Intemperate youth (by fad experience found)
Ends in an age imperfect and unfound.
Cyrus, though ag'd (if Xenophon say true);
Lucius Metellus (whom when young I knew)
Who held (after his fecond confulate)
Twenty-two years the high pontificate;
Neither of thefe, in body or in mind,
Before their death the leaft decay did find.
I fpeak not of myself, though none deny
To age, to praise their youth, the liberty:
Such an unwafted ftrength I cannot boast,
Yet now my years are eighty-four almost :
And though from what it was my ftrength is far,
Both in the firft and fecond Punick war,
Nor at Thermopylæ, under Glabrio,
Nor when I conful into Spain did go;
But yet I feel no weakness, nor hath length
Of winters quite enervated my strength;
And I, my guest, my client, or my friend,
Still in the courts of juftice can defend :
Neither muft I that proverb's truth allow,
"Who would be antient, must be early fo."
I would be youthful still, and find no need
To appear old, till I was fo indeed.
And yet you fee my hours not idle are,
Though with your strength I cannot mine compare ; Yet this centurion's doth your's furmount,
Not therefore him the better man I count.
Milo, when entering the Olympic game,
With a huge ox upon his shoulder came.
Would you the force of Milo's body find,
Rather than of Pythagoras's mind?
The force which nature gives with care retain,
But, when decay'd, 'tis folly to complain;
In age to wish for youth is full as vain,
As for a youth to turn a child again.
Simple and certain nature's ways appear,
As the fets forth the feasons of the
year.
So in all parts of life we find her truth,
Weakness to childhood, rafhnefs to our youth;
To elder years to be discreet and grave,
Then to old age maturity fhe gave.
(Scipio) you know, how Maffiniffa bears
His kingly port at more than ninety years;
When marching with his foot, he walks till night;
When with his horfe, he never will alight;
Though cold, or wet, his head is always bare;
So hot, fo dry, his aged members are.
You fee how exercife and temperance
Ev'n to old years a youthful strength advance,
Our law (because from age our strength retires)
No duty which belongs to ftrength requires.
But age doth many men fo feeble make,
That they no great defign can undertake;
Yet, that to age not fingly is apply'd,
But to all man's infirmities befide.
That Scipio, who adopted you did fall
Into fuch pains, he had no health at all;
Who elfe had equal'd Africanus' parts,
Exceeding him in all the liberal arts :
Why fhould those errors then imputed be
To age alone, from which our youth's not free?
Every disease of age we may prevent,
Like thofe of youth, by being diligent.
When fick, fuch moderate exercise we use,
And diet, as our vital heat renews;
And if our body thence refreshment finds,
Then muft we alfo exercife our minds.
If with continual oil we not fupply
Our lamp, the light for want of it will die :
Though bodies may be tir'd with exercise,
No wearinefs the mind could e'er furprize.
Cæcilius the comedian, when of age
He represents the follies on the stage;
They're credulous, forgetful, diffolute,
Neither thofe crimes to age he doth impute,
But to old men to whom thofe crimes belong.
Luft, petulance, rafhnefs, are in youth more ftrong
Than age, and yet young men those vices hate,
Who virtuous are, difcreet, and temperate :
And so what we call dotage, feldom breeds
In bodies, but where nature fows the feeds.
There are five daughters, and four gallant fons,
In whom the blood of noble Appius runs,
With a most numerous family befide;
Whom he alone, though old and blind, did guide.
Yet his clear-fighted mind was still intent,
And to his business like a bow stood bent:
By children, fervants, neighbours, fo esteem'd,
He not a master, but a monarch feem'd.
All his relations his admirers were,
His fons paid reverence, and his fervants fear:
The order and the ancient difcipline
Of Romans did in all his actions shine.
Authority kept-up old age fecures,
Whose dignity as long as life endures.
Something of youth I in old age approve,
But more the marks of age in youth I love.
Who this obferves, may in his body find
Decrepit age, but never in his mind.
The feven volumes of my own reports,
Wherein are all the pleadings of our courts ;
All noble monuments of Greece are come
Unto my hands, with those of ancient Rome.
The pontificial, and the civil law,
I ftudy ftill, and thence orations draw.
And to confirm my memory, at night,
What I hear, fee, or do, by day, I still recite.
These exercises for my thoughts I find,
Thefe labours are the chariots of my mind.
To ferve my friends, the fenate I frequent,
And there, what I before digested, vent.
Which only from my ftrength of mind proceeds,
Not any outward force of body needs:
Which, if I could not do, I should delight
On what I would to ruminate at night.
Who in fuch practices their minds engage,
Nor fear nor think of their approaching age;
Which by degrees invifibly doth creep :
Nor do we feem to die, but fall asleep.
W muft I draw my forces 'gainst that host
Of pleasures, which i' th' sea of age are lost.
O thou most high tranfcendent gift of age!
Youth from its folly thus to difengage.
And now receive from me that most divine
Oration of that noble Tarentine,
Which at Tarentum I long fince did hear;
When I attended the great Fabius there.
Ye gods! was it man's nature, or his fate,
Betray'd him with sweet pleasure's poison'd bait?
Which he, with all defigns of art or power,
Doth with unbridled appetite devour:
And as all poifons feek the nobleft part,
Pleasure poffeffes first the head and heart;
Intoxicating both, by them, the finds,
And burns the facred temples of our minds.
Furies, which reason's divine chains had bound,
(That being broken) all the world confound.
Luft, murder, treafon, avarice, and hell
Itself broke loose, in reason's palace dwell:
Truth, honour, juftice, temperance, are fled,
All her attendants into darkness led.
But why all this difcourfe? when pleasure's rage
Hath conquer'd reason, we must treat with age.
Age undermines, and will in time surprize
Her ftrongeft forts, and cut off all fupplies;
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