Up to our thirty-sixth year, we may be compared, in respect of the way in which we use our vital energy, to people who live on the interest of their money:  what they spend to-day, they have again to-morrow.  But from the age of thirty-six onwards, our position is like that of the investor who begins to entrench upon his capital.  At first he hardly notices any difference at all, as the greater part of his expenses is covered by the interest of his securities; and if the deficit is but slight, he pays no attention to it.  But the deficit goes on increasing, until he awakes to the fact that it is becoming more serious every day:  his position becomes less and less secure, and he feels himself growing poorer and poorer, while he has no expectation of this drain upon his resources coming to an end.  His fall from wealth to poverty becomes faster every moment—­like the fall of a solid body in space, until at last he has absolutely nothing left.  A man is truly in a woeful plight if both the terms of this comparison—­his vital energy and his wealth—­really begin to melt away at one and the same time.  It is the dread of this calamity that makes love of possession increase with age.

On the other hand, at the beginning of life, in the years before we attain majority, and for some little time afterwards—­the state of our vital energy puts us on a level with those who each year lay by a part of their interest and add it to their capital:  in other words, not only does their interest come in regularly, but the capital is constantly receiving additions.  This happy condition of affairs is sometimes brought about—­with health as with money—­under the watchful care of some honest guardian.  O happy youth, and sad old age!

Nevertheless, a man should economize his strength even when he is young.  Aristotle[1] observes that amongst those who were victors at Olympia only two or three gained a prize at two different periods, once in boyhood and then again when they came to be men; and the reason of this was that the premature efforts which the training involved, so completely exhausted their powers that they failed to last on into manhood.  As this is true of muscular, so it is still more true of nervous energy, of which all intellectual achievements are the manifestation.  Hence, those infant prodigies—­ingenia praecoda—­the fruit of a hot-house education, who surprise us by their cleverness as children, afterwards turn out very ordinary folk.  Nay, the manner in which boys are forced into an early acquaintance with the ancient tongues may, perhaps, be to blame for the dullness and lack of judgment which distinguish so many learned persons.

[Footnote 1:  Politics.]

I have said that almost every man’s character seems to be specially suited to some one period of life, so that on reaching it the man is at his best.  Some people are charming so long as they are young, and afterwards there is nothing attractive about them; others are vigorous and active in manhood, and then lose all the value they possess as they advance in years; many appear to best advantage in old age, when their character assumes a gentler tone, as becomes men who have seen the world and take life easily.  This is often the case with the French.