English edit

Noun edit

age of judgment (plural ages of judgment)

  1. The age at which a child is presumed to be able to judge the difference between right and wrong
    • 1903: Anthony Jennings Bledsoe, Business Law for Business Men: A Reference Book Showing the Laws of California for Daily Use in Business Affairs, page 345 (2nd edition; self-published):
      The reason of the distinction between the contracts of minors under the age of 18 and the contracts of minors over 18 years is this, that a minor under the age of 18 is presumed not to have arrived at an age of judgment and discretion sufficient to protect him from the schemes of those who might take advantage of his infancy to defraud him ; and all persons who enter into a contract with a minor under the age of 18 must do so at the peril of having such a contract absolutely disowned and disaffirmed.
      Civil Code, Section 35.
    • 1915: Religious Education, volume 10, page 533 (Religious Education Association):
      The students are growing and developing at an astonishing rate mentally, physically, and morally. They are no longer children nor have they reached the age of judgment and discretion, but are in the period of transition, of vital and tremendous change.
  2. (theology) The time of the Last Judgment
    • 1692: William Sherlock, A Practical Diſcourſe concerning a Future Judgment, page 187 (2nd edition; printed by M.R. for W. Rogers, at the Sun over-againſt S. Dunſtan’s Church in Fleetſtreet):
      Thus if God fixes and determines the Day of Judgment, upon the foreſight of ſuch a General Impiety as will deſerve a final exciſion, God cannot reveal this to the World: For one would think it impoſſible, did the World know this beforehand, but the Age of Judgment ſhould be the moſt Devout and Religious Age, that ever had been from the beginning of the World; and then that would not be a fit time to deſtroy the World; and God could not foreſee it the propereſt time of Judgment.