers general and particular of the Imposts with all their Crew for all those men have been deprived as abovesaid of all their Possessions and Revenues the King has swallowed up all by his 200 Millions which he must raise for his Armies Where shall we find wherewithall to furnish the usual Covetousness and authorized Cheats of the Clergy who as we said before are still plundering and pillaging the Nation by their False and Counterfeit Devotions and Robbing the People tho' never so miserable of 15 Millions of Livers at least per Annum But let us leave this last Article concerning their Robberies for the 10 Millions which I said above the Clergy may pay now to the King during the War every Year We have still all the Officers of Judicature and the rest named in the foregoing Paragraph to maintain We cannot allow them less than the said 75 Millions of Livers which remain of the Profits of the National Industry and their share will be very small too for 't is probable they did altogether draw above 200 Millions yearly from the Substance of the People besides their Patrimonial Goods which are included in the Kings 200 millions per annum In that manner there remains nothing for all the rest of the Nation for all the Nobility Peasants Mechanicks Artists Manufacturers Merchants Sea-men and all other Orders of People Moreover besides all this the Debts of the Kingdom are unpaid I mean the Debts of all the Subjects one to another I said already that the Revenue of all the Estates both Real and Personal in the condition which the Kingdom stands in
would not be able to pay the Interest of the said Debts nor is the Value of all the Stocks able to pay the Principal Let us suppose that the Interest of them goes not beyond 130 Millions of Livers which is the Estimation we made of the present Revenue of all Estates whatsoever That 's already 130 Millions of the Stock of the Kingdom spent every year without reckoning any thing for Interest upon Interest But how shall we find wherewithal to maintain all the rest of the Nation 't is plain it cannot be done but by the Consumption of all their Stocks as I said before which Consumption cannot be under 3 or 4 hundred Millions per Annum besides the Interest of Debts of which I spoke just now I have mentioned the Ways also by which that Consumption is made and therefore I will not repeat them here tho' I am obliged too often to do it because very few will comprehend the meaning of my first Principles upon the first hint If any should ask what share I judge the Nobility might have in the 4 hundred Millions of Livers of Revenue to which I supposed all the Estates Real and Personal might have amounted thirty Years ago or in the 130 millions to which we reduce it at present I answer that I do not think the Nobility ever had above the 13th part of the whole that is to say about 30 Millions of Livers formerly and not above 10 at this day For we must always remember that the Clergy possesses half of the whole and I think the Third Estate which comprehends all those who are neither of the Nobility nor of the Clergy possesses 5 times as much Revenue as all the Nobility All which I submit to the Judgment of Understanding Men. This Chapter may appear to be very full of difficulty to those who are not accustomed to such Speculations and Computations therefore I desire them to read it over twice that they may understand it better perhaps they will not lose their pains if they do it The next Chapter will be more easie and diverting and may help much to confirm what I have said in this in relation to the Value of the Real and Personal-Estates and of the Profits of Industry in both Kingdoms CHAP III. That ENGLAND is and ought to be more Populous proportionably to its bigness than FRANCE was even before the War I Have undertaken to prove that England is more Populous proportionably to its bigness than France was even before the War I will not say that England is more Populous than France is at present for no body I believe questions that or if they do I could prove it by one sole Argument which is this That the City of London the Capital City of England is much Bigger and more Populous than Paris the Capital City of France tho' England contains but 30 Millions of Acres whereas France contains 82 Millions according to Sir Will Petty And moreover England has near as many other good Towns as France has proportionably to their respective bignesses for as I have already said England compared to France is but as four to eleven Some may perhaps judge at first that this consequence is not pregnant and indeed I confess the thing wants explanation Therefore to comprehend it the better we will suppose the Kingdom of France to be divided into 11 Parts or Provinces of an equal bigness and that England is no bigger than 4 of those Parts united together and according to that proportion London which must be in one of those four supposed Provinces of England and is the Head-City of the Kingdom ought not to be much bigger than the third part of the Head-City of the Kingdom of France viz. Paris so that the two other third parts of London should remain to be divided among the three other supposed Provinces in England Any one may easily conceive upon this supposition that those four Provinces of England must be proportionably more populous than the eleven of France since we can make out of those two superfluous third parts of London several large Cities which will render those Provinces so much the more populous that they must needs have as much more People in the Country to supply them with all sorts of Victuals and other necessary things as there shall be in the said new Cities beyond the number of People which there may be already in the said Provinces But to form a more particular and distinct Idea of the bigness of those two great Capital Cities and of the number of their respective People upon which our proof is grounded we must understand the number of Houses and Inhabitants of both places as near as can be There were at Paris 10 or 11 years ago according to the Relation of Master Azout one of the French King's famousest Mathematicians 23255 Houses which did contain as he affirmed 80 thousand Families viz. three Families and a half of 6 Persons each in one House with another comprehending in that number the Hotels or Noblemens great Houses but excepting out of it 38 Colledges which 23255 Houses as he pretended did contain in all 488-055 Souls Those who come from that City every day and such as were born there confess that very few Houses have been built lately upon new Foundations but only that some small ones have been pull'd down in pitiful narrow Streets to rebuild them Larger and more Commodious which does not increase but rather diminishes the number of the Houses and they all agree that there is a third part less people in Paris than there was 10 or 11 years ago But I shall notwithstanding allow Mr. Azout's number As for London the Rolls of the Chimney-Money left by the Collectors tell us there was 10 or 11 years ago 105 thousand Houses since which time at least 15 thousand have been built in places where never any old Foundation stood besides the augmentation made every day to many old Houses which are rebuilt higher more commodious than they were before besides above 11 thousand Cellars inhabited I grant there are several Houses empty but then I shall agree that those Cellars should not be reckoned that so we may fill the 120 thousand Houses Then supposing that there are 7 Souls in each House one with another either in one Family or in two it will amount to 840 thousand Souls I do not think any Man can fairly refuse to admit 7 Souls in all the Houses of London one with another since we condescend to admit 20 in those of Paris viz. three times as many and that we do also lay aside the inhabited Cellars of London to supply the vacancy of the empty Houses without deducting or abating them that might be also empty at Paris when Mr. Azout did write of which he takes no notice and also without mentioning the multitude of Men who are at all times lodged upon Ships in the River at London and if I were of a contradicting humour
I could justifie from reason and matter of fact that there never was 14 Souls in every House of Paris one with another nay perhaps not 12. For I believe I have studied Paris in relation to this Point as long and as exactly as any person whatever I will make bold to say here notwithstanding the respect due to so great and ingenious a Man as Sir William Petty that he did mistake in that Point making London less populous and Paris more populous than they really were tho' I must confess that I believe he did it out of modesty Then if London did contain no more People proportionably than Paris the Head-City of a Kingdom near 3 times as big there ought not to be above 180 thousand Souls in it so that the Overplus viz. 660 thousand Souls should remain to be divided among the three other Provinces of the 4 supposed to be in England Let us divide those 660 thousand Souls in three parts and make three other Cities for the three other Provinces to be the Head-Cities there as London is in the fourth they will be such Cities for multitude of people as the like will hardly be found in Germany Italy Spain and the Low-Countries Or if that be not so well let us divide them in 13 Cities of above 50 thousand Souls apiece it will make four great Cities for every one of the three Provinces and one besides for the fourth Province of which we suppose London to be the Head-City All those Cities added to those that are already in the Kingdom would make it appear extraordinarily populous So that by this any one may easily judge that England is more populous than France was thirty years ago or rather than it ever was For to conclude those 13 Cities of 50 thousand Souls apiece should contain perhaps as much people if you consult judicious Men about it and not the Rabble who are impertinent Judges in those Matters than did ever the 13 largest Cities in France Paris excepted It must be considered further as I intimated before that there must needs be added near as many Souls in Farmers and other Country-people to supply those new Cities with all sorts of Victuals and Provisions beyond the number of people in the said 13 Cities besides that which is already in the 3 supposed Provinces distinguished from the 4th in which London stands Since it is certain there needs almost as much people in the Country to provide and carry all Necessaries to a great City as there is of People in the said City So that I leave it to any Man to judge how populous those Provinces would be I confess that the adjacent parts to London would become so much the less populous but however they would be still as populous as are commonly the adjacent parts of the Head-Cities in other Countries whose bigness populousness holds more proportion to the other parts of the Nation than London doth for it must be granted that London is a Monster amongst Cities and that it holds no proportion to the rest of England the Head being three times too big for the Body The thing may perhaps be more easily comprehended another way which may possibly be more intelligible to many I affirm there are as many People in London according to the former Computation as there were thirty years ago in all the Cities and Towns of the four biggest Provinces of France which are Languedock with the Cevennes Vivarez and Velay which do belong to that Province Brittain Normandy and Champagne which may all together with the addition of two or three Millions of Acres contain near as much ground as England reckoning 160 Towns great and small in the said four Provinces 40 for every one of them one with another I allow 60 thousand Souls to every one of their Chief Cities one with another which is 240000. I know there might be more in Thoulouze and Roüen two of the said four Cities but it may be on the other hand there was not half of that number in the two other Capital Cities But if any man notwithstanding this should fancy that I allow to those Cities too few People he may be pleased to consider that in Dublin which is bigger than Roüen there is but 7 thousand Houses and not above 5 thousand at Bristol which is a Town considerable for its bigness I allow to 4 other Cities 30 thousand Souls apiece Which is 120000 To 8 others 14 thousand 116000 To 12 others 8 thousand 96000 To 16 others 6 thousand 96000 To 20 others 3 thousand 60000 To 30 others 2 thousand 60000 As for the rest who bear the name of Towns tho' they deserve hardly that of Boroughs to the number of above 60 I allow a thousand Souls apiece 60000. In all 8-40000 The City of London alone consumeth more Provisions and Commodities of all sorts than do all the said 160 Towns even tho' we â—dd Paris to them I grant indeed if there were no other Cities and Towns in England the Reasons proposed might be confuted by saying that 't is no wonder London should be so populous there being no other Towns in England but I make bold to say it were not hard to find in England 160 other Towns as good one with another as the 160 supposed to be in the aforesaid 4 Provinces of France And it were an easie matter to find 30 among the rest who would be better perhaps one with another than 30 of the best in the said Provinces of France As for example Bristol Newcastle York Norwich Plymouth Exeter Chester Colchesler Hull Scarborough Halifax Taunton Yarmouth Portsmouth Dorchester Winchester Worcester Leicester Gloucester Shrewsbury Hereford Salisbury Coventry Birmigham Oxford Cambridge Peterborough Lincoln Canterbury Nottingham Litchfield Rochester Reding Ypswitch Durham Derby Carlisle Northampton Dartmouth Lyn Leeds Liverpoole Barnstaple White-Haven Bediford and several others which are bigger than some of them have I named perhaps above 200 of which the lest contains above a thousand Souls apiece It is to be considered that there are in England 641 Market-Towns which are commonly good Towns I question very much whether there be so many in the two Third-parts of the Kingdom of France and 't is certain the English Market-Towns are commonly better than those of France The reason why Foreigners travelling in England and even English-men themselves do judge England not to be so populous nor so Rich as France is first that they think a comparison may be reasonably made betwixt Paris and London and that there is an equality between them and then after that they observe there are several other great Towns in France and do not think that there are any in England which seem to deserve that name They do not take notice as they should of the prodigious Bigness of London which they don't think so big as it really is because they don't know the half of it even not after several months residence in it because it is not so
compact as Paris and some other great Towns but extraordinarily and irregularly extended and because People commonly neglect to visit several great parts of it where they judge nothing deserves to be seen by reason that there is seldom any of the Nobility great Lawyers or rich Merchants that live in those parts but only a great multitude of the vulgar sort who live in Lanes Allies and Courts without number where the ways are very hard to be found and unknown even to a great many of the Inhabitants of London They do not take notice also of the Cellars where great numbers of People dwell They do not know or at least do not consider that there is a prodigious number of Manufactures of all sorts in a much greater number than at Paris which employ a vast multitude of People at home on the working days without mentioning the great number of those who are continually aboard the Ships in the River or upon the Keys Another Errour which they commit in the comparison of Paris with London is this that they do not distinguish the River of Seine which runs thro' the very middle of Paris and which in several places is divided in two Branches or Heads and contains a very great space of ground they do not I say distinguish that River from the body of the City as if the space which it takes up was a Continent of Houses and Streets and they do so because there are many Bridges upon that River in the middle of the City amongst which several are covered with Houses so that People pass every day over those Bridges without taking any notice that they are Bridges whereas in the Estimate they make of the Bigness of London they never fail to distinguish the Thames from London whereas if they did comprehend it with London as they do the Seine with Paris they should find in the River Thames alone a greater space of ground than that which Paris takes up with its River viz. from Lambeth to Blackwall But they may perhaps say that there are more Squares in London than Paris and that the River Seine ought to go for those Squares I answer that the River Seine takes up ten times more space than the said Squares do Besides there are so many Convents and Monasteries at Paris with vast Inclosures and several other Inclosures besides which are not built up as also several Palaces Hotels and great Houses with greater Gardens and Inclosures than we have at London except St. James's Park which they do also distinguish from London in their estimate of its Bigness whereas they comprehend all the said Inclosures within Paris when they compare it to London and notwithstanding all this even allowing them the Liberty to comprehend all those things within Paris and not to comprehend the Thames and the said Squares and St. James's Park within London I say granting them this I believe still that London takes up more ground than Paris by half Nor do they mind when they compare the multitude of People in England with that of France that England is but a little more in Extent than the Third part of France tho' at other times when comparing both the Kingdoms one with another they make England lesser than 't is which are mistakes very ordinary to Mankind But that which contributes most to confirm them in their Opinion to the disadvantage of England is that when they are travelling in England they do not meet as I observed already with such a great number of large Cities as they do when travelling in France The reason of which is very plain or rather several reasons may be alledged for it First The City of London is too big as I said already for the rest of the Kingdom and draws in the People of the Country to it more than any Head City of any other Nation known to us and will continue to do so more and more Secondly The other most considerable Towns in England are for the most part situated near the Sea whither few Travellers go whereas in France they are almost all of them placed in the Inand Countries and upon the great Roads So that 't is no wonder if Travellers do not meet with so many great Towns in England and even find sometimes a kind of Wilderness since 't is chiefly the Sea-Coasts which are well peopled and where the good Towns lye There 's one thing further to be considered viz. That Travellers in France do propose commonly to themselves nothing else but to take their Pleasure and learn the Tongue with some bodily Exercises which are not very necessary and don 't apply their Minds to learn the condition of the Provinces of that Kingdom so for the most part they travel only thro' the pleasantest most populous and luxurious parts of France where Victuals and Fruits are most Delicate and other pleasures most Exquisite They see Paris Roüen Orleans with all the other Places upon the River Loire Anger 's Lion Marseille Montpellier Nismes Thoulouze Bourdeaux Poictiers and some Rochelle but very few travel through the Provinces of Brittain Mainne Perche Vendomois where they might find great Wildernesses and in many Parts few People They travel seldom thro' the Provinces of Berry Bourbonnois Auvergne Cevennes Daufinè Provence Nivernois Limozin Quercy Bearn and several other considerable Parts of the Kingdom where few great Towns are to be found So that Foreigners see only the most populous Parts of France and not the other Parts quite contrary to them who travel thro' England who see the less populous parts and do not see the other This reason will also furnish us with another viz. That Strangers take notice of and love Towns according to the pleasure they enjoyed in them Now 't is known that London is the only place in England where Men of Pleasure or Curiosity find their Delights There is little or no Gallantry in the other Towns few great and handsome Buildings or fine Walks few Nobility and Gentry few Plays as Opera's Comedies c. no Thennis-Courts almost or other Games as Pall-Mall Billiard c. no Musick or acceptable Socleties of Learned Men the two Universities excepted few or no extraordinary Cooks where one may find good treatment The Streets of the Towns are narrow ill paved and worse clean'd and for those reasons England in general London and the two Universities excepted is look◠upon as uncultivated by travelling Men who love pleasure neatness and delicacy whereas they may find in France above 30 Towns as pleasant and diverting as Paris it self where People understand themselves as well They had ten Parliament Cities about twenty Universities as many Generalities or Offices of Treasurers in France a great number of considerable Towns with notable Courts of Justice called Presidials and Foreigners take much notice of all those things which helps to render that Country acceptable delightful makes it appear rich and populous to them They find in all those places
excellent Cooks or Ordinaries at reasonable rates delicate Wines Fruits Comedies and Plays of all sorts fine Walks and Courts of Governours Intendants c. a multitude of Noted Men in the Offices of Judicature Finances and Civil-Government who make a great show in their Towns with a small Revenue well managed curious and well-bred People learned Men others curious in their pleasures and fit for any Society There they have also Civil and Ingenious Gentlewomen free in their Conversation yet honest for the most part they also see several fair Buildings as well Private as Publick such as Gentlemens Houses Churches and Convents and at some distance from the Towns there are frequently several stately Houses with handsom Gardens belonging to the chief Families of the Towns All those things charm Foreigners and did mightily conduce to the drawing in of Strangers to that Country and to inrich it by that means It had also this effect that Strangers took it to be more populous and rich than really it was and I confess that it was indeed full of People but not so populous as it ought to have been nor yet so populous as England proportionably to their respective Extents As for Politeness and Refinedness in many things I confess France did go beyond England but that is not the thing in Question We may indeed say in that respect that there were many Courts and Capital Cities in France and but one in England It seems likewise that there are not so many Houses in the Country in England out of the Towns and Borroughs as are in France First Because of the Reasons above-mentioned viz. That good Towns are in general towards the Sea-Coasts and that People chuse rather to live thereabouts than in the midst of the Land And Secondly Because the adjacent Parts of London as well as the City it self contributes very much towards the depopulating of the Country Thirdly It must be considered that People apply themselves commonly more in England to the breeding of Cattle than they do in France and that a Farm in England takes up a greater extent of Land by reason of their Cattle which are very numerous and go of ' emselves a great way to the appointed Pasture without a Herd because they are free from Wolves and in such a Farm there is commonly a greater number of People proportionably than in the Farms in France where they are lesser for the most part and more frequent The French Plow more and have Vineyeards which require a greater number of small Houses dispersed to and fro But the Boroughs and Villages are commonly larger more lively and populous in England than in France not only because of the greater fruitfulness of the Soil and the lenity of the Government but also because the Cattle maintaineth a great number of Manufactures by their Wooll Hides Horns Tallow Butter Cheese c. and that abundance of Farmers live in them We must consider also that there is in England an incredible number of People imployed in the Mines either of Tin Copper Lead Coals or Iron who are almost all upon the Coasts which Travellers cannot see because they do not go that way Another thing to be taken notice of is that there are in England above 70 Sea-ports where three Mast-Ships may Ride safely at Anchor besides a great many less considerable Ports whereas in France tho' a much larger Country there is hardly the fourth part of that number They reckon indeed but ten thousand Parishes in England which is not much more than the third part of the 27 thousand Parishes in France but the English Parishes are commonly more populous We have another Proof both of the multitude of People in England and of the gentleness of the Government and if it may be spoken without offence of the bad Discipline kept in the Kingdom at the same time viz. the prodigious multitude of Shop-Keepers in London which is 6 times the number of those in Paris and 12 times the number of those in Amsterdam and many of them are idle persons who betake themselves to such imployments meerly to avoid working turn Bankrupt every day and ruine others What an incredible number of Victualling-Houses Taverns Ale-Houses Coffee-Houses and what a vast quantity of Houses where they sell Brandy and Tobacco and of others who let out Rooms furnished and unfurnished We know there is need of such sort of people but they are three times more numerous than they ought to be What an innumerable multitude of Young Women is there who have neither Estate nor Trade and yet are very sumptuously Cloathed and live High All those things argue a great multitude of People in a Country which notwithstanding such Disorders is indifferently well peopled and would be a great deal more populous if good Rule and Discipline were observed in it We find also that the Wages of Servants both Men and Women are cheaper at London than they were at Paris 30 years ago where an ordinary Servant Maid had 50 or 60 Livers per Annum and a Cook-Maid above 100 Livers besides the Wine allowed her or Money in the room of it whereas they are a great deal cheaper in London and we know that for 25 or 30 Leagues round Paris a Plowman or a Shepherd had 40 and 45 Crowns of Wages Yearly whereas such Men in England are to be had for less than the half of that Money But notwithstanding all these Reasons Gentlemen who travel in England where they see but few great Towns will always be apt to think that we are mistaken and retain their own Opinion viz. that there was more People in France 30 years ago than is in England at present Let us then make another supposition to convince them once for all We have already demonstrated that supposing London to be no more populous in proportion to the bigness of England than Paris is in proportion to the bigness of France 650 thousand Souls might be drawn out of London to form 13 other Cities of 50 thousand Souls apiece and as many people proportionably out of the adjacent parts of London because they are more populous than the rest of the Kingdom by reason of the Neighbourhood of that great City Then let any Man distribute as he shall think fit those 13 Cities of 50 thousand Souls a-piece or if he Judges more convenient 26 Cities of 25 thousand Souls each I say let him distribute them with all the Country-people necessary for supplying them with Provisions amongst the Shires of England who want most People and then let him freely give his Judgment whether he does not believe that England should have a greater number of larger Cities and more People proportionably than France For my part since I don't know how to do better I shall divide em ' mongst the chiefest roads in England and such parts of the Kingdom which I am informed are in most want of People I place first of all two of those Cities of 50
thousand Souls a-piece in Wales which may be divided if it be thought best in 4 Cities of 25 thousand Souls a-piece so that all the parts of the Country might have a share of them Then I place three other of those Cities of 50 thousand Souls or six of 25 thousand a-piece upon the Road betwixt London and Edinburgh those Cities added to York which is already in that Road would make the Land look very populous I place further two of the said Cities of 50 thousand Souls or four of 25 thousand each upon the Road from London to Chester I place two likewise of 50 thousand or four of 25 thousand upon the Roads from London to Exeter Plymouth and Cornwall As for the 4 other Cities remaining I should also make 8 out of them of 25 thousand Souls a piece and place one of the number betwixt London and Bristol another betwixt London and Portsmouth one between London and Norwich one between London and Dover one between London and Harwich one between London and Oxford and another between London and Cambridg and the other in Cumberland or in any other manner which should be found better for it were perhaps more convenient to add these eight last to those places already named viz. To Bristol Portsmouth Norwich Dover Harwich Oxford Cambridg and Carlisle to make them up great Cities Let us suppose further since suppositions cost us nothing that there were one hundred or two hundred Families able to keep Coaches of their own in each of those Cities and abundance of Well-bred People Learned and Curious in all sort of Disciplines and Noble Arts and who understand the World well several delicate Publick-houses to eat and drink with exquisite Cooks who could treat well for a little Money with quantities of all sorts of Fowl both wild and tame good Wine delicate Fruits and very cheap that the said Cities were neat well built in good Air with several fine Squares stately Buildings within and without both Publick and Private curious Walks and Gardens all sorts of Games as Tennis Mall Billiard and others Comedies Ballets Musick of all kinds good Masters for all sorts of Sciences for the Exercises of the Body and for Musical Instruments several exquisite and rare Artists in all things relating either to Ornament Curiosity or Pleasure and above all the rest the People courteous civil obliging and always ready to serve Strangers for little or nothing as in France I say if all those things were to be found in twenty or thirty great Cities in England no question but Travellers would not only be better pleased with them than they are now but also would think England to be much more populous than they do now We are apt to forget the great Towns where we had no pleasure and saw no curiosity as if we had met with no living Soul in them or as if all the Inhabitants had been meer Clowns and Peasants and not civilized People The Country-Towns in France had I confess a great advantage in all those things over the Towns in England but it must be granted also that no wealth or easiness was to be found any where else for the Country-people was plunged in an incredible Misery and the Nobility ruined the Cities and Towns did drain all the Wealth and Money both by receiving the King's Taxes and by an infinite number of Officers of Judicature and Finances and by the Clergy and Maltotiers The English Nobility and Gentry who have been in France remember they found great satisfaction in several Cities and Towns of that Kingdom which for that reason make still a considerable Impression on their Minds whereas they know no place in England except London that is acceptable to them for pleasures and curiosity But yet this doth not argue that France was ever so populous as England is even at present To all the reasons from matter of Fact alledged already to prove that England is more populous proportionably to its bigness than France was 30 years ago and consequently richer I shall add several others to shew that it must be so and shall repeat those already hinted that they may be seen together I must intreat the Reader here to redouble his Attention because tho' the Subject which I handle in this place and the Reasons that I shall alledge are fitted to the capacity of all sorts of People yet they are of very great moment especially those that I shall produce in the beginning which show the mischiefs which Popery brings upon Nations subject to it There you will find Arguments against Popery which being neither Theological nor Philosophical but only Political may perhaps make a greater impression upon Princes and their Councils who commonly have regard for nothing else but their own Temporal Interest or that of their People than all the Reasons adduced from Scripture commonly do tho' they be infinitely of more weight Some Heads will be something long but they are of great consequence This is a Field that hath not hitherto been sufficiently plowed and which in time may with God's blessing bring forth a plentiful Harvest 1. The Protestant Religion does not permit their Ecclesiasticks to live at the Charge of the People as the Clergy of the pretended Church of Rome do who pillage and exhaust them there being not a Year even at present notwithstanding the general Misery of the Subjects but they get from them one way or other above 15 Millions of Livers by their ridiculous unscriptural Devotions and Superstitions and thousands of Tricks and Cheats which contributing to the Ruine of the People is destructive to Propagation 2. There are six Church-men in France at least for one in England proportionably to the respective bigness of both Kingdoms tho' it s known that we do not want Church-men in England and by consequence there are so many Subjects more in France that do not work and are not useful to the Nation except a very small number of them 3. In particular the Mendicant Fryers are extreamly burthensom to the Kingdom being altogether useless whereas among the Secular Clergy the Bishops with their Canons the Curates and part of their Priests are proper for the ordinary service of their pretended Church such as it is And those Begging-Monks are yet more intolerable in this than the Indowed Monks that by their voluntary and base beggarliness they are very chargeable to the People who must maintain them plentifully one way or other For they have commonly a plentiful Table and drink abundance of Wine while a great many honest Men and such as are useful to the Nation have no Bread to eat This sort of Monks do moreover a great prejudice to the Real Poor for they can find no Bread because the Monks exhaust the Charity of the People And further they out-do all the rest of the Clergy in Hypocricy and Ignorance by their pretences to a great Mortification draw in abundance of Young and Handsom Ladies who chuse them for
their Confessors whereby great uncleannesses are practised 'T is thought there are above sixty thousand of this sort in the Kingdom And suppose they cost the Nation but 6 pence a day one with another it will amount to near 7 Millions of Livers Yearly That 's the least they spend for they are commonly in the best Towns where they live daintily but they take always great care that the Publick should not be informed of their good chear for fear it should obstruct the Charities bestowed upon them I have seen many times several Spits full of excellent Meat a roasting for them with all sorts of Fowl wild and tame and great Joynts of the best Meat in By-houses a little remote from their Monastries and the People who lived mostly by that Trade told us that all that was Charity given to the good Fathers 4. The Popish Clergy do not Marry whereas our Church-men do for the most part and therefore help to people the Land 5. Half of the Real and Personal-Estates in the Kingdom is in their hands that is to say in Mortemain which is far less advantagious than if they were in the hands of People fit either for Trade Manufactures or Arts or if those Estates did pass hereditarily by Succession from Parents to Children or to the next a-kin and by consequence is destructive to the Propagation and Welfare of a Kingdom 6. Their mischievous Custom of keeping always abundance of Plate in their Churches and Convents and in those Treasures as they call them as at S. Denis Notre Dame de Liesse Notre Dame des Ardillieres and several other such Places I say that foolish Custom deprives the State and the People of a considerable part of the Gold and Silver which is in the Nation and would be useful for Trade 7. It is also the usual method of many amongst the Secular and Regular Clergy to hoard up Money for tho' they have no Children Legitimate at least and are not allowed to Trade and withal enjoy great Revenues yet 't is their usual custom to Treasure up Money and commonly under the same pretence as that the Popes have viz. to assist their Nephews and Nieces which they seldom do but when they are a dying which is doubly prejudicial to Trade 'T is observed also that this sort of Men is very covetous and do not love to give Almes tho' obliged to it by their first Institution and the intention of the Founders I need not say any thing how prejudicial such practices are to Trade and consequently to the Prosperity of a Nation 8. The great number of ridiculous Holy-days which they observe in France rob that Nation of the 6th part of the working days in the year since they have above 50 Holy-days more than we have in England which is of very great consequence to a Nation for if so be the Profits of Labour and Industry both of Men and Women go almost twice as far as all the Revenues both of Real and Personal-Estates let any Man judge what may be the loss of the sixth part of those Profits This is also so much the more ruinous to the People of France that they have already a greater number of Men unfit for Work proportionably than we have here in England viz all the Officers of the Courts of Judicature great and small the Maltotiers or Farmers of the Impositions with their innumerable Crew of Underlings a prodigious number of other Civil Officers greater standing Armies even in times of Peace a prodigious number of Begging-people and then the vast number of the Clergy-men without mentioning the loss of the time spent in Processions for the Saint of every Parish and Trade whose days are not observed every where as others are as also in Pilgrimages to some Statues Images or Bones of some pretended Saints upon which they spend whole Weeks Months and Years going sometimes as far as Rome and the remotest parts of Spain to see the Statue of St. James of Galicia They lose also their time in their Confession to the Priests at their Anniversaries for the Dead as Ashwednesday at the Private Masses for the cure of the Diseases of their Beasts whereat they must be present A great many lose their time also in carrying their Mass-God about to the Sick and elsewhere for there must be 4 Men to carry the Canopy besides the Priest who holds the pretended Sacrament in his hands and that is performed sometimes in 50 different places at once in the great Cities every day besides many other such vain ways of trifling away their precious time about such fooleries Without mentioning the Debaucheries and Rogueries that are committed on so many Holy-days 9. The Pope to whom all the Popish Nations are Tributaries and a kind of Slaves and their Princes his Vassals and a sort of Subjects does also rob the Kingdom of France of several Millions of Livers every Year under divers Pretences and Names as the Annates Bulls Dispensations Indulgences Reliques Provisions Agnus Dei and consecrated Grains and several other such Names which is so much the more ridiculous for France to endure it that the Nation in these last Ages has had no greater Enemies than the Popes 10. The Pensions paid yearly at Rome to the Cardinals Protectors of France as they love to be called and to several other such men who possess great Church-Livings in France which they spend at Rome and the Knights of Maltha draw vast Sums every year out of the Kingdom of France from all which mischievous practices England hath been delivered since the Reformation 11. There was spent needlesly in France about two Millions of Livers every year in Tapers and Wax-Candles burnt in their Churches before their Statues Images Hostie and in their Funeral Ceremonies c. of which Wax a great part was imported from Foreign Countries and the other part which was the product of France might have been sold and imployed to better uses without mentioning the Oyl which was also burnt on the same occasion or the time spent in making such Wax-Lights One can hardly imagine the Extravagant Expence that was made about these things in great and rich Towns I confess it is much lessened at present by reason of the great Misery of the Kingdom and I do not think it amounts now to the third part of what it did formerly However this thing contributing towards the Ruine of the Kingdom was also an obstruction to Propagation 12. Their Lent and other pretended Fast-days as they call them They are not called Fish-days as in England because Fish is very scarce in the most parts of France does also a great prejudice to the Kingdom seeing they spent some years ago when the Kingdom was more populous and rich above six Millions of Livers every year in dry and salt Fish which they bought from Foreign Countries besides what they themselves took This Custom was also very prejudicial to the Breeding of Cattle of which much less
was consumed than would have been otherwise and consequently it did diminish the Revenue of Lands and does constantly occasion the death of a great many people with whose Constitution Fish does not agree and who either cannot find Meat in the small Towns and Boroughs in Lent have no Money to buy it or else entertain scruples against it by the suggestion of the Idolatrous Priests who flatter them with hopes of going directly to Heaven without passing thro' Purgatory if they abstain from Meat at such times This did also destroy the Fish of the Rivers in Countries remote from the Sea so as they cannot be furnished again which is a great loss to the Nation for Sea-Fish being there very scarce and dear the Priests and Monks and some People in Towns and Country eat scarce any other but Fresh-water Fish They do also lose their time in Fishing and very often catch nothing at all And being upon this Subject it may not be perhaps unseasonable to confute the Errour of those who fancy that Lent and pretended Fast-days are advantagious to a Nation because say they it saves abundance of Cattle and puts people upon Fishing and consequently to the getting of more profit by the Sea than they would otherwise do and by that same means also more Sea-men are bred I confess that Lent and Fast-days are very useful to some Nations but 't is not by observing them themselves but by furnishing those who do so with Fish as the English Scotch Dutch c. who furnish the French and others In England the English were quickly sensible that this was a mistake in Politicks for after Lent hath been observed there a while since the Reformation on pretence of some such Political reasons as the encouragement of Fishing c. they soon left it off perceiving it did more hurt than good they saw it did not increase the number of Sea-men but rather diminish them and that there was no more Fish taken and consumed but rather less by reason that People being under that servitude were disgusted with it and did eat it against their will upon the very Fish-days and could not endure it at all at other times Whereas they eat it at all times indifferently now and there is always good store of all sorts to be found at the Fish-mongers as well of Sea as of Fresh-water Fish and all sorts of Shell-fish and now those who love Fish more than Meat can please themselves which they could not do if they were commanded tyrannically to do it Besides Fisher-men could not then make their constant Trade of Fishing but only in Lent and about Fridays and Saturdays whereas they can fish now and do fish actually every day 'T is true France does not afford such plenty of Meat as England but this must be also granted that the People in France who have Means do not feed so much upon Meat even upon Flesh-days as they call them as the English commonly do and besides the most part of the French People have not wherewithal to do it But I say further that France is in greater want of Fish than of Flesh and that the Kingdom would have had Meat enough if Lent the four Ember-weeks and other Fast-days had not been set up by Superstition for this occasioned a neglect in breeding of Cattle and even at present tho' the Kingdom lies desolate in most parts they could afford Cattle enough if Lent were abolished and Lands not abandoned and tho' France is at less Expence now as to the buying of Foreign Fish than it was before the War yet it expends still very great Sums that way tho' the poorer sort of People in the remotest Provinces from Sea seldom tast Fish of any sort and even very rarely of Meat But lest any body should imagine that I contradict my self in saying that the People of England does not eat less Fish since the observation of Lent but do rather eat more and that I pretend nevertheless that the observation of such a Superstition prejudices the Revenues of Land in France and hinders the breeding and consumption of Cattle I shall answer that specious Objection I call it specious because it seems that if so be the abolishing of Lent and other Fish-days in England produces that effect that more Fish is eaten in it since it would seem to follow that less Meat should be consumed and so consequently if Lent and other pretended Fast-days were abolished in France more Fish would be eaten and less Flesh destroyed I answer to this That there is no real contradiction in my Position but only a seeming one and that only to those who do not weigh things rightly My reason is this that in England the People have always and at all seasons plenty both of Meat and Fish no place in the Kingdom being very remote from Sea and there being many Rivers full of Fresh-water Fish and the Tide coming up a great way in many of those Rivers the Sea-Fish is convey'd into the Country at a very small charge They have also plenty of good Cattle so that they may at all times eat that which they like best or find cheapest and eat it also without that aversion which the Tyranny of Imposition occasions when they are commanded or forbidden upon pain of Eternal Damnation to eat or not to eat such and such things at such and such times Whereas France is generally much more remote from the Sea and Fish there very scarce or dear Now in the places far distant from Sea if it were not for the Superstition of Lent and other Fast-days as they call them in those places I say they would eat much more Meat than they do and more also than is eaten near the Sea-Coasts where Fish is more plentiful and cheaper and consequently they should breed more Cattle and likewise they should eat more Fish in the Sea-ports and other places near the Sea than they do at present if it were not for the Tyranny imposed upon their Conscience which forbids them to eat Meat at such and such times which creates if not in all in most part of them a kind of abhorrency for Fish which they are forced to eat And so it comes to pass that less Fish is taken in the Sea-ports than there would be without this Superstition and also less Cattle is bred in the Country than there would be if it were not for the same abuse which forbids the eating of Meat for about five Months in the Year and so puts all things in disorder For by this means those that live near the Sea are disgusted at Fish which Nature and Providence affords them very cheap and almost for nothing and which would be a great Treasure to them if it were not for the Tyranny imposed upon them and those that live in the Country farther off who could breed abundance of Cattle and eat Meat very cheap are forced to abstain from it and lose that great advantage and cannot have
and Profits of their Industry help them towards the paying of Taxes whereas the Clergy has no such help But for all that the Laity is overwhelmed with Taxes while the Clergy thrives and fares well Moreover what Justice is it that the diligent and laborious sort of People in a Nation should perish and be destroyed like Victims in order to fatten the lazy and idle sort and that so many Millions of useful Subjects should be Sacrificed to such sluggish Belly-Gods We can never enough bewail such a blindness as this nor express all the mischiefs which such an Unjustice brings along with it and wherewith France hath been afflicted for so many Centuries the effects which are more pernicions now than ever 15. What shall we say of the Moral Philosophy of that pretended Religion so suitable to its Doctrines which is commonly ascribed to the Jesuites but belongs de faclo and de jure to all the Sects and Parts of the Popery and is authorized by the constant practice of all their pretended Church Which canonizes all the Crimes perpetrated for its interest and palliates and extenuates all others has abolished the Ten Commandments of God's Law by other Laws diametrically opposite and contrary to them and constantly practised and commanded by that Society of Men commonly called the Church of Room as I could easily justifie which fills the whole World but France especially with Ungodliness and all sorts of Vices 16. What shall we say more of that Spirit of Tyranny with which the Romish Clergy but especially the Jesuits do inspire Princes who are ruled by them not only in things relating to Religion but also to Political Government by counselling 'em to make use of the most desperate Tyranny because that how much the more the Princes whom they govern are authorized and feared of their Subjects so much the more are the Jesuits their Tutors authorized and dreaded also France smarts at present under the effects of this and England has but lately escaped the like danger That Spirit of Tyranny which makes up a great part of the Essence of Popery is yet more peculiar to the Society of Jesuits than to any other in Popery And 't is known that the Principles of their Order as they call it do give their General an absolute and indefinite Power to Command and to do what he lists and that they are to render him a Blindfold-obedience and they look upon the Pope's pretended Monarchy over the Universal Church and World to be the most perfect Pattern of Governments in assuming to himself the Authority to destroy all Nations and Persons in Soul and Body who oppose his temporal Interste 17. The Unchastity of all their Clergy both Male and Female caused by their Celibacy and execrable Morals as well as by the example of all the chiefest Prelates at Rome is of a very great prejudice to France because it did formerly fill the whole Kingdom with Adulteries Fornications Incestuous Copulations and things yet more execrable nay with millions of open and hidden Crimes and causes still abundance of such Disorders as an infinite number of Abortions Murtherings of Children and such like for the Clergy who are guilty of those Vices make no scruple so they can but conceal them to murther both the Mothers and Children And then besides they corrupt People by their ill Examples auricular Confessions and the pretended Power they have to give Absolution for all such Vices these things with the Morals of their Casuists has done horrid Effects in France and does still destroy many thousands of People every year keeps abundance of People from Marrying is a great obstruction to Propagation and is very contrary to the Publick good 18. The Drunkenness of that Clergy had also formerly and has still tho' not so much now because of the Extream Misery a very great influence upon the Manners of all the Nation For the greatest part of the Clergy-men except several Bishops and Curates in the biggest Towns and some other Men in Monasteries and Commonalties are Drunkards and upon their example many of the Common-people are such also and it must be confessed that besides the loss of so great a quantity of Wine unprofitably spent by that Clergy and upon their example by the People which is a very great loss Drunkenness as well as Whoredom ruines abundance of Families and destroys many People shortning their days and causing them to lose all their time I leave to Divines to speak of the bad effects of those Vices as to the Eternal Salvation It were to no purpose to say that Drunkenness Adultery and Fornication are common also to other Nations but Papists For 't is the Popish Church that hath most of all infected all the Word and therefore she is very properly called in Scripture The Mother of all the Fornications and Abominations of all the Earth for she practises abets and countenances them And besides that it is certain that the Popish Clergy and even in general all People in the World who are ignorant in the Revealed Religion and hate the Holy Scripture or do not read it and have plenty of all things as that Clergy who have nothing to do for there is not one in two hundred that Preaches or Studies that have no Legitimate Children or any care of Family that by their Sacred Statutes must above all things be well provided with Tools fit for Generation and to have no Aversion from Wine 'T is certain I say that People who are in all those Circumstances as the Popish Clergy is commonly are Reprobates and given to all Crimes and Vices How much the more that Clergy who are not obnoxious to the Secular Justice and fear no repression who are awed and respected generally by the People tho' never so impious and profane as making their own God and pardoning Sins authoritative to whom they please and upon whose intention the making of all Sacraments depends Such Clergy I say who do not propose to themselves any other Examples of Vertue but that of the Popes and Cardinals whose Ambition Pride Perfidiousness Cruelty Impiety and Covetousness are so well known and yet if we 'll believe them they can save and damn all Men and Nations as they please It 's certainly easie enough to conceive that a Nation can hardly thrive so well under the Direction of such Men and such a strange sort of Religion which is truly Antichristian as under the Reformed Religion and a Protestant Ministry In a word it may be truly affirmed without any passion or invective that the Popish Morals and the constant practice of their pretended Church do authorize even by their Councils and approved Doctors all Crimes and Vices which has a powerful and mighty influence upon the manners of the People and by this means if God had permitted the Secular Justice to be depraved to such a degree as the Principles and Practices of that Church are humane Society should never have subsisted So that we
I shall prove several other such Paradoxes before I die But some will object and say Are not we also reduced to great Extremities in England Are not the Affairs of our Coin Exchequer and Banks in an ill condition And is not our Army likewise unpaid I confess indeed that a great many people suffer in England by the ill State of the Coin but 't is neither an effect of the War nor yet of any decay of the Riches of the Kingdom for if it had all this mis-fortune would have happened a year ago for 't is known that a twelve-month ago the Affairs of the Kingdom were in such a flourishing condition that it was thought fit to Reform the Coin in the heat of the War and to Establish several great Banks in the Nation so that we may justly say that this Accident is a bad effect of the good condition of the Kingdom to which the same thing hath happened that usually befals those who finding themselves in a better state of health than ordinary attempt to make some great Effort by which they find themselves injured either because the thing is too great for them or because they do not make use of the best Methods to perform it or that they are crossed in it However all the Riches that were in England before that time are in it still This was also an effect of the too great Indulgence used commonly towards a great number of wicked people in this Kingdom for want of strict Discipline and a necessary Severity amongst which there was an incredible number of Clippers both Men and Women 't is they who have done this mischief to which the Stock-Jobbers have also contribued and the Effects of it would have been very bad even in a time of Peace Yet we may venture to say that all this would not have done much hurt if there had been a competent number of Coiners in the Tower to have Recoined the Clipped Money in a Month's time for that Money having been a great while useless in the Tower and Exchequer hath added to the Mischievous Consequences of it As for the rest tho' the People have suffered for a year past and do suffer still very much by it that is not to be compared to the Sufferings which the People of France have laboured under ever since the beginning of this War and before it I would fain know of the Gentlemen who make this Objection how many People there are in England that because of this do sell their Plate to Goldsmiths or who spend less at their Tables or in Recreations and Divertisements than they did before Are the Lands and Houses either sold or Farmed at easier rates or are Provisions which are plentiful much fallen in their price for all the Money is so scarce amongst the People Tho' they grumble sufficiently at the scarcity of the Coin yet they are sensible that the disease is not very great And indeed in all the other States of Europe it would be remedied in two days time by making use of Authority But in England the King and Parliament do in all their conduct avoid the least appearance of constraint even where it would be very useful because their Affairs are in such a condition as they may easily forbear it But to return to the Clippers they have diminished the Silver-Coin it may be by about 3 Millions Sterling but this is not an Absolute Loss to the Kingdom if it be a loss at all seeing 't is probable that all or the greatest part of that Metal remains still in the Nation And it is very likely nay certain that they had Multiplied the Species of Silver because several of them were also Coiners who did make of an Unclip'd Half Crown or Shilling two of the same Species and 't is probable that had it not been for 'em the Silver-Species would have been less copious than it was However 't is an easie matter to make up that want by melting part of the Plate of the Nation which is excessive in quantity and suppose 3 Millions Sterling lost by the Clippers it would be but inconsiderable to a Kingdom which may be worth 800 Millions Sterling I mean all the Real and Personal-Estates with the People and Their Industry What comparison then is there to be made between this Kingdom and that of France whereof the Estates Real and Personal are generally sunk above the two-thirds in Revenue and much more in the Capital Stock as I have already demonstrated and where above two-third parts of all the Working-men are destroyed whereas in England the Real and Personal-Estates are increased in value as every body knows without any scarcity of Provisions and even under the scarcity of Money so much complained of This is the true Touch-stone of the Good or Bad Condition of a Kingdom to try whether the Real and Personal-Estates Decrease or Increase in Value So that there can be no more comparison between England and France as to that than between a very healthful and lusty Man and one who is in a deep Consumption 'T is known also that all Foreign Trade is totally lost in France except a little in the Streights whereas in England it is otherwise 'T is true the French Privateers are troublesom but I shall shew in its proper place that they bring no benefit to France 'T is also true that the Publick Taxes in England did not bring in any thing near of what was expected from them but this must be imputed to the casual Interruption of the course of the Money and partly to the negligence and indulgence of Assessors and Collectors which is so very great that there is nothing like it in the Universal World nor would it be thought credible any where else For they favour whom they please and dispose more freely of the Publick Revenues than they do of their own which denotes not only the Extream Indulgence of the Government but also that the People are very far from suffering as they do in all Countries especially in France since there 's not the least shaddow of severity or hardship used towards them and besides the People themselves are in a manner the Umpires and Arbitrators who and what every one must pay and the truth is they dispense with many thousands of People from paying any thing who live better than a great many in France who are obliged to pay every year 50 and 100 Pounds to the French King How should this Nation be fallen into Poverty since 't is the Nation it self represented by those who are supposed to be the Wisest Men in the Kingdom viz the Great Council of the Nation Assembled in Parliament which chuses the Imposts that are most proper and which â—…xes and regulates the Sums and who themselves pay cherfully their quota of the said Sums proportionably to every One's Estate and not as in France where they who order and regulate the Taxes enrich themselves thereby and pay nothing they make
of Europe about Trade for that was meerly accidental and for a time only by reason of the weakness of those who did then govern the Neighbouring Nations but suppose France had got 100 Millions of Livers in Coin by it above what it should have had naturally without it what signifies that to the value of a Kingdom worth perhaps 18 or 20 thousand Millions of Livers 'T is not the plenty of Coin hoarded up that makes a Kingdom rich 't is the great Revenues of Real and Personal-Estates and of the Profits of Industry and Trade The Province of Holland alone has more Money than all England together and yet the People has not the fifth part of the Revenues in Real and Personal-Estates of what England has the Profits of Trade excluded A Gentleman who has but a thousand Pounds of Revenue and one or two thousand Pounds in ready Money is not so rich as another who has less ready Money and has three thousand Pounds Revenue When a Monied-man who hath no great Revenue but some accidental Profits now and then is profuse in his Expence the Money is soon gone so has it been with France She had plenty of Money by the negligence of her Neighbours and was used to govern the Neighbouring Nations and to get advantages over them it made her proud She thought it would have lasted thus for ever and now She is enraged to see that her Neighbours are come to their wits and better governed and wiser than before She cannot endure it as thinking She loses all her former Glory and will rather perish than yield being unwilling as it were to survive her self so that Flectere si nequeat Superes Acheronta movebit being puffed up with the Invasions and Conquests made upon her Neighbours and with the Reputation She had unjustly gotten of Prudence and Greatness and by the Flatteries of the Clergy and some other mercenary Pens and the manifold extravagant Inscriptions set up at all the Corners of Paris and some of them very Impious to the Glory of her Monarch I say France being puffed up with so much vain Glory cannot endure to think that her Laurels should fade and her pretended Glory to be obscured in the least so that She stands stiffly against the Torrent which is in plain Terms to resist God and his Providence whereby he hath declared against her for all the cruelty violations of Faith c. that She is guilty of I know that some will be yet apt to say that France is of a larger Extent than I allow and that she contains at least 100 or 120 Millions of Acres But besides what I said already that I would not recede from Sir William Petty whom I think to have had good Reasons for his Computation of the Extent of France I say further that if any body would suppose that France contains 100 or 200 Millions of Acres it would prejudge their Cause instead of being subservient to it for how much greater the Extent of a Countrey is with a few People the less it is worth t is the great multitude of People and not the Extent of a Kingdom that makes it valuable as I said already Now I have shewn before by a kind of demonstration that England is much more populous than France which we supposed to contain 82 Millions of Acres ever was by the comparison I made of London and the other Towns in England with Paris and all the Towns of the 4 greatest Provinces of France which take almost as much ground as England does Now it is clear that how much the more France will be enlarged beyond the said 82 Millions of Acres the more will my Position be confirmed and France appear poorer and less populous Some may also alledge That France was also more populous 30 years ago than I made it to be allowing only 500 persons to every one of her Parishes one with another If I have committed an Errour as to that it will be much greater in relation to the Parishes in England to which I allowed only 600 persons one with another for 't is easie to see by all the Reasons above brought forth that those of England ought to be more populous at least by the third than those of France whereas I allow them only a 6th part more People They must know that I am so far from aggravating the Disadvantages of France which are already great enough that I do rather extenuate them As for example I suppose yet 9 Millions of People in France tho' I do not believe there are eight nor that their present Revenues are so great as I make them I valued the Revenues of France before these last 30 years at 1000 Millions taking in the Profits of Industry but I do not believe that they did ever exceed 800 Millions by reason of Popery and its consequences And so I reckoned the People of England to be only six Millions now tho' several Authors reckon them at seven Millions I valued likewise the Revenue of Lands in England at 8 Millions Sterling as some have done before me but I believe in truth that it amounts at least to ten Millions and so I did in several other things indulge France whose misery is inexpressible As for example about the number of working-men who are less in number than I said But notwithstanding all what we can say there are some and even honest people who have such a mighty conceit of the Greatness and Power of France that they will not admit of any Reasons against their prejudicate Opinion tho' they bring none to support it and they are confirmed in it by the Foreign News-mongers that keep Correspondencies with the Novelists of Paris who writ them a thousand Lies because they would not be suffered but rather punished severely and hanged too if they did write any thing that was not to the advantage of France and 't is not improbable but that they are even rewarded by the Court for the News they write for by that means they do the same thing among the Allies which the Spies of Joshua did when coming from the Neighbouring Countries of the Canaanites they reported that the Inhabitants were all Gyants much bigger and stronger than they really were which caused the hearts of the Israelites to faint France has practised several such cunning Methods for a long time against her Neighbours As for example all the Letters of the Novelists of Paris did report lately that there is more Money in France than ever was some others that they find as many Soldiers as they wish 'T is visible that all these are impudent Lies for what I have reported of the Melting of the Plate and the raising of the Money twice within these six years last is confirmed by thousands of French People here from Paris and other Towns And then the Novelists add that the Farmers of the Impositions find Money at 8 per cent Interest to advance the King which cannot be true
the Kingdom who should imploy them at work or eat them as Meat when above half of the Grown and Working-men are destroyed as I have said already and shall prove it elsewhere If the Cattle were plentiful it would follow that they ought to be cheap because of scarcity of People But we hear to the contrary that Butchers-Meat has been dearer at Paris for some years past than before tho' Money is scarcer and the number of Eaters lesser The reason of it is evident viz. that the number of People is not so much diminished in Paris as in the Provinces which are hardly capable to furnish Paris with Meat because they are Untilled and Unpeopled besides the Land-Forces in Flanders and Germany being always very numerous and sojourning in so much exhausted Countries require abundance of Provisions This dearness of Meat is a sensible effect of the great Depopulation of the Kingdom especially if joyned with the scarcity of Money As for Horses and Mules but especially Horses the number of them has decreased very much because for many years there is scarce any body has been able to keep Horses and Mares for breed because of the want of Means what profit soever there may be at present by that Trade because of the dearness of Horses 'T is known the War has destroyed almost all of ' em The King has swallowed up all the debts of the Wealthy Ones in his Kingdom that is to say all that was owing them for Money lent to private Persons for which the Lands Houses Offices Cattle and Houshold-Goods of the Borrowers were mortgaged Since the same Lands and Houses and the rest are come to nothing Which amounts perhaps to more than the present value of all the Stocks in the Kingdom as I said already He has devoured all the Civil Offices and Charges in the Kingdom which he sold very dear so that they were instead of a Capital Stock to the Proprietors whereas now they yield almost nothing to the Officers and generally speaking cannot be sold for the sixth part of what they were bought for For altho' the Office of a Master of Requests or of a Counsellor in the Parliament of Paris may be still sometimes sold for the half of what they did cost at first 't is not so in the Provinces where the Places of Councellor in some considerable Courts of Judicature called Presidiaux as at Poictiers and Anger 's are exposed to Sale for four thousand Livers at present which had cost formerly above forty thousand Livers He has also consumed the Estates belonging to Towns Corporations and to great numbers of private Persons who did possess them lawfully by the Re-union that he has made of them to his Demain He has devoured all the Magazines of Merchandizes in the Kingdom which used to be well stored but are now empty I mean not only those of Foreign Commodities but also those of Home-Manufactures and Product so that no body dares to meddle with Trade for fear he should be presently swallowed up by Taxes if he did but shew himself to have any Wealth He hath eat up the Stock of the East and West-India Companies which are just upon the point of being totally ruined He has eat up the Value of all the Trading-Ships in his Kingdom which are for the most part useless and lie rotting in the Harbours He has destroyed all the Manufactures in his Kingdom which were an inestimable Possession nay what is worse his Enemies have appropriated them to themselves and improved them He has swallowed up at several times many hundreds of Millions of Livers which he extorted now and then from those they call Partisans who are the Farmers of the Imposts whom he despoiled at last after they had despoiled others He has borrowed Immense Sums of Money from his Subjects which he is not able to pay if he were willing to do it Finally He has consumed above the half of his People if not in number at least in value as I have said already and promised to demonstrate hereafter So that every one may see that I had reason enough to say that the Kingdom is decayed within these 30 years more than the three fourths in Value but specially since the eight last years of the War And I dare say that this War does so much prejudice to it that it amounts to near two thousand Millions of Livers every year one with another And since I have advanced my self so far I must shew how the thing may be demonstrated I supposed already the Kingdom of France might be worth near 30 Millions Sterling of Revenue or about 400 Millions of Livers in Real and Personal Estate when the War begun as England is valued at this day at sixteen Millions Sterling or 208 Millions of Livers Revenue in Estates Real and Personal I supposed also that the Revenues or Profits of the Industry of the People of France might be worth about 45 Millions St. or 600 Millions of Livers yearly as those of the English Nation may be valued at this day at 26 Millions Sterling or near 240 Millions of Livers And so all France with all its Effects of which the People is the principal might produce about 1000 Millions of Livers of Annual Revenue or profit which being valued at 20 years purchase ought to be worth 20 thousand Millions for the Stock the People taken in bulk being as perpetual in duration as Lands and Lands being worth nothing without People So that the Real and Personal Estates in France yielding 400 Millions of Livers yearly rent if we estimate them upon the foot of 20 years purchase they had been worth 8 thousand Millions of Livers Now if what we have supposed also be true that the Real Estates taken in general cannot be sold after the Peace tho' made to morrow at the 4th part of what they were valued at 30 years ago and that the Personal Estates be fallen the same proportion it will make six thousand Millions loss on those Estates alone As for the People supposing that 4 Millions and a half of Souls have perished within these 30 years half of which were Adult Men if we value them only at 80 Pistols per head one with another tho' Men are worth more than the double of that Sum it would make near 4000 Millions of Livers loss upon that Head Nor can we reckon less than four thousand Millions of Livers for the Decrease in Price and Value of the remaining People that is of the nine Millions of Souls supposed to be remaining in France the greatest part of which consists in Women and other sorts of People more unprofitable still for the National Work viz. Children Old Infirm Lame Sickly People and Soldiers and Men who by their Estates Dignity and Profession are exempted from working For it holds constantly true that the Value of People in a Nation depends upon that of their Industry and Labour and on the Fruits and Profits proceeding therefrom or to speak
a day viz. either a VVoman or a Child could easily do In a Depopulated and thin Peopled Country the charges of prosecution of Suits at Law is greater than in a well Peopled One and in such Countries those who have Estates and are born for Peace are obliged to be their own Officers and Souldiers and the charge and trouble of defending and guarding a Depopulated Country against all Foreign Invasion is greater than in a Populous Country there 's great want of Hospitals for the Sick and Wounded Orphans Lame and Mad People There are no Houses of Correction or Discipline or VVork-Houses for there is none either able or willing to be at the charges of them in Maritime Countries the multitude of People is infinitely useful for equipping with diligence great numbers of men of War and other Ships to supply the Merchants with Convoys there may be found in an instant all the necessaries for Navigation if not in one place yet in another very near but it is the contrary in a thin peopled Country The Sciences and Noble Arts cannot flourish in a Depopulated Land because the People must needs be poor there and so that there is none to maintain the Universities Academies Colledges and Schools necessary to that purpose The Administration of Civil Government as well as of Justice is more easie and less chargeable in a well peopled Country than in one that is depopulated Every one is obliged in a dispeopled Country to have his House constantly furnished with all sorts of Provisions for a long time like a Vessel that undertakes a long Voyage which occasions a greater wast of the same besides that they are not so good or are sooner spoiled and that the owners forbear to sell them when they might do it to advantage or are forced to lay out a great deal of Money in buying them from which they might have a good Interest if it had been imployed elsewhere 'T is not easie to conceive the other inconveniencies which arise from the Depopulation of a Country into which France must of necessity fall since it Labours already under them but her Case will be a great deal worse twenty years hence I confess as I insinuated before that if so be the remaining People in France were united and compacted together in half of the Kingdom forsaking the other half to any that would have it that Moeity so peopled should be worth as much as one half of the Kingdom of France was 30 or 40 years ago provided their Clergy-men Lawyers and others which we call unprofitable in comparison with those that are more profitable were reduced to a competent number I shall adventure to say further That if so be the remnant of the People of the Kingdom were united and gathered together in the fourth part of it that fourth part should be worth more and would afford more Revenue than the one half of the Kingdom which should have but the same number of Inhabitants and I do verily think that the fourth part so peopled would be worth more than the Kingdom of France ever was provided they were situated as much as possible by the Sea side The Province of Holland as I said before is but a small Country but extraordinary rich because it is extraordinary populous it is not so much as the 40th part of England and yet may be worth about 4th part of it tho' I believe it does not contain above the 7th part of the Inhabitants of this Kingdom And again Spain is three times as big as England and yet is not worth the third part of it and Ireland being 20 times as big as the Province of Holland tho' provided with many good Sea-Ports and a fruitful Soil is not worth the third part of that Province because it is not peopled enough no more than Spain This I understand with regard to their respective Extent for absolutely speaking there are more People in Ireland and in Spain taken apart than is in the Province of Holland there being above a Million of Souls in Ireland and there being apparently a lesser number in Holland As for Spain there may be four or five times that number in it so that it is not the multitude of People in a large Country of a vast Extent which makes the Kingdom rich and formidable but such a Number as is sufficient not only to Cultivate all the Lands which might and ought to be Cultivated in it but also may furnish great numbers of Men sit to make a Nation flourish by Arts Manufactures Trade Navigation and Fishing Now 't is evident that France is very far from having all the People which are necessary for all those things The King and his Ministers who formed such vast Projects upon the Number of that People which to them seemed to be infinite were guilty of a mighty mistake For France might and ought to have been two or three times as populous as it was Had the French Politicians been as understanding as they would make us believe them to have been and as some fancy they really are they ought to have applied themselves above all things to increase the number of the People and not to make War against all the World without Conduct or Judgment nor to have extended themselves in foolish and vain Conquests as they have done for some time by which they have dispersed and weakned themselves There is no Remedy at present for such a Disaster but if they were able to improve their unhappy Experience they ought to abandon their Conquests speedily and restrict themselves into a narrower compass Virtus unita fortior Virtue united is so much the stronger as did the Emperour Augustus of old Decretum factum de coercendo intra limites Imperio Tacit. and even if they would after having done this lay desolate all their Frontier-Provinces by their Absolute Authority and withdraw all the People in them with their Effects and settle the same in the contiguous Maritime Provinces as much as possible and give them a Compensation for what they lost the Prince and his Subjects would get infinitely by it I am confident that instead of 82 millions of Acres that are contained as I said in the Kingdom of France on which there are at present but 9 millions of Souls according to our former supposition which is about 8 Acres for every Soul I am confident I say and it can easily be demonstrated that 18 Millions of Acres would be sufficient to maintain the said 9 millions of Souls and they should even enrich themselves extraordinarily their Industry Arts Manufactures Trade Navigation c. supplying them plentifully with all those things which the Soil could not afford provided the Government were moderate and they would be as able in a little time to defend themselves against all Enemies and even to carry on the War against any Neighbouring Nation as much and better than ever the French Nation was if there were any necessity for it We