13. Solon however made ten periods of life, each of seven years; so that the first period, or infancy, should extend to the growth of the teeth, to chew its food, and utter articulate words so as to seem intelligible; boyhood again extends to the time of puberty and of carnal temptation; youth to the growth of the beard; adult age lasts until virtue has attained its perfection; the fifth is the age of manhood, fitted, during its whole course, for marriage; the sixth belongs also to manhood, in that it is adapted to the combat of prudence, and is strenuous in action; the seventh and eighth period also exhibit man ripe in years, ♦vigorous in faculties, and his discourse endowed with a grace of utterance not unpleasing; the ninth period has still some strength remaining, and ♦in speech and wisdom are of a chastened kind; the tenth period fills up the measure, and he who has strength to reach it, will after a full period of years knock late at the gate of death. Sidenote: Eph. iv. 18. 14. Thus Hippocrates and Solon recognized either seven ages, or periods of age consisting of seven years. In this then let the number seven prevail; but the octave introduces one uninterrupted period during which we grow up into a perfect man, in the knowledge of God, in the fulness of faith, wherein the measure of a legitimate period of life is completed. 15. In our inward parts also the virtue of the seventh number is manifested; for it is said that we have within us seven organs, the stomach, heart, lungs, spleen, liver, and the two kidneys, and outwardly seven also, the head, the hinder parts, the belly, two hands and two feet. Sidenote: Phil. i. 21. Sidenote: Gal. ii. 20. Sidenote: 1 S. John ii. 18. Sidenote: 2 Cor. v. 15. 16. Very excellent are these members, but subject to pain. Who then can doubt that the office of the Octave, which has renewed the whole man, so as not to be susceptible of pain, is more exalted? Wherefore the seventh age of the world being completed, the grace of the Octave has shone upon us, that grace which has made man to be no longer of this world, but above the world. But now we live not according to our own life but to that of Christ. For to us _to live is Christ, and to die is gain, and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God_. So says the Apostle, whence we gather that the day of the world is come to a close. Again, at the last hour the Lord Jesus came, and died for us, _and we are all dead in Him, that we may live to God_. It is not then our former selves that now live, _but Christ liveth in us_. Sidenote: Jer. xxxi. 31, 32; Heb. viii. 8, 9. Sidenote: Ib. 9.