| Genesis 5:5
| And all the time that Adam lived, came to nine hundred and thirty years, and he died.
| He died. Ecclesiasticus 14:12, says very justly, the covenant of this world is, he shall surely die. God prolonged the lives of the patriarchs to a more advanced age, that the world might be sooner filled. Their constitution was then more excellent, the fruits of the earth more nourishing, etc. But the sole satisfactory reason for their living almost a thousand years, while we can hardly arrive at 70, is, because so it pleased God, in whose hands are all our lots. There is a great difference in the number of years assigned by the Hebrew and Vulgate, from that which the Samaritan copy mentions; and the Septuagint differs from both. Whether the difference be real, or only apparent, we shall not pretend to determine. The Church has not decided which system of chronology is the most accurate. In the Martyrology, she adopts that of the Septuagint and places the birth of Christ in [the year of the world] 5199, after Eusebius and Ven. Bede, though Riccioli calculates the Septuagint at 5634 years. (Haydock) --- Adam died penitent, as we are assured by the Holy Ghost, Wisdom 10:2.; and tradition affirms the same of Eve, insomuch, that the heresy of the Encratites, who condemned our first parents to hell, was exploded with horror. (St. Epiphanius; St. Augustine, in haeres.; Tirinus)
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