The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1833-12-06 00:00:00

CATHOLIC POPULATION IN LIVERPOOL.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE LIVERPOOL ST.INDARD.

Ste,—We live iu days of exaggeration and revolution, and no
wonder that the most barefaced assumptions and the most fal-
lacious calculations should be accredited as true and mathema-
tical as any problem in Euclid. A statement was laid before
the Commissioners, (which will, as a matter of course, be laid
before Parliament,) of the Catholic population in Liverpool.—
This statement is made out by Mr. Robson, a Catholic barrister,
and a man of the name of Wignall, or Whitnall, a Catholic
schoolmaster. The intent of the statement is to persuade the
public and the government that the Catholics are increasing in
number with their increasing and never-ceasing demands for all
the good things which their enlightened forefathers held in the
dark and bigoted ages.
The statement concludes with making the Catholic popula-
tion 62,051, because, by the rule of three, (well done ! the school-
master abroad!) the total registered baptisms in the parish of
Liverpool amount to 8,501
And the whole population to 220,974

. .
And the number of Catholic baptisms registered, or
procured as such by-Mr. Rosson and his tutor, at 2,388
Therefore, the number of Catholics will be 62,051 ! !
To make this calculation anything like the correct number, it
would be necessary to prove :-
Ist. That all baptisms in the parish of Liverpool have been
registered ;
2d. That no sect baptizes its own children without any refe-
rence to registration in the parish books;
3d. That the Catholic poor, in the borough, do not bear a
greater proportion to the whole of the Catholic popula-
tion, than the poor of the Established Church and Dis-
senters (other than Catholics) do to the whole population
(other than Catholics) in the town.—Because,
4th. The expectancy of life of the children of the poor cannot
be so great as that of the children of the middle and
richer classes of society.
Not one of these have been mentioned, much less proved to
have been taken into consideration, in the random calculation
of Mr. Rosson; who, I fear, is like his brother barrister, the
veracious O'Connell, eloquent only in hyperbole, and

" Most to be believed when fiction is the theme."

It is evident to any one who has resided in town a week, that
the greatest poverty, irregularity, and immorality, Are found
among the low Irish, and it is equally true that the greatest num-
ber of the low Irish are Catholics; and the inference from this
will easily be made, that, as the children of the poor have not
the same chance of living, or (which is the same thing) the
same expectancy of life as those of the rich, the decrement of
life in the tables of mortality in Liverpool would be greater
much greater—among the Catholic population than in the same
proportion among the other Dissenters, and children belonging
to the Established Church.

I will, however, assume the number of baptisms as given by
Mr. Rosson and his tutor; and wella.ve a method, at once clear
and satisfactory, given by the celebrated Dr. Price, for finding
the population of any town, by multiplying the expectancy of a
new-born child in that town by the number of baptisms.
The expectancy of life of a child born in ioondons 19 31.5.
And suppose we add 1-19th for Liverpool as Ltie yr.
healthier place of the two,'which is •.

2,1 yrs.
We have then 2,388 mult. by 20, ;rich is equal to 47,660 C. P.
And, at the utmost, suppose 1-sth tot the seamen of
the port to be Catholics, which is extravagant to
suppose—but take it at 10,000 total 4 and we shall
then have.

Total Catholic population in Lll;erpoof ' 49,660
• •This number deducted from 62;001 leaves 12,391 over-stated
and over-calculated, by any rational hypothesis.'
It must be 'borne in mind that more than one-halfof Lilts
children of the poor die before attaining theirlhircryear i.Vagg ;
and this has been ably shown in a letter on this subject, already
published in the Liverpool Cour:cr of the 27th ult., wherein ate
given the opinions of Dr. Adam Smith, antkothers, respecting
the longevity of the children of the poor in large towns.
The foregoing calculation is made when the burials and bap- .
tisms are equal, or nearly so ; but as the burials of the Catholics
are considerably greater (on au' average, ten years)• than
the baptisms, the above computation of the Catholic population,
is far too favourable. If the shoohnaster, however, will state;
without any mental reservation whatever, the avei'agd number
Of burials and births among the:Catholics, I promise.'to give
him as correct a statement of the total populatift of his sect in
Liverpool as figures can make it; but when he, or any other,
comes forward with a mere blind of common rule of three
matter, in calculating the Catholic population in town', I can-
not but feel convinced that, instead of teaching;le•has a'very
great deal to learn, and particularly in political arithmetic.
Mount-pleasant, 4th Dec., 1833. BRIWANICUS.