1702) in 1887; while vols. vii. and viii. (1702–1793), for which Rogers had made large collections, are being prepared for publication by his fourth son, Mr. A. G. L. Rogers.
Rogers published both the materials which he extracted from contemporary records and the averages and the conclusions he based upon them. The materials are of permanent value, but some of his conclusions have been assailed as inaccurate. He sought to trace the influence of economic forces on political movements, and appealed to history to illustrate and condemn what he regarded as economic fallacies. But he seems to have overestimated the prosperous condition of the English labourer in the middle ages, and to have somewhat exaggerated the oppressive effects of legislation on his position in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Mr. Frederic Seebohm proved that Rogers greatly underestimated the effects on the rural population of the ‘black death’ of 1349 (cf. Fortnightly Review, ii. iii. iv.); Dr. Cunningham has shown that Rogers seriously antedated the commutation of villein-service, and misapprehended the value of the currency in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries (Growth of English Industry and Commerce, passim). But it should be recognised that much of Rogers's vast work is that of a pioneer making roads through an unexplored country. To abstract economic theory Rogers made no important contribution. He objected to the method and to many of the conclusions of the Ricardian school of economists, but he never shook himself free from their conceptions. Nor had he much sympathy with the historical school of economists of the type of Roscher.
Several of Rogers's other publications were largely based upon the ‘History of Agriculture and Prices.’ Of these the most important was ‘Six Centuries of Work and Wages’ (2 vols. London, 1884, 8vo; new edition revised in one volume, London, 1886, 8vo; 3rd edit. 1890, 8vo). Eight chapters of his ‘Six Centuries’ were reprinted separately as ‘The History of Work and Wages,’ 1885, 8vo. His ‘First Nine Years of the Bank of England,’ Oxford, 1887, 8vo, and his article ‘Finance’ in the ‘Encylopædia Britannica,’ 9th edit., are valuable contributions to financial history. The former reprints a weekly register discovered by Rogers of the prices of bank stock from 1694 to 1703, with a narrative showing the reasons of the fluctuations.
Rogers also published: 1. ‘Primogeniture and Entail,’ &c., Manchester, 1864, 8vo. 2. ‘Historical Gleanings: a series of sketches, Montague, Walpole, Adam Smith, Cobbett,’ London, 1869, 8vo; 2nd ser. Wiclif, Laud, Wilkes, Horne Tooke, London, 1870, 8vo. 3. ‘Paul of Tarsus: an inquiry into the Times and the Gospel of the Apostle of the Gentiles, by a Graduate’ [anon.], 1872, 8vo. 4. ‘A Complete Collection of the Protests of the Lords, with Historical Introductions,’ &c., 3 vols. Oxford, 1875, 8vo. 5. ‘The Correspondence of the English establishment, with the Purpose of its Foundation,’ London [1875], 8vo. 6. ‘Loci e Libro Veritatum. Passages selected from Gascoyne's Theological Dictionary …’ 1881, 4to. 7. ‘Ensilage in America: its Prospects in English Agriculture,’ London, 1883, 8vo; 2nd edit., with a new introduction on the progress of ensilage in England during 1883–4, London, 1884, 8vo. 8. ‘The British Citizen: his Rights and Privileges,’ 1885 (in the People's Library.) 9. ‘Holland’ (Story of the Nations series), 1888, 8vo. 10. ‘The Relations of Economic Science to Social and Political Action,’ London, 1888, 8vo. 11. ‘The Economic Interpretation of History,’ &c., London, 1888, 8vo; there are translations in French, German, and Spanish. 12. ‘Oxford City Documents … 1268–1665’ (Oxford Historical Society), Oxford, 1891, 8vo. 13. ‘Industrial and Commercial History of England,’ a course of lectures, edited by his fourth son, Mr. A. G. L. Rogers, London, 1892, 8vo.
Joseph Rogers (1821–1889), medical practitioner, elder brother of the above, for forty years actively promoted reform in the administration of the poor law. Commencing practice in London in 1844, he became supernumerary medical officer at St. Anne's, Soho, in 1855, on the occasion of an outbreak of cholera. In the following year he was appointed medical officer to the Strand workhouse. In 1861 he gave evidence before the select committee of the House of Commons on the supply of drugs in workhouse infirmaries, when his views were adopted by the committee. In 1868 his zeal for reform brought him into conflict with the guardians, and the president of the poor-law board, after an inquiry, removed him from office. In 1872 he became medical officer of the Westminster infirmary. Here also the guardians resented his efforts at reform and suspended him, but he was reinstated by the president of the poor-law board, and his admirers presented him with a testimonial consisting of three pieces of plate and a cheque for 150l. He was the founder and for some time president of the Poor Law Medical Officers' Association. The system of poor-law dispensaries and separate sick wards, with proper staffs of medical attendants and nurses, is due to the efforts of
