582 THE MOUNTAIN. 



only been a short time in operation, all its productions had 

 less consistency. Man's body, especially, was more pliant, 

 supple, and more susceptible of extension ; it could then 

 grow a longer time ; man arrived at puberty only upon at- 

 taining one hundred and thirty years, instead of fourteen. 

 With this, other things are reconciled, for in multiplying 

 these two numbers, one hundred and thirty and fourteen, 

 by the same number, i.e. seven, 'we perceive,' says Buffon, 

 'that the life of man being now-a-days ninety-eight years, 

 it must then have been nine hundred and ten years.'* It 

 is singular that Buffon here states this view seriously, be- 

 cause he gives it as his own, although he sneers at it in 

 Woodward, from whom he has taken #."f Hufeland 

 cleaves the knot of the standing joke on this point, namely, 

 the age of Methuselah, by adopting the views of Hensler. 

 He says : "Acute theologists have shown that the chrono- 

 logy of the early ages was not the same as that used at 

 present. Some, particularly Hensler, have proved, with the 

 highest probability, that the year, till the time of Abraham, 

 consisted only of three months ; that it was afterwards ex- 

 tended to eight ; and that it was not till the time of Joseph 

 that it was made to consist of twelve. These assertions are, 

 in a certain degree, confirmed by some of the Eastern na- 

 tions, who still reckon only three months to a year ; and 

 besides, it would be altogether inexplicable why the life of 

 man should have been shortened one-half immediately 

 after the flood. It would be equally inexplicable why the 

 patriarchs did not marry till their sixtieth, seventieth, and 

 even hundredth year ; but this difficulty vanishes when we 

 reckon these ages according to the before-mentioned stand- 

 ard, which will give the twentieth or thirtieth year ; and 

 consequently, same periods at which people marry at pre- 

 sent. The whole, therefore, according to this explanation, 

 assumes a different appearance. The sixteen hundred years 

 before the flood will become four hundred and fourteen ; and 

 the nine hundred years (the highest recorded) which Methu- 



* Vol. xi. p. 76. f Flourens, ''Human Longevity." 



