294 LONGEVITY OP ANIMALS. 



of what we have advanced. Mankind, in the early ages of the 

 world, have been said to live for several centuries. We mean 

 not to contradict the assertion. But we must remark, that, if 

 ever men lived so long, they must have been very different, 

 both in the structure of their bodies, and in their manners, 

 from those who now exist. From infancy to manhood, there 

 is a gradual growth or extension of our organs. After this 

 period, and when we advance in years, the bones harden, the 

 muscles become stiff, the cartilages are converted into bones, 

 the membranes into cartilages, the stomach and bowels lose 

 their tone, and the whole fabric, instead of being soft, flexi- 

 ble, and obedient to the inclinations, or even the commands, 

 of the mind, becomes rigid, inactive, and feeble. These are 

 the general and progressive causes of death, and they are 

 common to all animals. There are modes of living more fa- 

 vorable to health than others. But examples are not want- 

 ing of men who have arrived at an extreme old age, without 

 observing either temperance, or any of the other modes of 

 living which are generally supposed to be favorable to longev- 

 ity. Some men, who lived temperately, and even abstemi- 

 ously, reached to great ages ; others, who observed the very 

 opposite conduct, who lived freely and often intemperately, 

 have had their existence equally prolonged. But, in general, 

 notwithstanding a few exceptions, temperance, a placid and 

 cheerful disposition, moderate exercise, and proper exertions 

 of mind, contribute, in no uncommon degree, to the pro- 

 longation of life. 



A few examples of longevity in the human species, though 

 no general conclusions can be drawn from them, may not be 

 incurious to the reader. We shall not go back to a remote 

 and obscure antiquity, but confine ourselves to more modern 

 times, when the modes of living were nearly the same as they 

 are at present. 



On this subject, the celebrated Lord Verulam, in his Sylva 

 Sylvarum, gives the following passages, chiefly translated from 

 the seventh book of Pliny's Natural History. " The year of 

 our Lord seventy-six, falling into the time of Vespasian, if 

 memorable ; in which we shall find, as it were, a kalendar ot 

 long-lived men ; for that year there was a taxing (now a tax 

 ing is the most authentical and truest informer touching the 

 ages of men), and in that part of Italy which lieth between 

 the Apennine mountains and the river Po, there were found 

 one hundred and twenty-four persons that either equalled 01 

 exceeded an hundred years of age, namely ; 



