Quotes about growing old

Ptahhotep Ptah-hotep

c. 24th century BC · Memphis, ancient Egypt

O Prince, my Lord, the end of life is at hand; old age descendeth [upon me]; feebleness cometh, and childishness is renewed. He [that is old] lieth down in misery every day. The eyes are small; the ears are deaf. Energy is diminished, the heart hath no rest. The mouth is silent, and he speaketh no word; the heart stoppeth, and he remembereth not yesterday. The bones are painful throughout the body; good turneth unto evil. All taste departeth. These things doeth old age for mankind, being evil in all things.

The Instruction of Ptahhotep, the prologue · in place of the original: the English translation by Battiscombe Gunn (1906)

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Confucius 孔子

5th century BC · Lu, Spring and Autumn China

"At fifteen I set my heart on learning. At thirty I stood firm. At forty I had no doubts. At fifty I knew the will of heaven. At sixty my ear was attuned. At seventy I could follow what my heart desired without overstepping the line."

子曰：「吾十有五而志于學，三十而立，四十而不惑，五十而知天命，六十而耳順，七十而從心所欲，不踰矩。」

Analects, book 2 (Weizheng)

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Ambapali Ambapālī

c. 5th century BC · Vesali, India

Black as the colour of bees, curled at the tips, was the hair of my head. With age it has become like hemp bark. The words of the Speaker of Truth do not prove false.

Kāḷakā bhamaravaṇṇasādisā, Vellitaggā mama muddhajā ahuṁ; Te jarāya sāṇavākasādisā, Saccavādivacanaṁ anaññathā.

Therigatha (Verses of the Elder Nuns) 13.1, the song of Ambapali

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Cao Cao 曹操

AD 207 · end of the Later Han, China · At fifty-three

An old steed lies in the stable, but his heart is set on a thousand miles. A man of purpose in his last years: his bold heart does not stop.

老驥伏櫪，志在千里。 烈士暮年，壯心不已。

"Though the Tortoise Lives Long"

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Zuhayr زهير بن أبي سلمى

c. 600 · pre-Islamic Arabia

I am weary of the burdens of life. Whoever lives eighty years, believe me, grows weary.

سئمت تكاليف الحياة ، ومن يعش ثمانين حولا لا أبا لك يسأم

The Muallaqa, Divan of Zuhayr

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Wang Bo 王勃

c. 675 · Tang China

Old, one should be all the stronger: how could white hair change the heart? Poor, one should be all the firmer, and never let fall one's aim among the blue clouds.

老當益壯，寧移白首之心？窮且益堅，不墜青雲之志。

"Preface to the Pavilion of Prince Teng"

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Du Fu 杜甫

759 · Tang China · Visiting an old friend's house after twenty years

How long does youth last? Our temples have both turned grey. We ask after old friends, and half are ghosts. We cry out, and something burns within.

少壯能幾時，鬢髮各已蒼。 訪舊半爲鬼，驚呼熱中腸。

"For the Recluse Wei the Eighth," in the Complete Tang Poems

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Han Yu 韓愈

803 · Tang China · At thirty-six

Last year I lost a molar. This year I lost a front tooth. All at once six or seven are gone, and the falling shows no sign of stopping.

去年落一牙，今年落一齒。 俄然落六七，落勢殊未已。

"Losing My Teeth," in the Complete Tang Poems

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Han Yu 韓愈

803 · Tang China · On news of the death of the nephew he grew up with. Here he recalls a letter he sent him the year before

I am not yet forty, and my sight is dim, my hair is grey, and my teeth are loose.

吾年未四十，而視茫茫，而髮蒼蒼，而齒牙動搖。

"Offering for My Nephew, the Twelfth"

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Abu al-Atahiya أبو العتاهية

early 9th century · Abbasid Baghdad

If only youth would come back for a single day, I would tell it what grey hair has done to me.

فيا ليت الشباب يعود يوما ، فأخبره بما فعل المشيب

Divan of Abu al-Atahiya

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Bai Juyi 白居易

late 830s · Tang China · To Liu Yuxi, a friend born the same year, when both were past sixty and living in Luoyang

You and I have both grown old. I ask myself what old age is like. My eyes are dry, so I lie down early; my head is lazy, and goes uncombed at dawn. Now and then I go out on a stick; whole days I sit behind a shut gate. I am slow to look in a new-polished mirror, and leave small-print books alone. My feeling for old friends grows deeper; my path drifts apart from the young. Only the pleasure of idle talk: when we meet there is still plenty of that.

與君俱老也，自問老何如。 眼澀夜先臥，頭慵朝未梳。 有時扶杖出，盡日閉門居。 嬾照新磨鏡，休看小字書。 情於故人重，迹共少年疎。 唯是閑談興，相逢尚有餘。

"On Old Age, for Mengde," in the Complete Tang Poems

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Liu Yuxi 劉禹錫

late 830s · Tang China · In answer to Bai Juyi's poem. The last line is widely known in another reading, "turned to rose clouds, it still fills the sky"; the text here follows the Complete Tang Poems

Who does not wish to live long? Yet once old, who will pity you? The body thins and the belt is taken in again; the hair thins and the cap sits askew. I put books aside to spare my eyes, and burn more moxa as the years ask. But having seen affairs, one understands affairs; one reads people as one reads a stream. Think it through and it is all good fortune; let this go and the heart is free. Do not say the sun is late among the mulberries and elms: a faint glow still fills the sky.

人誰不願老，老去有誰憐。 身瘦帶頻減，髪稀冠自偏。 廢書緣惜眼，多炙爲隨年。 經事還諳事，閱人如閱川。 細思皆幸矣，下此便翛然。 莫道桑榆晚，微霞尚滿天。

"Answering Letian's Poem on Old Age," in the Complete Tang Poems

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Li Shangyin 李商隱

mid-9th century · Tang China

Towards evening, my heart ill at ease, I drive my carriage up to the ancient plain. The setting sun is boundlessly good, only it is so near to dusk.

向晚意不適，驅車登古原。 夕陽無限好，只是近黃昏。

"Leyou Plain," in the Complete Tang Poems

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Rudaki رودکی

earlier 10th century · Samanid Central Asia

Every tooth I had wore down and fell out. They were not teeth. No, they were shining lamps.

مرا بسود و فرو ریخت هر چه دندان بود نبود دندان، لابل چراغ تابان بود

Rudaki's poem "Old Age"

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Usama ibn Munqidh أسامة بن منقذ

c. 1185 · Shaizar, Syria · At ninety

When I rise, I feel I am carrying a mountain, and when I walk, I walk like a man in fetters.

فإذا نهضت حسبت أني حامل جبلا وأمشي إن مشيت مقيدا

The memoir Book of Contemplation (Kitab al-I'tibar)

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Xin Qiji 辛棄疾

1180s · Song China

When I was young I did not know the taste of sorrow, and loved to climb the high tower. I loved to climb the high tower, and to make a new song I forced myself to speak of sorrow. Now I know the taste of sorrow to the full, and start to speak and stop. I start to speak and stop, and say instead: "A cool day. What a fine autumn."

少年不識愁滋味，愛上層樓。愛上層樓，爲賦新詞強說愁。 而今識盡愁滋味，欲說還休。欲說還休，卻道天涼好箇秋。

To the tune "The Ugly Slave": written on a wall on the road to Boshan

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Yi Gyubo 李奎報

early 13th century · Goryeo Korea

I had not faced a mirror in so long that I could not remember whose face mine was. Happening to look into a well just now, I thought: he seems someone I once knew slightly.

不對靑銅久 吾顏莫記誰 偶來方炤井 似昔稍相知

Dongguk Yi Sangguk jip, "Looking into a Well, Written in Jest"

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U Tak 禹倬

early 14th century (recorded in a songbook of 1876) · Goryeo Korea

A stick in one hand, a thorn branch in the other, I meant to block the road of age with thorns and beat off white hair with the stick. But white hair knew it first, and came by the short cut.

한 손에 막ᄃᆡ를 들고 ᄯᅩ 한 손에 ᄀᆞ싀를 쥐여 늙는 길 ᄀᆞ싀로 막고 오는 白髮을 ᄆᆡ로 티렷터니 白髮이 제 몬져 알고 즈럼ᄭᅴᆯ로 오도다

"Song of Lamenting Old Age," in Gagok wollyu (1876)

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Leonardo da Vinci

late 15th century · Florence · Milan

As a day well spent procures a happy sleep, so a life well employed procures a happy death.

From his notebooks · in place of the original: the English translation edited by J. P. Richter (1883)

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Heo Nanseolheon 許蘭雪軒

1580s · Joseon Korea · Handed down as the work of Heo Nanseolheon

Only the other day I was young; how have I grown so old already? I think of the pleasures of my youth, but there is no use speaking of them. Old now, I try to tell my sorrows and my throat closes.

엇그제 저멋더니 ᄒᆞ마 어이 다 늘거니 소년행락(小年行樂) 생각ᄒᆞ니 일러도 속절업다 늘거야 서른 말ᄉᆞᆷ ᄒᆞ자니 목이 멘다

The gasa "Gyuwonga" (A Woman's Sorrow), the opening

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William Shakespeare

published 1609 · England

That time of year thou mayst in me behold When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.

Sonnets, 73

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Jeong Yakyong 丁若鏞

1832 · Joseon Korea · From a sequence of six written at seventy-one

One of an old man's pleasures: having no teeth comes next. To lose half is truly miserable. To have none at all is a satisfaction.

老人一快事 齒豁抑其次 半落誠可苦 全空乃得意

Yeoyudang jeonseo, "An Old Man's Pleasures," second poem

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Jeong Yakyong 丁若鏞

1832 · Joseon Korea

Now that my hair is entirely gone, what can all those troubles cling to? No more labour of combing and washing, and I am spared the shame of going grey.

今髮旣全無 衆瘼將焉倚 旣無櫛沐勞 亦免衰白恥

Yeoyudang jeonseo, "An Old Man's Pleasures," first poem

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Jeong Yakyong 丁若鏞

1832 · Joseon Korea · From a sequence of six written at seventy-one: a bald head, lost teeth, dim eyes, deaf ears, verse written as he pleases, and a game of go

One of an old man's pleasures: going deaf comes next. The world's noise has no good sound in it; nearly all of it is who is right and who is wrong.

老人一快事 耳聾又次之 世聲無好音 大都皆是非

Yeoyudang jeonseo, "An Old Man's Pleasures," fourth poem

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Black Hawk Ma-ka-tai-me-she-kia-kiak

1833 · Sauk nation, North America

I am now an obscure member of a nation that formerly honored and respected my opinions. The pathway to glory is rough, and many gloomy hours obscure it.

Autobiography of Black Hawk, the dedication

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Mark Twain

1897 · Missouri, USA · Connecticut

Wrinkles should merely indicate where smiles have been.

Following the Equator, epigraph to chapter 52, from "Pudd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar"

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