242 WILLIAMS' CASE.—3 BLAND.

minatiori of the Degrees of Mortality, in order to adjust the valua-
tion of annuities on lives, founded, as he informs us, upon a table
of observations of the births and deaths in the City of Breslaw in
Silesia. Rees' Cyclo. T. Halley. Soon after, the Observations on
Chronology, involving similar considerations as to the duration of
human life, were published by Sir * Isaac Newton. Rees'
448 Cyclo v. Newton; 1 Niebuhr's Rome, 285; 16 Westm. Rev. 328.
In the year 1746, M. Deparcieux published his Observations on
the Rate of Mortality as it occurred among the nominees of two
tontines in France, from 1695 to 1740; and on great numbers of
monks and nuns HI France, who died in the century preceding.
Finlaison's Report, &c. 8; 2 Price Obser. 454. Subsequently to
which. Abraham deMoivre, then of England, published his Essays
on the Doctrine of Chances, and on Annuities. And it is said,
that towards the close of his life, which happened in 1754, he was
consulted oa all questions relating to chances, gaming, and annui-
ties, and by his answers chiefly subsisted. Rees' Cyclo. v. De
Moivre; 9 Westm. Rev. 421. In the year 1740, Thomas Simpson,
an eminent English mathematician, published a Treatise on the
Nature and Laws of Chance; soon after which he published a small
volume on the Doctrine of Annuities and Reversions, deduced from
general and evident principles, with useful tables shewing the
values of single and joint lives. And in the year 1752, appeared
his work entitled, Select Exercises for Young Proficients in Mathe-
matics. Rees' Cyclo. r. Simpson. In the year 1771, Doctor Richard
Price, an eminent Englishman, published his celebrated work in
lelation to this matter, entitled, " Observations on Reversionary
Payments," &c. The seventh edition of which enlarged and im-
proved by William Morgan, was published m 1812.(n) The public
attention, in Great Britain, had not only been thus repeatedly-
called to this subject, by the publications of these eminent men;
but a very great importance had been given to it by the formation,
or legal incorporation, from the year 1706 to 1765, of many socie-
ties and bodies politic, for the granting of annuities and insurances
upon lives: Price Obser. 72, 97, 104, 109, 119, 142, 158, 9 Westm.
Rev. 389; and still more so, by the government's undertaking in
1692; and still continuing to raise revenue by the sale of annui-
ties for life and for years. 4 W. & M. c. 3, s. 18; 5 W. & M. c. 5
and 20; 1 Ann. Stat. 2, c. 5. In reference to which governmental
interest in the matter, it has been lately taken up in the House of
Commons, and investigated with great care.(o)

(n) Since that time Arthur Morgan, in the year 1834, published a set of
"Tables shewing the total number of persons assured in the Equitable
Society, (London,) from its commencement in September, 1762, to January,
1829," &c.

(o) The report from the select committee on life annuities, 4 June, 1829;
The report of John Finlaison, actuary of the national debt, on the evidence