148 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2nd s. N" 86., Aug. 22. '57. 



precision to what he meant for definitions, would 

 be so exactly exemplified by such expressions as 

 plenituclo patricB and pleniiudo vice, that if Davenant 

 was not actually transferring them from Bacon's 

 pages to his own, he must have been imitating his 

 wonderful contemporary. The edition of the 

 Expos. Pauli ad Coloss., from which I copy, was 

 printed at Cambridge in 1627, and the bishop 

 announces this volume as the publication of lec- 

 tures which he had delivered olim as Lady Mar- 

 garet's Professor; but this will not necessarily 

 mean that the language has not been revised and 

 altered. In the same page (48.) he has said : 

 " Non frigide, neque dicis causa, a Deo petere 

 debemus beneficia," and dicis causa is such a very 

 unusual form of expression, though to be found 

 in Cicero, that I feel much disposed to suspect 

 that Bacon had drawn it out of the great Roman 

 advocate's stores, and then the bishop from his. 



Henry Waxtee. 



CLIMACTERICS. 



I send you the rubbing of a brass in the 

 church of Sidbui'y, adjoining Sidmouth. It is 

 fixed against the wall on the south side of the 

 chancel. In inches it measures 7f X 4|. The 

 inscription, in Roman capitals, has attracted at- 

 tention, and has given rise to some speculation. 

 It is this : 



« 1650. 



HIC . lACET . HENRICVS . KOBERTI . 

 PARSONII . FIL1V3 . QVI . EXIIT . ANNO . 



^TATIS . SVAi . CLIMACTERICO 

 AETTEPOnPii'Tfl." 



" 1650. Here lies Henry, the son of Eobert Parsoniiis, 

 who died in tlie second-first climacteric year of his age." 



_ The question then arises, In what year did he 

 die ? It may be inquired whether he died in the 

 second year after having attained to his first cli- 

 macteric, or in the year in which he attained to 

 his second climacteric after the first climacteric ? 

 The superstition respecting climacterics, or cri- 

 tical periods of life, was very strong during the 

 Middle Ages ; and even down to rather recent 

 times the mystic numbers 7 and 9, so frequently 

 occurring in the Bible, and the combinations of 

 these numbers, have had their influence with 

 many^ persons. It was believed that the con- 

 stitution of man changed every seven years ; and 

 that during every septime the whole of the solids 

 and fluids of the body were periodically renewed 

 — the old cast off, and new matter formed. 

 Periods of seven years were looked upon as steps 

 or stages^ in life. At seven years of age a child 

 had left infancy ; at twice seven, or fourteen, he 

 had attained puberty; at three times seven, or 

 twenty-one, he had reached manhood, and so on. 

 But as people advanced in years the more critical 

 points were approached, and the grand climac- 



teric was looked forward to with some anxiety. 

 Combinations of the numbers 3, 7, and 9 were 

 mostly employed, and 3x7 = 21, 7x7 = 49, 

 7x9=63, and 9x9=81, were important periods. 

 In the Thesau7'us Linguce Romanm et Britannicce , 

 1578, we have — 



" Climactericus annus, 

 The perilous or dangerous yeare of one's lyfe. 



" Cliraactera. — The perilous time of one's life, at euery vii 

 yeres' ende ; or after other, at the end of 63 yeres ; at 

 which tyme he is in some perill of body or minde." 



In Florio's Worlds of Wordes, London, 1598, 

 we read : 



" Climacterico, the dangerous and perilous yeer of one's 

 life : coinonly the yeere G3. 



Johnson, in his Dictionary, refers to Cotgrave, 

 who says : 



" Climactere ; every seventh, ninth, or the sixty-third 

 years of a man's life : all very dangerous, but the last 

 most." 



" Death might have taken such, her end deferr'd. 

 Until the time she had been climacter'd. 

 When she would have been three score j'ears and three, 

 Such as our best at three and twenty be." 



Drayton, On the Death of Lady Clifton. 



In the 59th number of The Tatler it is re- 

 marked by a jocose old gentleman, that, having 

 attained to sixty-four, he has passed his grand 

 climactei'ic. Brown, in his Vulgar Errors, de- 

 clares that there were two climacterics, 7 X 9 or 

 63, and 9x9 or 81. If the writer of the inscrip- 

 tion on the brass were impressed with these ideas, 

 could he have used the word 5evTepoTrp(ir<j> to imply 

 81 ? Lemon's Etymological Dictionary makes the 

 grand climacteric to be eighty-one, though some of 

 the other authorities speak of sixty-three as the 

 great and momentous period of life. One of the 

 early editions of the Encyclopcedia Britannica 

 (the 4th, 1810) speaks of two or more : 



" According to some," it says, " the climacteric is every 

 seventh year ; but others allow only those j'ears produced 

 by multiplying 7 by the odd numbers 3, 5, 7, and 9 to be 

 climacterical. These years, they say, bring with them 

 some remarkable change with respect to health, life, or 

 fortune. The grand climacteric is the 63rd year; but 

 some, makihg two, add to this the 81st. The other re- 

 markable climacterics are the 7th, 21st, 35th, 49th, and 

 56th." 



This quotation rather involves than elucidates 

 the point. In Rawlins's Latin Dictionary^ 1693, 

 we have — 



" Numerus, qui ex novem novenariis resultat. Nempe, 

 unitas ter sumpta conficit ternarium ; Ternarius in se 

 ductus, novenarium ; Novenarius novies sumptus, unum 

 et octoginta, qui est numerus climactericus." 



Foreign authorities are not more explicit. On 

 turning over several French, Spanish, Italian, and 

 Dutch writers, they all harp upon the numbers 7 

 and 9 ; but have no clear ideas of the meaning of 

 the word climacteric. 



But the word Sfintpoirpfirci) occurs in tho first 



