element of personal interest which makes all writings of the kind more attractive.  The argument in defence of the paradox that it is a good thing to grow old, proceeds upon the only possible ground, the theory of compensations.  It is put into the mouth of Cato the Censor, who had died about a century before, and who is introduced as giving a kind of lecture on the subject to his young friends Scipio and Laelius, in his eighty-fourth year.  He was certainly a remarkable example in his own case of its being possible to grow old gracefully and usefully, if, as he tells us, he was at that age still able to take part in the debates in the Senate, was busy collecting materials for the early history of Rome, had quite lately begun the study of Greek, could enjoy a country dinner-party, and had been thinking of taking lessons in playing on the lyre.

[Footnote 1:  “Il donne l’appetit de vieiller".]

He states four reasons why old age is so commonly considered miserable.  First, it unfits us for active employment; secondly, it weakens the bodily strength; thirdly, it deprives us of nearly all pleasures; fourthly and lastly, it is drawing near death.  As to the first, the old senator argues very fairly that very much of the more important business of life is not only transacted by old men, but in point of fact, as is confessed by the very name and composition of the Roman Senate, it is thought safest to intrust it to the elders in the state.  The pilot at the helm may not be able to climb the mast and run up and down the deck like the younger sailor, but he steers none the worse for being old.  He quotes some well-known examples of this from Roman annals; examples which might be matched by obvious instances in modern English history.  The defence which he makes of old age against the second charge—­loss of muscular vigour—­is rather more of the nature of special pleading.  He says little more than that mere muscular strength, after all, is not much wanted for our happiness:  that there are always comparative degrees of strength; and that an old man need no more make himself unhappy because he has not the strength of a young man, than the latter does because he has not the strength of a bull or an elephant.  It was very well for the great wrestler Milo to be able to carry an ox round the arena on his shoulders; but, on the whole, a man does not often want to walk about with a bullock on his back.  The old are said, too, to lose their memory.  Cato thinks they can remember pretty well all that they care to remember.  They are not apt to forget who owes them money; and “I never knew an old man forget”, he says, “where he had buried his gold”.  Then as to the pleasures of the senses, which age undoubtedly diminishes our power of enjoying.  “This”, says Cato, “is really a privilege, not a deprivation; to be delivered from the yoke of such tyrants as our passions—­to feel that we have ‘got our discharge’ from such a warfare—­is a blessing for which men ought rather to be grateful to their advancing years”.  And the respect and authority which is by general consent conceded to old age, is a pleasure more than equivalent to the vanished pleasures of youth.