eighty or ninety. A few exceed these years, and nearly or quite touch one hundred. There are others, still fewer indeed, who live even longer than one hundred years.

The late Sir George Cornewall Lewis having expressed doubts as to the evidence of any life exceeding one hundred years, much inquiry ensued. The affirmation, if not absolutely proved, must appear to those who have followed the controversy to be most probable. Quite recently however, the first case on record verified by an Assurance society of a person dying at the age of one hundred and three occurred. One such case is conclusive, and must not be ignored in dealing with the question before us. Whilst all the recorded stories of persons living one hundred and fifty to two hundred years and upwards, Jenkyns, Parr, etc., must in the present state of our knowledge be regarded as myths. The very numerous cases claiming an age somewhat beyond one hundred, when no positive evidence could be adduced, are now proved to have no inherent impossibility. (See Note A, p. 150.)

There have been many attempts to determine

what is the limit of human life, and various opinions have been advanced based upon data as various. None have appeared so reasonable and so worthy of acceptance as that of M. Flourens, and his views have accordingly attracted much notice.

M. Flourens conceives he has discovered a fixed relation to exist between the time required for the growth to maturity of an animal body, and its ultimate natural duration-all causes of premature mortality excluded.

Taking his observations from the group mammalia, of the class vertebrata, as having the closest resemblance to man, and such species as are permitted to live the full term of their natural lives under circumstances not admitting error or doubt, the elephant, horse, dog, etc., he found that their natural life extends exactly to five times the period of their growth.

Applying the rule thus obtained to human life, and taking the age when the body is fully matured to be twenty years, he concludes the natural duration of the life of man to be one hundred years. (See Note B, p. 151.)

If these observations and inference are on the whole well founded, a slight modification must be admitted, since it is highly probable that the time of perfect maturity of growth is not an absolutely fixed, but a variable quantity, some individuals attaining it somewhat earlier, some later. It would perhaps be safe to assume that the body has reached its full development and maturity from eighteen to twenty-one. These numbers multiplied by five, would bring the natural life of man to be from ninety to one hundred and five years. This conclusion must, we think, be regarded as the truth, or at least a very close approximation to the truth,-the discovery of a most interesting and important natural fact, or law.

The inference necessarily follows, that all persons who die under eighty years of age, many who die under ninety, some who die under one hundred or even under one hundred and five, die prematurely. (See Note C, p. 153.)

And this inference is supported by observations made in another direction; for all pathologists agree in stating that very few persons indeed

die of mere old age. Of those whose lives reach to between eighty and ninety, and even extend beyond ninety, the majority die of diseases which might have been avoided, cured, or kept in abeyance until the full term of human life had been attained.

The Registrar-General, in several publications, has deplored the premature mortality of the people of England, and in most forcible language urged the subject on the attention of all thoughtful persons. (See Note D, p. 155.)

THE PURPOSE AND LIMIT OF THIS WORK.

To trace human life from birth to old age-to point out in detail the known causes which cut it short in infancy, childhood, youth, and maturity to discuss the occasions and circumstances leading to culpable or unavoidable neglect of precautions and measures for its preservation, would require a work of considerable magnitude. My present purpose is to treat of ONE EPOCH only, that which may not inaptly be designated Advanced Age-in popular language,

the Decline of Life,-to show what is the precise nature of the changes in the constitution which take place in that epoch, and constitute in the aggregate ageing,-to enumerate the most common and prominent physical troubles incident to advanced age,-to point out the antidotes and means furnished by science and experience for ameliorating or avoiding those troubles, and for retarding the effects of time, and thus for prolonging life.

IS THE DURATION OF LIFE IN ANY DEGREE WITHIN OUR POWER?

This question may not unreasonably be raised; and it may be well to consider it, and to state briefly the arguments on which an affirmative answer may be founded.

Some persons may be disposed, prima facie, to entertain doubts on the subject. The expression in Holy Scripture will occur to them, "There is an appointed time for man upon earth." Such an interpretation and application of this text is not unfrequently made; and we often