under ground. Again, it hath been found out lately, that a slip of a wild tree, as of an elm, oak, ash, or such like, grafted into a stock of the same kind, will bring forth larger leaves than those that grow without grafting. Also men are not nourished so well with raw flesh as with that which hath passed the fire. 4. Living creatures are nourished by the mouth, plants by the root, young ones in the womb by the navel. Birds for a while are nourished with the yolk in the egg, whereof some is found in their crops after they are hatched. or some other way than by the stomach, then the weakness of concoction, which is incident to old men, might be recompensed by these helps, and concoction restored to them entire. Length and Shortness of Life in Man. To the fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, and eleventh articles. The History. 1. Before the flood, as the sacred Scriptures relate, men lived many hundred years; yet none of the fathers attained to a full thousand. Neither was this length of life peculiar only to grace or the holy line; for there are reckoned of the fathers, until the flood, eleven generations; but of the sons of Adam, by Cain, only eight generations; so as the posterity of Cain may seem the longer lived. But this length of life, immediately after the flood, was reduced to a moiety, but in the postnati; for Noah, who was born before, equalled the age of his ancestors, and Sem saw the six hundredth year of his life. Afterwards, three generations being run from the 6. In all alimentation or nourishment there is flood, the life of man was brought down to a a twofold action, extusion, and attraction; where-fourth part of the primitive age, that was, to of the former proceeds from the inward function, about two hundred years. the latter from the outward. 5. All nourishment moveth from the centre to the circumference, or from the inward to the outward; yet it is to be noted, that in trees and plants the nourishment passeth rather by the bark and outward parts, than by the pith and inward parts; for if the bark be pulled off, though but for a small breadth round, they live no more; and the blood in the veins of living creatures doth no less nourish the flesh beneath than the flesh above it. 7. Vegetables assimilate their nourishment simply, without excerning; for gums and tears of trees are rather exuberances than excrements, and knots or knobs are nothing but diseases. But the substance of living creatures is more perceptible of the like; and, therefore, it is conjoined with a kind of disdain, whereby it rejecteth the bad and assimilateth the good. 8. It is a strange thing of the stalks of fruits, that all the nourishment which produceth sometimes such great fruits, should be forced to pass through so narrow necks; for the fruit is never joined to the stocks without some stalk. 9. It is to be noted, that the seeds of living creatures will not be fruitful but when they new shed, but the seeds of plants will be fruitful a long time after they are gathered; yet the slips or cions of trees will not grow unless they be grafted green, neither will the roots keep long fresh unless they be covered with earth. 2. Abraham lived a hundred and seventy and five years; a man of a high courage, and prosperous in all things. Isaac came to a hundred and eighty years of age; a chaste man, and enjoying more quietness than his father. But Jacob, after many crosses, and a numerous progeny, lasted to the one hundred and forty-seventh year of his life; a patient, gentle, and wise man. Ismael, a military man, lived a hundred and thirty and seven years. Sarah (whose years only amongst women are recorded) died in the hundred and twentyseventh year of her age; a beautiful and magnanimous woman, a singular good mother and wife, and yet no less famous for her liberty than obsequiousness towards her husband. Joseph, also, a prudent and politic man, passing his youth in affliction, afterwards advanced to the height of honour and prosperity, lived a hundred and ten years. But his brother Levi, older than himself, attained to a hundred and thirty-seven years; a man impatient of contumely and revengeful. Near unto the same age attained the son of Levi; also his grandchild, the father of Aaron and Moses. 10. In living creatures there are degrees of nourishment according to their age; in the womb, the young one is nourished with the mother's blood; when it is new-born, with milk; after3. Moses lived a hundred and twenty years; a wards with meats and drinks: and in old age the stout man, and yet the meekest upon the earth, most nourishing and savoury meats please best. and of a very slow tongue. Howsoever, Moses, Above all, it maketh to the present inquisition, in his psalm, pronounceth that the life of man is to inquire diligently and attentively whether a but seventy years, and if a man have strength, man may not receive nourishment from without, then eighty; which term of man's life standeth at least some other way besides the mouth. We firm in many particulars even at this day. Aaron, know that baths of milk are used in some hectic who was three years the older, died the same fevers, and when the body is brought extreme year with his brother; a man of a readier speech, low, and physicians do provide nourishing glis- of a more facile disposition, and less constant. ters. This matter would be well studied; for if But Phineas, grandchild of Aaron, (perhaps ont nourishment may be made either from without, of extraordinary grace,) may be collected to have seeing many at this day attain to those years. But the Arcadian kings are fabulously reported to have lived very long. Surely that country was mountainous, full of flocks of sheep, and brought forth most wholesome food, notwithstanding, seeing Pan was their god, we may conceive that all things about them were panic and vain, and subject to fables. 7. Numa, King of the Romans, lived to eighty years; a man peaceable, contemplative, and much devoted to religion. Marcus Valerius Corvinus saw a hundred years complete, there being betwixt his first and sixth consulship forty-six years; a man valorous, affable, popular, and always fortunate. lived three hundred years; if so be the war of the we find nothing of moment in those works that Israelites against the tribe of Benjamin (in which are extant, as touching long life; for their kings expedition Phineas consulted with) were perform- which reigned longest did not exceed fifty, or ed in the same order of time in which the history five-and-fifty years; which is no great matter, hath ranked it; he was a man of a most eminent zeal. Joshua, a martial man and an excellent leader, and evermore victorious, lived to the hundred and tenth year of his life. Caleb was his contemporary, and seemeth to have been of as great years. Ebud, the judge, seems to have been no less than a hundred years old, in regard that after the victory over the Moabites, the Holy Land had rest under his government eighty years; he was a man fierce and undaunted, and one that in a sort neglected his life for the good of his people. 4. Job lived, after the restoration of his happiness, a hundred and forty years, being, before his afflictions, of that age that he had sons at man's estate; a man politic, eloquent, charitable, and the example of patience. Eli, the priest, lived ninety-eight years; a corpulent man, calm of disposition, and indulgent to his children. But Elizæus, the prophet, may seem to have died when he was above a hundred years old; for he is found to have lived after the assumption of Elias sixty years; and at the time of that assumption he was of those years, that the boys mocked him by the name of baldhead; a man vehement and severe, and of an austere life, and a contemner of riches. Also Isaiah, the prophet, seemeth to have been a hundred years old; for he is found to have exercised the function of a prophet seventy years together, the years both of his beginning to prophecy, and of his death, being uncertain; a man of an admirable eloquence, an evangelical prophet, full of the promises of God of the New Testament, as a bottle with sweet wine. 8. Solon of Athens, the lawgiver, and one of the seven wise men, lived above eighty years, a man of high courage, but popular, and affected to his country; also learned, given to pleasures, and a soft kind of life. Epimenides, the Cretian, is reported to have lived a hundred and fifty-seven years; the matter is mixed with a prodigious relation, for fifty-seven of those years he is said to have slept in a cave. Half an age after, Xenophon, the Colophonian, lived a hundred and two years, or rather more; for at the age of twentyfive years he left his country, seventy-seven complete years he travelled, and after that returned; but how long he lived after his return appears not; a man no less wandering in mind than in body; for his name was changed for the madness of his opinions, from Xenophanes to Xenomanes; a man, no doubt, of a vast conceit, and that minded nothing but infinitum. 5. Tobias, the elder, lived a hundred and fifty- 9. Anacreon, the poet, lived eighty years, and eight years, the younger a hundred and twenty-somewhat better, a man lascivious, voluptuous, seven; merciful men, and great alms-givers. It and given to drink. Pindarus, the Theban, lived seems, in the time of the captivity, many of the to eighty years; a poet of a high fancy, singular Jews who returned out of Babylon were of great in his conceits, and a great adorer of the gods. years, seeing they could remember both temples, Sophocles, the Athenian, attained to the like age; (there being no less than seventy years betwixt a lofty tragic poet, given over wholly to writing, them,) and wept for the unlikeness of them. and neglectful of his family. Many ages after that, in the time of our Saviour, lived old Simeon, to the age of ninety; a devout man, and full both of hope and expectation. Into the same time also fell Anna, the prophetess, who could not possibly be less than a hundred years old, for she had been seven years a wife, about eighty-four years a widow, besides the years of her virginity, and the time that she lived after her prophecy of our Saviour; she was a holy woman, and passed her days in fastings and prayers. 6. The long lives of men mentioned in heathen authors have no great certainty in them; both for the intermixture of fables, whereunto those kind of relations were very prone, and for their false calculation of years. Certainly of the Egyptians 10. Artaxerxes, King of Persia, lived ninety-four years; a man of a dull wit, averse to the despatch of business, desirous of glory, but rather of ease. At the same time lived Agesilaus, King of Sparta, to eighty-four years of age; a moderate prince, as being a philosopher among kings, but, notwithstanding, ambitious, and a warrior, and no less stout in war than in business. 11. Gorgias, the Sicilian, was a hundred and eight years old; a rhetorician, and a great boaster of his faculty, one that taught youth for profit. He had seen many countries, and a little before his death said, that he had done nothing worthy of blame since he was an old man. Protagoras, of Abdera, saw ninety years of age. This man was likewise a rhetorician, but professed not so much to teach the liberal arts, as the art of governing commonwealths and states; notwithstanding he was a great wanderer in the world, no less than Gorgias. Isocrates, the Athenian, lived ninety-eight years; he was a rhetorician also, but an exceeding modest man, one that shunned the public light, and opened his school only in his own house. Democritus, of Abdera, reached to a hundred and nine years; he was a great philosopher, and, if ever any man amongst the Grecians, a true naturalist, a surveyor of many countries, but much more of nature; also a diligent searcher into experiments, and (as Aristotle objected against him) one that followed similitudes more than the laws of arguments. Diogenes, the Sinopean, lived ninety years; a man that used liberty towards others, but tyranny over himself, a coarse diet, and of much patience. Zeno, of Citium, lacked about two years of a hundred; a man of a high mind, and a contemner of other men's opinions; also of a great acuteness, but yet not troublesome, choosing rather to take men's minds than to enforce them. The like whereof afterwards was in Seneca. Plato, the Athenian, attained to eighty-one years; a man of a great courage, but yet a lover of ease, in his notions sublime, and of a fancy, neat and delicate in his life, rather calm than merry, and one that carried a kind of majesty in his countenance. Theophrastus, the Eressian, arrived at eighty-five years of age; a man sweet for his eloquence, sweet for the variety of his matters, and who selected the pleasant things of philosophy, and let the bitter and harsh go. Carneades, of Cyrena, many years after, came to the like age of eightyfive years; a man of a fluent eloquence, and one who, by the acceptable and pleasant variety of his knowledge, delighted both himself and others. But Orbilius, who lived in Cicero's time, no philosopher or rhetorician, but a grammarian, attained to a hundred years of age; he was first a soldier, then a schoolmaster; a man by nature tart both in his tongue and pen, and severe towards his scholars. 12. Quintius Fabius Maximus was augur sixtythree years, which showed him to be above eighty years of age at his death; though it be true, that in the augurship nobility was more respected than age; a wise man, and a great deliberator, and in all his proceedings moderate, and not without affability severe. Masinissa, King of Numidia, lived ninety years, and being more than eightyfive, got a son; a daring man, and trusting upon his fortune, who in his youth had tasted of the inconstancy of fortune, but in his succeeding age was constantly happy. But Marcus Porcius Cato lived above ninety years of age; a man of an iron body and mind; he had a bitter tongue, and loved to cherish factions; he was given to husbandry, and was to himself and his family a physician. VOL. III.-61 13. Terentia, Cicero's wife, lived a hundred and three years; a woman afflicted with many crosses; first, with the banishment of her husband, then with the difference betwixt them; lastly, with his last fatal misfortune. She was also oftentimes vexed with the gout. Luceia must needs exceed a hundred by many years, for it is said, that she acted a whole hundred years upon the stage, at first, perhaps, representing the person of some young girl, at last of some decrepit old woman. But Galeria Copiola, a player also, and a dancer, was brought upon the stage as a novice, in what year of her age is not known; but ninety-nine years after, at the dedication of the theatre by Pompey the Great, she was shown upon the stage, not now for an actress, but for a wonder. Neither was this all; for after that, in the solemnities for the health and life of Augustus, she was shown upon the stage the third time. 14. There was another actress, somewhat inferior in age, but much superior in dignity, which lived well near ninety years, I mean Livia Julia Augusta, wife to Augustus Cæsar, and mother to Tiberius. For, if Augustus his life were a play, (as himself would have it, when as upon his death-bed he charged his friends they should give him a plaudit after he was dead,) certainly this lady was an excellent actress, who could carry it so well with her husband by a dissembled obedience, and with her son by power and authority. A woman affable, and yet of a matronal carriage, pragmatical, and unholding her power. But Junia, the wife of Caius Cassius, and sister of Marcus Brutus, was also ninety years old, for she survived the Philippic battle sixty-four years; a magnanimous woman, in her great wealth happy, in the calamity of her husband, and near kinsfolks, and in a long widowhood unhappy, notwithstanding much honoured of all. 15. The year of our Lord seventy-six, falling into the time of Vespasian, is memorable; in which we shall find, as it were, a calendar of long-lived men; for that year there was a taxing: (now, a taxing is the most authentical and truest informer touching the ages of men ;) and in that part of Italy, which lieth betwixt the Apennine mountains and the river Po, there were found a hundred and four-and-twenty persons that either equalled or exceeded a hundred years of age: namely, of a hundred years, just fifty-four persons; of a hundrad and ten, fifty seven persons; of a hundred and five-and-twenty, two only; of a hundred and thirty, four men; of a hundred and five-andthirty, or seven-and-thirty, four more; of a hundred and forty, three men. Besides these, Parma in particular afforded five, whereof three fulfilled a hundred and twenty years, and two a hundred and thirty. Brussels afforded one of a hundred and twenty five years old. Placentia one, aged a hundredthirtyand one. Faventia one woman, aged one hundred thirty-and-two. A certain town, then called Vel 2 S leiatium, situate in the hills about Placentia, | short in the performance. That our catalogue might not be extended too much in length, we have thought fit, as well in those whom we have rehearsed, as in those whom we shall rehearse, to offer none under eighty years of age. Now we have affixed to every one a true and short character or elogy; but of that sort whereunto, in our judgment, length of life (which is not a little subject to the manners and fortunes of men) hath some relation, and that in a twofold respect; either that such kind of men are for the most part long-lived, or that such men may sometimes be of long life, though otherwise not well disposed for it. 16. Amongst the Roman and Grecian emperors, also, the French and Almain, to these our days, which make up the number of well near two hundred princes, there are only four found that lived to eighty years of age; unto whom we may add the two first emperors, Augustus and Tiberius, whereof the latter fulfilled the seventyand-eighth year, the former the seventy-and-sixth year of his age, and might both, perhaps, have lived to forescore, if Livia and Caius had been pleased. Augustus (as was said) lived seventyand-six years; a man of moderate disposition, in accomplishing his designs vehement, but otherwise calm and serene; in meat and drink sober, venery intemperate, through all his lifetime happy; and who, about the thirtieth year of his life, had a great and dangerous sickness, insomuch as they despaired of life in him, whom Antonius Musa, the physician, when other physicians had applied hot medicines, as most agreeable to his disease, on the contrary cured with cold medicines, which perchance might be some help to the prolonging of his life. Tiberius lived to be two years older; a man with lean chaps, as Augustus was wont to say, for his speech stuck within his jaws, but was weighty. He was bloody, a drinker, and one that took lust into a part of his diet; notwithstanding a great observer of his health, insomuch that he used to say that he was a fool, that after thirty years of age took advice of a physician. Gordian, the elder, lived eighty years, and yet died a violent death, when he was scarce warm in his empire; a man of a high spirit, and renowned, learned, and a poet, and constantly happy throughout the whole course of his life, save only that he ended his days by a violent death. Valerian, the emperor, was seventy-six years of age before he was taken prisoner by Sapor, King of Persia. After his captivity he lived seven years in reproaches, and then died a violent death also; a man of a poor mind, and not valiant, notwithstanding lifted up in his own, and the opinion of men, but falling Anastasius, surnamed Dicorut, lived eighty-eight years; he was of a settled mind, but too abject, and superstitious, and fearful. Anicius Justinianus lived to eightythree years, a man greedy of glory, performing nothing in his own person, but in the valour of his captains happy and renowned, uxorious, and not his own, but suffering others to lead him. Helena, of Britain, mother of Constantine the Great, was fourscore years old; a woman that intermeddled not in matters of state, neither in her husband's nor son's reign, but devoted herself wholly to religion; magnanimous, and perpetually flourishing. Theodora, the empress, (who was sister to Zoes, wife of Monomachus, and reigned alone after her decease,) lived above eighty years; a pragmatical woman, and one that took delight in governing; fortunate in the highest degree, and through her good fortunes credulous. 17. We will proceed now from these secular princes to the princes in the church; St. John, an apostle of our Saviour, and the beloved disciple, lived ninety-three years. He was rightly denoted under the emblem of the eagle, for his piercing sight into the divinity, and was a seraph amongst the apostles, in respect of his burning love. St. Luke, the Evangelist, fulfilled fourscore and four years; an eloquent man, and a traveller, St. Paul's inseparable companion, and a physician. Simeon, the son of Cleophas, called the brother of our Lord, and Bishop of Jerusalem, lived a hundred and twenty years, though he was cut short by martyrdom; a stout man, and constant, and full of good works. Polycarpus, disciple unto the apostles, and Bishop of Smyrna, seemeth to have extended his age to a hundred years and more, though he were also cut off by martyrdom; a man of a high mind, of an heroical patience, and unwearied with labours. Dionysius Areopagita, contemporary to the apostle St. Paul, lived ninety years; he was called the bird of heaven for his high-flying divinity, and was famous, as well for his holy life as for his meditations. Aquila and Priscilla, first St. Paul the apostle's hosts, afterwards his fellowhelpers, lived together in a happy and famous wedlock, at least to a hundred years of age apiece, for they were both alive under Pope Xistus the First; a noble pair, and prone to all kind of charity, who amongst other their comforts (which no doubt were great unto the first founders of the church) had this added, to enjoy each other so long in a happy marriage. St. Paul, the hermit, lived a hundred and thirteen years; now, he lived in a cave, his diet was so slender and strict, that it was thought almost impossible to support human nature therewithal; he passed his years only in meditations and soliloquies; yet he was not illiterate, or an idiot, but learned. Saint Anthony, the first founder of monks, or (as some will have it) the restorer only, attained to a hundred and five years of age; a man devout and contemplative, | kings in Italy, the father and the son, are reported though not unfit for civil affairs; his life was aus- to have lived, the one eight hundred, the other tere and mortifying, notwithstanding he lived in a six hundred years; but this is delivered unto us kind of glorious solitude, and exercised a com- by certain philologists, who, though otherwise mand, for he had his monks under him. And, credulous enough, yet themselves have suspected besides, many Christians and philosophers came the truth of this matter, or rather condemned it. to visit him as a living image, from which they Others record some Arcadian kings to have lived parted not without some adoration. St. Athanasius three hundred years; the country, no doubt, is a exceeded the term of eighty years; a man of an place apt for long life, but the relation I suspect invincible constancy, commanding fame, and not to be fabulous. They tell of one Dando, in Illyyielding to fortune. He was free towards the rium, that lived without the inconveniences of great ones, with the people gracious and accept- old age, to five hundred years. They tell, also, able, beaten and practised to oppositions, and in of the Epians, a part of Ætolia, that the whole delivering himself from them, stout and wise. nation of them were exceeding long-lived, inscSt. Hierom, by the consent of most writers, ex- much that many of them were two hundred years ceeded ninety years of age; a man powerful in his old; and that one principal man amongst them, pen, and of a manly eloquence, variously learned named Litorius, a man of giantlike stature, could both in the tongues and sciences; also a traveller, have told three hundred years. It is recorded, and that lived strictly towards his old age, in an that on the top of the mountain Timolus, anestate private, and not dignified; he bore high ciently called Tempsis, many of the inhabitants spirits, and shined far out of obscurity. lived to a hundred and fifty years. We read 18. The Popes of Rome are in number, to this that the Esseans, amongst the Jews, did usually day, two hundred, forty, and one. Of so great extend their life to a hundred years. Now, that a number, five only have attained to the age of sect used a single or abstemious diet, after the foorscore years or upwards. But, in many of rule of Pythagoras. Apollonius Tyaneus exthe first popes, their full age was intercepted by ceeded a hundred years, his face bewraying no the prerogative and crown of martyrdom. John, such age; he was an admirable man, of the the twenty-third Pope of Rome, fulfilled the heathens reputed to have something divine in ninetieth year of his age; a man of an unquiet him, of the Christians held for a sorcerer; in his disposition, and one that studied novelty; he diet pythagorical, a great traveller, much renownaltered many things, some to the better, others ed, and by some adored as a god; nothwithstandonly to the new, a great accumulator of riches ing, towards the end of his life, he was subject and treasures. Gregory, called the twelfth, to many complaints against him, and reproaches, created in schism, and not fully acknowledged all which he made shift to escape. But, lest his pope, died at ninety years. Of him, in respect long life should be imputed to his pythagorical of his short papacy, we find nothing to make a diet, and not rather that it was hereditary, his judgment upon. Paul, the third, lived eighty grandfather before him lived a hundred and thirty years and one; a temperate man, and of a pro-years. It is undoubted, that Quintus Metellus found wisdom; he was learned, an astrologer, lived above a hundred years; and that, after and one that tended his health carefully, but, several consulships happily administered, in his after the example of old Eli the priest, over-in-old age he was made Pontifex Maximus, and dulgent to his family. Paul the fourth attained exercised those holy duties full two-and-twenty to the age of eighty-three years; a man of a years; in the performance of which rites his harsh nature, and severe, of a haughty mind, voice never failed, nor his hand trembled. It is and imperious, prone to anger, his speech was most certain, that Appius Cæcus was very old, but eloquent and ready. Gregory the thirteenth ful- his years are not extant, the most part whereof he filled the like age of eighty-three years; an abso- passed after he was blind, yet this misfortune no lute good man, sound in mind and body, politic, whit softened him, but that he was able to govern a temperate, full of good works, and an almsgiver. numerous family, a great retinue and dependence, 19. Those that follow are to be more promis- yea, even the commonwealth itself, with great cuous in their order, more doubtful in their faith, stoutness. In his extreme old age he was brought and more barren of observation. King Argan- in a litter into the senate-house, and vehemently thenius, who reigned at Cadiz in Spain, lived a dissuaded the peace with Pyrrhus; the beginning hundred and thirty, or, as some would have it, a of his oration was very memorable, showing an inhundred and forty years, of which he reigned vincible spirit and strength of mind. "I have, eighty. Concerning his manners, institution of with great grief of mind, (Fathers Conscript,) his life, and the time wherein he reigned, there these many years borne my blindness, but now I is a general silence. Cynirus, King of Cyprus, could wish that I were deaf also, when I hear you living in the island then termed the happy and speak to such dishonourable treaties." Marcus pleasant island, is affirmed to have attained to a Perpenna lived ninety-eight years, surviving all hundred and fifty or sixty years. Two Latin those whose suffrages he had gathered in the |