INCREASED LENGTH OF LIFE.

Bruce Herald, Volume XVII, Issue 1623, 27 February 1885, Page 5

INCREASED LENGTH OF LIFE.

The stage to which we have at present attained may be stated thus :—Compared witli the period 1838-51 (the earliest for which there .are trustworthy records) the .average duration of a man's life is now 41.9 years instead of 30. U, and of a woman's 45.3 instead of 4L.U years, an addition of 8 per cent, to the female life and 5 per cent, to the male. Of each thousand males born at the present day, forty-four more will attain the age of thirty-live than used to be the case previous to 1871. For the whole of life the estimate now is that of one thousand persons (one-half males and one-half females) 35 survive at the age of forty-five, 25 at fifty-five. To put the case in another way, every thousand persons born since 1870 will live about 2700 years longer than before. In other words the life of a thousand persons is now equal in duration to that of 1070 persons previously; and 1000 births will now keep up the growth of our population as well as 1070 births used to do. This is equivalent in result to an increase in our population, and in the best form — viz., not by more births but by fewer deaths, which means fewer maladies and better health. What is more, nearly 70 per cent, of this increase of life takes place (or is lived) in the " useful period," — namely, between the ages of twenty and sixty. Thus of the 2700 additional years lived by each thousand of our population 70 per cent, or 1890 years, will be a direct addition to the working power of our people. It is to be remembered that there might be a great addition to the birtha in a country with little addition to the national working power — nay, with an actual reduction of the national wealth and prosperity — aeeing that, regarded as " economic agents," children are simply a source of expense, and so also are the majority of the elderly who have passed the age of three-score. On the other hand, as already said, only one quarter of the longer or additional life now enjoyed by our people is passed in the useless periods of childhood and old age, and more than one-third of it is lived at ages vvlieu life is in its highest vigour, aud most productive alike of wealth aud of enjoyment. — Corn/all Magazine.