Petty

Petty, SIR WILLIAM, a man of singular versatility, best known as a political economist, was born at Romsey in Hampshire on 26th May 1623, and educated partly at Caen, partly at the universities of the Netherlands, and at Paris. His versatility and talent are evidenced by the positions he successively held, and the subjects he interested himself in: he taught anatomy and chemistry at Oxford (1648), and was made professor of Anatomy there (1651); was professor of Music at Gresham College, London; was physician to the army in Ireland (1652), executed a fresh survey of the Irish lands forfeited in 1641, started ironworks, lead-mines, sea-fisheries, and other industries on estates he bought in south-west Ireland; was secretary to Henry Cromwell when he was lord-lieutenant of that island; was made surveyor-general of Ireland by Charles II., who knighted him; invented a copying-machine (1647) and a double-bottomed sea-boat (1663); and in early life took much interest in education. In political economy he claims a place as one of the most important precursors of Adam Smith, on the strength of his Treatise on Taxes and Contributions (1662) and his Political Arithmetic (1691), the latter a discussion of the value of comparative statistics. He died in London on 16th December 1687.