OP HUMAN LIFE. fc6l 



primitive prerogatives, i. e. to the power of controuling 

 univerfal nature, to the means of underftanding the 

 language of beafts, of making fpirits compliant and 

 fubfervient to their purpofes, of reaching to a thoufand 

 years of age, of being on one and the fame day at Pa- 

 ris and at Grand Cairo, of becoming invisible, of fly- 

 ing in the air, of walking on the water, of calling up 

 the dead, &c. The only furpriling part of the frory 

 is, that fuch rhodomontades did not more forcibly oc- 

 cur to fo intelligent a man as Paul Lucas otherwife was. 

 He juft ventures to fuggeft, with all this, and as much 

 as the fage may be fuperior to us poor fouls, yet, at 

 leaft, he muft die as well as other people. — " One can 

 "eafilyfee, returns the dervife, that you have never 

 " beheld any true philofopher." — And now he proves 

 to him that the natural age to which man was ordained 

 from the beginning, caff be no lefs a period than a 

 thoufand years ; and to attain to this advanced age is 

 one of the prerogatives annexed to the poffeilion of the 

 philofopher's frone, in which is contained the true pa- 

 nacea, whereby the man is enabled not only to remove 

 from him whatever may deftroy his natural conititution, 

 or throw it into diforder, but comprifes all the know- 

 ledge that God infufed into the mind of the firft man, 

 and which he loft by the abufe of his reafon. 



But, replies Lucas, our famous Flamel pofleffed 

 this Hone, and yet it is a clear cafe that he died and 

 was buried in due form. The dervife faiiled at the 

 limplicity of the honeft, .Lucas, who could imagine that 

 iuch a man as Flamel was dead like any other earth- 

 born mortal. As I gave full credit to almoft all that 

 he had hitherto told me (fays our traveller artleffly 

 j^V* ■ ' 3 ^p-t'" ; ^ enough), 



' Hi. 



