Human Life.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 878, 28 December 1888, Page 10

Human Life.

Evidence that its Duration is Constantly Increasing. Dr Benjamin Richardson, in a recent address before the Sanitary Institute in London, brought out many facta of interest, some of which were not new, but are so little known that they have still something of novelty about them. It has been well known that the average duration of human life has, within a few centuries, been extended from about thirty-two years up to a mean duration of forty-one years, an increase of almost 25 per cent. The statistics taken for England and other European countries, are applicable, with little modification, to our country. The mean duration of life—that is, the life of a generation, has gone bevond forty years, and is moving on toward half a century. . But a man at forty years is still regarded as in his early prime. After that age he is expected to accomplish as much or more than ho has in all his preceding life. In the greater number of instances the best work is done after forty years. A fund of experience has been accumulated ; the faculties are better trained ; all the results of studies and reading are at command; the rawness and dangers of youth are past. If a generation dies at forty-one years, is it not certain that it dies in its prime, or at the period which may be called middle ago ? Is there not such a thing as the storage of life ? The authority quoted maintains the affirmative. He cites these amongst other instances : • Quito recently I had at the same time in tbe consulting-room three gentlemen whose united ages reached the total of two hundred and sixty-two years, or over eighty, seven years for each, and each with a fair promise of four or five years more of life at least. I have seen and carefully examined physically, a woman who had attained the age of one hundred and five years, and who lived afterward for three or four years.' But in all these examples there was nothing in the social condition of the individuals that could account for this uuusual storage of life. Two were men of great mental power ; the other had a chequered career, and had been subjected to great pressures both of mind and body. In the fourth instance the individual had fought the way from the lowest position to one of affluence and power. It would seem that there is an inborn capacity in some to live longer than others. It is not exactly the survival .of the fittest, but the survival of those who have run the gauntlet of diseases, and by some inherent capacity have kept on longer than others. Other influences have contributed to the longer duration ofc life. The environment has been favourable. There may have been improved sanitation, better food, clothing and shelter, less exhaustive vocations, ternperance and much phjsical exeroise, tranquility of mind, or a philosophy of living which makes the best of life under all circumstances. These conditions, while they do not account for particular instances of great longevity, do Account for the extended life of a generation. Social and sanitary science is all en’isted on the side of human life. There is more temperance, more continence, more of self-restraint. It is tine that modern civilisation haß brought a longer list of luxuries within the reach, not only of the rich, but of people of moderate moans. But it has brought, also, a better knowledge of all the conditions favourable to the extension of life. ' v " ;

It may be well to note that pugilists, rowers, athletes and all who have had excessive physical training, do _ndt furnish any striking examples of longevity! The training and the resulting exercise have been excessive, making large drafts on vital forces. The pugilist drops off at a time when theoretically, he ought to be in his prime; The rower and the wrestler rarely live to tell of their exploits at eighty years of age. The prodigies have little acquired capacity to bold on to life. They do not possess it by virtue of the violent that they have put on their physical faculties. There is no storage of l’fo, but rather a great waste through intemperate, exercise! Is there an instance -on record of an athlete who ever reached the age ot a hundred years? It would bo difficult to find an instance where even eighty years had been reached by any pugilist or prize fighter ? . , ■ The problem of long life, according to the authority quoted, is affected. by the following conditions : (1) Hereditary qualification ; (2) the virtue of continently ; (3) main, tenance of balance of bodily function ; (4) perfect temperance; (5) purity from, implanted or acquired disease; The hereditary qualification has the first place because when the capacity for an extended duration of life appears in several successive generations it becomes an established principle. It may be said to run in families; they are. long lived. Thus, while there is the heredity of diseases, both physical and mental, there is also the heredity of long life. The limits of the latter capacity cannot be strictly defined. The average ’ longevity of a generation is constantly increasing. The duration, of individual life is increasing, both by inheritance and by an improved environment. While this is true, the inherited capacity of long life is constantlj abridged in other lines. Dr Blchardson estimates that a man at eighty years, based on the standard of six antecedent lives, would yield a product of ninety yeais, and a man of a hundred a product of a hundred and twenty, or even a hundred and thirty years. • It may reasonably be asked why. and where there should be any change on either side. With a steadily decreasing storage of life why should not families die out altogether, and with an increasing value of life, why should not families go on living continuously afeer the course of a few generations ? To the first of these questions the auswer is that failing families do die out. To the second it must bo admitted that there has been no sufficient time in the history of mankind during historical dates to allow of an answer being given to the inquiry. For my part I do not see, theoretically, any reason why, id a perfectly constituted human organism, there should be any necessity for the cessation of the storage of life. I see a very obvious necessity for death in a world which is always eating up its vital, energy by the prodigal method of over-multiplying the organic forms which need the vital energy for their own-existence, because the. organic forms must destroy one another in order that the living may continue to live, and this, no doubt, is the cause, wholesale, of death. Bat in place of excessive reproduction of new forms, put reconstruction of existing forms; and there does not. appear to be the least reason why the individual storage of life should cease. .The same authority affirms that there is no such thing,, necessarily, as death, except from accident, violence, disease,. *or ignorance of the means of sustaining the natural functions of vital reconstruction.’ . The inherited capacity for long life is often defeated in a succeeding generation by the ‘ inter-marriage of disease,’or those unwise marriages where it is certain that the offspring will inherit nothing better than an early dissolution. There may yet be a social state involving every condition favourable to the greatest duration of human life. The coming civilisation may include temperance, moderation, the restraint of every excess, the limitation of all desires, a certain noble simplicity which makes for the storage of life, in addition to the increasing power of inheritance. The centenarian then, under such conditions, might b© in tho prim© of his years.