The man whose thoughts,
actions, and affections center upon himself, soon acquires a fixity and
crustiness which (if to be old is to be "strange to youth") is old as
nothing else is. But the man who makes the welfare and happiness of
others his happiness, is as young at threescore as he was at twenty,
and perhaps even younger, for he has had no time to grow old.
_April 30th_.--The Courtneys are in town! This is, I believe, her
first visit to America since he married her. At all events, I have not
seen or heard of her in all these seven years. I wonder ... I was going
to write, I wonder whether she remembers me. Of course she remembers
me, in a sort of way. I am tied up somewhere among her bundle of
recollections, and occasionally, in an idle moment, her eye falls upon
me, and moves her, perhaps, to smile or to sigh. For my own part, in
thinking over our old days, I find I forget her less than I had
supposed. Probably she has been more or less consciously in my mind
throughout. In the same way, one has always latent within him the
knowledge that he must die; but it does not follow that he is
continually musing on the thought of death.
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