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Show , ) ) ) • > I I I 1 ) \ J)) SEEING OU~ WAV. tl~n ) Aerstanding, is far more .valuable to u~ than. tt~e common~ ljg.ht 9f Q.ay\ '.:lt IS ,our o~-.r\~C!- hght witl.nn us-n~BiHg can cl,(,}u?l>~i ; . da.tkness 1t&e1Jf cannot hide it, if itvis' cnce v]HNdled •1ll• -the prop~r ~1ann~r, ~nd to the proper extent. But though I~s 11l_ummatmg influence be within, we m11st at first hght Jt up. frof!l without; and though it be the candle o~ the mmd, It can only be lighted by knowledg.e obtai?ed through the medium of those senses with wh1ch our ~11- bountiful Creator has furnished us. T~e exerctse of those senses is oBSERVATION; and that IS the fountain of all knowledge, and the ori~inal s~mrce of all pleasure, whether that which we 1mmedwtely know or enjoy be or be not present to the se;nses. What we thus obtain is unalienably vested m us for the whole period of our lives. Th~t which we have in our coffers may decay through time, or be destroyed by accident; or it may be taken from us, or we from it; and that which is told to us by others may be false, or we may forget it because of the we~kness of the impression that it made; bl:lt that w.hich ~e see with our own eyes, or otherwise .perceive ~Ith our own senses, is proof against accidents, agamst time, and against forgetfulness. In the case of old people, even after their powers of observation are decayed, and when themselves are, as we would say, in their dotag~, we find that they enjoy themselves and are happy m the mem~ry of their young years. Not only so; but when, msensible as it were, to the present, they glance back for plea~ure to the days that .they have lived, th.e earlier in life the occurrence 1s, they remember It the better. And past events, and past objects, g~t more shadowy, not as they are more remote, as IS the case with views in space, but as they are nearei to the present time. The man of fourscore may forget that he was a man of threescore and ten ; but he never forgets that he was a boy; and one of tho reasons why very old people are so fond of the YOUTH IN AGE. 27 society of children is, that the recollections of age, and even manhood, are comparatively faint on t~eir memories and they actually remember, and thmk, and enjoy themselves as children, after they cease to find pleasure as men. We call those years of extreme age-t.hose lingerings by the grave's brink, "a second childhood;" and the thoughtless among u~ !egard the .appellation as one of pity, if not of densiOn. Bu~ It parta~es of that sound philosophy and perfect wisdom wh~ch are contained in all proverbs and by-words which pass current among m~n, and :=tr~ sanctioned by the general voice. Why, mdeed, IS It that a~y exp:ession becomes a proverb or by-word 1 Is It not JUSt because the truth of it is so plain and so striking, that everybody, learned or unlearned, assents t_? ~t at once ; and that it cleaves to the memory as If It were a fact of which our own senses have been the immediate evidence 1 There is something very delightful, as well as something very instructive, in this revival of the memory of youth in the very extreme of old age. It is delightful to think that the mind is independent of time, and not affected by that decay which wastes the body, and in the end brings it to the dust. Were there no other proof of the mind's immortality- no other hope of a life beyond the grave, that alone would be a demonstration of it, as clear and satisfactory as we can obtain of any truth whatever. But the lesson is more to our present purpose: Why is it that, when we come near to the end of life, and look back upon it, the events of our young years are the most fresh to our memory 1 It is not the mere youth; for there is a period younger still, of which we can remember nothing. Nobody remembers being born, and there are few that remember being carried in the nurse's arms. But if it is not the mere fact of our being younger that makes ·us remember better so neither is it that our minds |