Page:William Petty - Economic Writings (1899) vol 1.djvu/94

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lxxxvi
Introduction.

The year 1660 saw a regrouping of the parishes which established the classification still in force when Petty wrote[1]. The two groups of parishes within the liberties remained, with the exception of Christ Church, Southwark, above noted, as they had been before 1660. But the third group, "the Out-parishes, now called ten, formerly nine, and before that eight[2]," was divided. Four parishes of this group[3] were classified with St Margaret as "the five parishes within the city and liberties of Westminster," while the remaining six parishes were joined with the six parishes added in 1636 to make the "twelve parishes lying in Middlesex and Surrey[4]." After 1660 there were, therefore, four groups of parishes within the bills, viz, the ninety-seven parishes within the walls, the sixteen parishes without the walls, the five parishes in Westminster, and the twelve out-parishes in Middlesex and Surrey. To these one hundred and thirty parishes there were added, between 1660 and 1686, four others. St Paul, Shadwell[5], which first appeared in the weekly bill of 4—11 April, 1671, was reckoned the thirteenth out-parish, and a fourteenth out-parish, Christ Church, Surrey[6], was added in the bill of 16—23 December, 1673. Since Christ Church had been formerly a part of St Saviour, Southwark, this change made no alteration in the total area within the bills. It simply transferred to the group of out-parishes an area which, since 1604, had been reckoned to the parishes within the liberties. This transfer is without significance for Petty's arguments. The two remaining additions are St James, Westminster[7] and St Anne, Westminster[8], raising the Westminster group of parishes to six, and afterwards to seven[9]. Since both of these parishes were taken out of St Martin-in-the-Fields, which already belonged to the Westminster group, no change of area or of distribution was effected[10].

  1. In 1683—86, p. 457.
  2. Graunt, p. 380.
  3. St Clement Danes, St Paul, Covent Garden, St Martin-in-the- Fields, and St Mary, Savoy.
  4. P. 345.
  5. Erected by Private Act of 22 Charles II. 27. Taken out of Stepney.
  6. Erected by Private Act 22, 23 Charles II. 12, an Act for making the Manor of Paris Garden a Parish. Seymour, Survey, ii. 816.
  7. In the weekly bill 14—21 July 1685. The Act, i James II. is the last in the table of statutes printed for 1685.
  8. In the weekly bill 30 March—6 April, 1686. Private Act, 30 Charles II. 7.
  9. See p. 457 note.
  10. Ogle's Inquiry has an appendix on "Successive Changes in the Area covered by the Bills." Jour, Stat. Soc., iv. 453—455.