OLD AGE QUOTES VII
quotations about old age
Old men's eyes are like old men's memories; they are strongest for things a long way off.
GEORGE ELIOT
Romola
Oh dear, this living and eating and growing old; these doubts and aches in the back, and want of interest in the Moon and Roses... Am I the person who used to wake in the middle of the night and laugh with the joy of living? Who worried about the existence of God, and danced with young ladies till long after daybreak? Who sang "Auld Lang Syne" and howled with sentiment, and more than once gazed at the summer stars through a blur of great, romantic tears?
LOGAN PEARSALL SMITH
Trivia
You know you're getting older when you notice that more and more history questions happened in your lifetime!
TOM WILSON
Ziggy, July 3, 1999
People often say to themselves in life that they should avoid a variety of occupation, and, more particularly, be the less willing to enter upon new work the older they grow. But it is easy to talk, easy to give advice to oneself and others. To grow old is itself to enter upon a new business; all the circumstances change, and a man must either cease acting altogether, or willingly and consciously take over the new rôle.
JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE
The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe
If I ever get to 100, I'd want to be filled with wonder and wild, adolescent, wide-eyed interest in newness. So let's keep the flame burning. Let's stop thinking everyone over 29, or 49, has to be reinforced by concrete.
TANITH LEE
interview, Intergalactic Medicine Show
Maybe age is kinder to us than we think. With my bad eyes, I can't see how bad I look, and with my rotten memory, I have a good excuse for getting out of a lot of stuff.
ERMA BOMBECK
Family: The Ties that Bind ... And Gag!
Old age diminishes our strength; it takes away our pleasures one after the other; it withers the soul as well as the body; it renders adventure and friendship difficult; and finally it is shadowed by thoughts of death.
ANDRÉ MAUROIS
An Art of Living
Youth is the season of receptivity, and should be devoted to acquirement; and manhood of power--that demands an earnest application. Old age is for revision.
CHRISTIAN NESTELL BOVEE
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought
Just like those who are incurably ill, the aged know everything about their dying except exactly when.
PHILIP ROTH
The Facts: A Novelist's Autobiography
Young he was not, so that one had to call him old, but the word did not suit him.
URSULA K. LE GUIN
The Farthest Shore
There's nothing like being old to be sure of everything.
FRAN LEBOWITZ
interview, Index Magazine, 1997
Science as culture misdirects the way in which old age is understood. Rather than valuing life in all its diversity, including its final phase, it leads to misguided devotion of resources to solving the problem of death. The focus on biological failure sets up a cultural construction of old age which leads to the low esteem in which it is currently held.
JOHN A. VINCENT
"Marketing Immortality", JSTOR Daily, February 2, 2017
Age overtakes us all;
Our temples first; then on o'er cheek and chin,
Slowly and surely, creep the frosts of Time.
Up and do somewhat, ere thy limbs are sere.
THEOCRITUS
"The Love of Thyonichus"
Nothing makes you look older than attempting to look young.
KARL LAGERFELD
The Telegraph, May 12, 2014
Old age is like a plane flying through a storm. Once you're aboard, there's nothing you can do.
GOLDA MEIR
attributed, The Ultimate Book of Quotations
The habits of a young man are, like his coat, removable; the habits of an old man are like the drapery of a statue.
AUSTIN O'MALLEY
Keystones of Thought
If I am to tell you how to grow old gracefully, I must tell you at the beginning of life; for no man can grow old gracefully unless he begins early.
LYMAN ABBOTT
Problems of Life: Selections from the Writings of Rev. Lyman Abbott
Old age is when the liver spots show through your gloves.
PHYLLIS DILLER
attributed, Funny Ladies: The Best Humor from America's Funniest Women
A graceful and blessed old age must have three elements in it: a happy retrospect, a peaceful present, and an inspiring future. And old age cannot have either one of these three if the youth has been wasted and manhood has been misspent.
LYMAN ABBOTT
Problems of Life: Selections from the Writings of Rev. Lyman Abbott
The only real change in life comes with the consciousness of old age.
AUSTIN O'MALLEY
Keystones of Thought