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ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A44287 The primitive origination of mankind, considered and examined according to the light of nature written by the Honourable Sir Matthew Hale, Knight ... Hale, Matthew, Sir, 1609-1676. 1677 (1677) Wing H258; ESTC R17451 427,614 449

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had its successive Alterations and Seasons according to certain Periodical Revolutions of the Planets to the first Ages of the World he assigns the Presidency of Saturn in matters of Religion and so downward according to several successive assigned Periods These are vain Conjectures but they serve to explain what I mean namely That there may be successive Alterations and Changes in the professed Religion of the World in successive Ages and successively in the same and other places of the World whereby it will be hard to determin the Epocha of the Commencement of Mankind by any one Form or Shape of Religion professed in the World for there may be some Religion antecedent to that which to us in this Age appears to have been the ancientest but still with this probable Conclusion That since Truth is more ancient than Errour it seems that if there were any Religion that was Primitive in the World it was the true Religion and true Worship of the true God and not Idolatry or worshipping of Men or Idols or the Works of Nature and consequently that although we had no Monuments extant of any Religion ancienter than Idolatry yet we had no reason to conclude that that Idolatrous Religion was the most ancient or coeval to the Origination of Mankind but rather that Mankind had an Existence in the World much antecedent to such Idolatrous Worship wherein the true God was for many Ages and Generations truly worshipped and that partly by the subtilty of the Enemy of Mankind partly by the apostacy and corruption of Humane Nature and partly by the gradual decay of that true and ancient Tradition of the true Worship of the true God Idolatry and Superstition prevailed and obtained in the World So that although it be a most certain Truth that Mankind had an Origination and was not without Beginning yet the Evidence of the Origination of their Idolatry and Idolatrous Deities is no sufficient Proof or Evidence of the Origination of Mankind CAP. VI. A Fifth Consideration concerning the Decays especially of the Humane Nature and whether there be any such Decays and what may be collected concerning the Origination of Man upon that Supposition THis Argument hath been excellently handled by Dr. Hakewell I shall therefore be the shorter in it yet somewhat I shall say concerning it Some of those that have been inquisitive into the Nature of Man have observed two things which if they were true would certainly give us an irrefragable Argument against the Eternal Succession of Mankind viz. 1. That the Ages of Men grow gradually shorter and shorter 2. That the Quantity of Humane Bodies was ordinarily heretofore much larger than they are now and by a kind of gradual decay of that Natural Vigour and Strength they decline to a smaller Stature Thus Plutarch inter placita Philosophorum tells us out of Empedocles Nostrae aetatis homines priscis comparatos infantium instar esse and yet Empedocles lived upon the point of 2000 Years since and Plutarch near 1500 Years since and Pliny in the 7 th Book of his Natural History cap. 16. tells us the same In plenum autem cuncto mortalium generi minorem indies fieri propemodum observatur rarósque patribus proceriores consumente ubertate seminum exustione in cujus vices nunc vergat aevum and some Instances are given there and by the Additional Notes thereupon of the great Sceletons of Mens Bodies found in several Ages and that Jam ante annos mille vates ille Homerus non cessavit minora corpora mortalium quam prisca conqueri And indeed if this natural Decrease of the Ages of Mens Lives and their Bodily Statures had held such a proportion it would not only avoid the possibility of an Eternal Succession of Mankind but would also give us a very late Epocha of their first Origination For a very ancient Original accompanied with such a natural Decrease of Age and Stature by reason of that insensible but unintermitted decay of the strength and stature of Nature would have long since reduced Mankind to be but Ephemeraes in duration and little other than Insects in extent or rather wholly determined and put a Period to the whole Species infinite Ages past But it seems that these are mistaken complaints both of Empedocles and Homer for surely in so great a Period as 2000 or 1500 Years elapsed since the death of those Men the experiment of that Decrease would have been much more obvious and observable than we find it at this day And although the nature of Mankind and of other Creatures subject to corruption if left to it self without the continued Subsidium and Influence of the Divine Providence would soon have faln into dissolution per saltum and without the incessant and corroding invasions of so long a time yet that same Power that first gave Being to things hath supported their successive Generations in the same state and natural vigour that it ever had abating those accidental occurrences that Sin Excess and other occurrences have brought into things First therefore as touching the Decays of the Age of Man's Life we do indeed learn from the Sacred Scripture for no Humane History reacheth so high That the Lives of the Ancients were very long especially before and for some time after the Flood and this the Divine Wisdom Providence and Goodness ordered for most excellent Ends namely the Peopling of the New World and that without any other means than his own Will or at least by means unknown to us in Arphaxad the Son of Shem the great Age of the Ancients was cut to halves namely to 440 Years and in his Grand-child Peleg it was again cut to halves for he lived but 242 Years and it is also true that afterwards gradually to the days of Moses the Lives of Men became shorter and shorter till they fixed in that common Period of the Life of Man of 70 or 80 Years and although it be true that the Histories of former times give us some account of longer Lives of Men as the Lives of Moses Aaron Phinehas and some others and those mentioned by Pliny lib. 7. cap. 48. and some in our own Experience yet Moses himself states the ordinary Standard of the Life of Man to be 70 or at most 80 Years Psal 90.10 2 Sam. 19.32 35. And this we shall find true upon the consideration of the Chronological Account of the Years of the ancient Patriarchs and Kings that succeeded Moses as likewise of the time that the Israelites lived in the Wilderness all which that were twenty Years old and upwards at the coming into the Wilderness when the Spies were sent into Canaan which was shortly after their coming thither all these I say except Joshua and Caleb dyed within the 40 Years Peregrination in the Wilderness and at this stay the ordinary Age of Men hath been for these 4000 Years abating those casualties either of Diseases or other Accidents that have shortned the ordinary complete