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London Further observation upon the Dublin bills The stationer to the reader A postscript to the stationer Two essays in political arithmetic To the king's most excellent majesty An essay in political arithmetic Five essays in political arithmetic The first essay The second essay The third essay. The fourth essay The fifth essay Of the people of England (by Gregory King)
INTRODUCTION.
William Petty, born on the 26th of May, 1623, was the son of a clothier at Romsey in Hampshire. After education at the Romsey Grammar School, he continued his studies at Caen in Normandy. There he supported himself by a little trade while learning French, and advancing his knowledge of Greek, Latin, Mathematics, and much else that belonged to his idea of a liberal education. His idea was large. He came back to England, and had for a short time a place in the Navy; but at the age of twenty he went abroad again, and was away three years, studying actively at Utrecht, Leyden, and Amsterdam, and also in Paris. In Paris he assisted Thomas Hobbes in drawing diagrams for his treatise on optics. At the age of twenty- four Petty took out a patent for the invention of a copying machine. It was described in a folio pamphlet "On Double Writing." That was in 1647, in Civil War time, and although Petty followed Hobbes in his studies, he did not share the philosopher's political opinions, but held with the Parliament. In 1648 he added to his former pamphlet a "Declaration concerning the newly invented Art of Double Writing."
Samuel Hartlib, the large-hearted Pole, who in those days spent his worldly means in England for the advancement of agriculture and of education, and other aids to the well-being of a nation, had caused Milton to write his letter on education, as has been shown in the Introduction to the hundred and twenty-first volume of this Library, which contains that Letter together with Milton's Areopagitica. Young Petty's first published writing was a Letter to Hartlib on Education, entitled "The Advice of W. P. to Mr.
Mankind and Political Arithmetic, page 1
by Sir William Petty