236 History of Nature. [Boon VII. 



fourth Consulship ; considering that between the one and 

 the other there were but 63 Years ; and yet Stephanio lived 

 for a considerable Time after. Mutianus witnesseth, that in 

 Tempsis, which is the Crest of the Mountain Tmolus, People 

 lived 150 Years. At that Age, T. Fullonius, of Bononia, 

 entered his Name in the Census at the Time that Claudius 

 Ccesar held the Registry ; and that he was so old indeed, 

 appeared by comparing together several Registries that he 

 had before made, as also by circumstances that had occurred 

 in his Lifetime ; for the Emperor took care in that way to 

 find out the Truth. 1 



CHAPTER XLIX. 

 Of Differences in, the Nativities. 



THIS Point would require the Advice of the Science of 

 the Stars ; for Epigenes saith, that it is not possible for a 

 Man to live a hundred and twenty-two Years ; and Berosus 

 is of opinion, that one cannot pass an hundred and seven- 

 teen. That Calculation holdeth good which Petosiris and 

 Necepsos have delivered, and which they call Tetartemorion, 

 from a portion of three Signs ; according to which account it 



1 The length of life detailed in the Mosaic records was unknown to 

 the Greeks, who had only retained an obscure traditionary remembrance 

 of it, and of the great stature and strength with which it was supposed to 

 be accompanied. But that Pliny's mode of interpreting it, by a peculiar 

 method of explaining the length of the year, will not apply to the narra- 

 tive in the Book of Genesis, appears from the fact that the same history 

 records the reduction of the length of human life, by sudden transitions, 

 to at last threescore and ten years, which we are compelled to measure 

 by the same scale as the former. 



As a general summary of the duration of life in historical times, the 

 " History of Life and Death," by Lord Bacon, may be consulted. Fuller 

 mentions James Sands, of Horborne in Staffordshire, who lived 140 

 years, and his wife 120. The Countess of Desmond, known to Sir W 

 Rawleigh, lived to about 140 years, and had new teeth three several 

 times. Thomas Parr was born in 1483 ; married at the age of eighty, 

 and in the space of thirty-two years had only two children. At the age 

 of 120 he had another child, and died aged 150 years. Wern. Club. 



