Thursday, January 23, 2020

It only finds us still as true children

From Faust: A Dramatic Poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
Youth, my good friend, you want, indeed, when foes press you hard in the fight,—when the loveliest of lasses cling with ardor round your neck, — when, from afar, the garland of the swift course beckons from the hard-won goal, — when, after the dance's maddening whirl, one drinks away the night carousing. But to strike the familiar lyre with spirit and grace, to sweep along, with happy wanderings, towards a self-appointed aim; — that, old gentleman, is your duty, and we honor you not the less on that account. Old age does not make childish, as men say; it only finds us still as true children.

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