Above all, middle age must not lose its admirations, its reverences, its enthusiasms. The edge of enthusiasm may be dulled with the passing of the years,—but the body and substance of one’s admirations need not be diminished, and by our admirations we live. Anatole France, speaking of the old campaigners of the Reserve, uses this finely stimulating word with regard to them,—“they unite the elasticity of youth with the staunchness of maturity.” There is another and an older way of describing the characteristic quality of middle age, which must combine “the wisdom of age and the heart of youth.”
III
AGE: HOW NOT TO GROW OLD
“But why, you ask me, should this tale be told
To men grown old, or who are growing old?
It is too late! Ah, nothing is too late
Till the tired heart shall cease to palpitate.
What, then? Shall we sit idly down and say
The night hath come; it is no longer day?
The night hath not yet come; we are not quite