The works of Francis Bacon, lord chancellor of England.

480 HISTORY OF LIFE AND DEATH.
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 seeing many at this day attain to those years.
zeal. Joshua, a martial man and an excellent But the Arcadian kings are fabulously reported to
leader, and evermore victorious, lived to the hun- have lived very long. Surely that country was
dred and tenth year of his life. Caleb was his con- mountainous, full of flocks of sheep, and brought
temporary, and seemeth to have been of as great forth most wholesome food, notwithstanding,
years. Ebud, the judge, seems to have been no seeing Pan was their god, we may conceive that
less than a hundred years old, in regard that after all things about them were panic and vain, and
the victory over the Moabites, the Holy Land had subject to fables.
rest under his government eighty years; he was 7. Numa, King of the Romans, lived to eighty
a man fierce and undaunted, and one that in a years; a man peaceable, contemplative, and much
sort neglected his life for the good of his people. devoted to religion. Marcus Valerius Corvinus
4. Job lived, after the restoration of his happi- saw a hundred years complete, there being betwixt
ness, a hundred and forty years, being, before his his first and sixth consulship forty-six years; a
afflictions, of that age that he had sons at man's man valorous, affable, popular, and always fortuestate; a man politic, eloquent, charitable, and nate.
the example of patience. Eli, the priest, lived 8. Solon of Athens, the lawgiver, and one of
ninety-eight years; a corpulent man, calm of dis- the seven wise men, lived above eighty years, a
position, and indulgent to his children. But man of high courage, but popular, and affected to
Elizweus, the prophet, may seem to have died his country; also learned, given to pleasures, and
when he was above a hundred years old; for he a soft kind of life. Epimenides, the Cretian, is
is found to have lived after the assumption of reported to have lived a hundred and fifty-seven
Elias sixty years; and at the time of that as- years; the matter is mixed with a prodigious
sumption he was of those years, that the boys relation, for fifty-seven of those years he is said
mocked him by the name of baldhead; a man ve- to have slept in a cave. Half an age after, Xenohemnent and severe, and of an austere life, and a phon, the Colophonian, lived a hundred and two
contemner of riches. Also Isaiah, the prophet, years, or rather more; for at the age of twentyseemeth to have been a hundred years old; for five years he left his country, seventy-seven comhe is found to have exercised the function of a plete years he travelled, and after that returned;
prophet seventy years together, the years both of but how long he lived after his return appears not;
his beginning to prophecy, and of his death, being a man no less wandering in mind than in body;
uncertain; a man of an admirable eloquence, an for his name was changed for the madness of his
evangelical prophet, full of the promises of God opinions, from Xenophanes to Xenomanes; a
of the New Testament, as a bottle with sweet man, no doubt, of a vast conceit, and that minded
wine. 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 lilke 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, 10. Artaxerxes, King of Persia, lived ninety-four
lived old Simeon, to the age of ninety; a devout years; a man of a dull wit, averse to the despatch
man, and full both of hope and expectation. Into of business, desirous of glory, but rather of ease.
the same time also fell Anna, the prophetess, who At the same time lived Agesilaus, King of Sparta,
could not possibly be less than a hundred years to eighty-four years of age; a moderate prince, as
old, for she had been seven years a wife, about being a philosopher among kings, but, notwitheighty-four years a widow, besides the years of standing, ambitious, and a warrior, and no less
her virginity, and the time that she lived after her stout in war than in business.
prophecy of our Saviour; she was a holy woman, 11. Gorgias, the Sicilian, was a hundred and
and passed her days in fastings and prayers. eight years old; a rhetorician, and a great boaster
6. The long lives of men mentioned in heathen of his faculty, one that taught youth for profit.
authors have no great certainty in them; both for He had seen many countries, and a little before
the intermixture of fables, whereunto those kind his death said, that he had done nothing worthy
of relations were very prone, and for their false of blame since he was an old man. Protagoras,
calculation of years. Certainly of the Egyptians of Abdera, saw ninety years of age. This man