III
CONSOLATIONS FOR LOST STRENGTH

Nowadays I do not miss the powers of youth – that was the second point about the failings of old age – any more than when I was young, I felt the lack of a bull’s strength or an elephant’s. A man should use what he has, and in all his doings accommodate himself to his strength. There is a story about Milo of Crotona,1 in his later years, watching the athletes train on the race-course. With tears in his eyes he looked at his own muscles, and said a pitiable thing: ‘And these are now dead.’ But you are the one who is dead, not they, you stupid fellow, because your fame never came from yourself, it came from brute physical force.

Very different were the men who instructed their fellow-citizens in the law and remained expert jurists until their dying breath: Sextus Aelius Paetus Catus,² and at an earlier date Titus Coruncanius.³ and more recently again Publius Licinius Crassus Dives. It is true that a public speaker’s powers diminish when he becomes old, because his profession depends on the strength of his lungs and physique as well as on his brain. Nevertheless, advancing years have a way of bringing out a fine melodious quality of delivery. I myself still have something of this, and you can see how old I am. But the oratorical style appropriate for later years is peaceful and restrained: a mild, elegant speech from an old but skilful speaker very often secures a favourable hearing.

Or even if you cannot achieve this yourself, you can instruct a Scipio or a Laelius! I can think of nothing more agreeable than an old age surrounded by the activities of young people in their prime. For surely at the very least we must concede age the capacity to teach and train young men and fit them for jobs of every kind; and no function could possibly be more honourable than that. I used to think, Scipio, of the good fortune of your great-grandfather Publius Cornelius Scipio and his brother Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio Calvus, and your grandfathers Lucius Aemilius Paullus and Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus – because they had leading young Romans as their companions. However infirm with age a man has become, if he is imparting to others a liberal education he cannot fail to be accounted happy.

In any case, when failures of bodily vigour do occur they are to be blamed upon youthful dissipations more often than upon old age. A youth spent in immoderate debauchery transmits to later years a body that is already worn out. The aged Cyrus the elder,1 on the other hand, declared in his deathbed speech (quoted by Xenophon) that he had never felt feebler in age than he did as a young man. And then consider Lucius Caecilius Metellus, who four years after his second consulship became chief priest and retained the post for twenty-two years; when I was a boy I remember that he was still so vigorous, in spite of extreme old age, that the loss of youth meant nothing to him.

I need not remind you of my own case! – though old men like me are allowed the privilege of doing so: look at Homer’s Nestor, and how he constantly proclaims his own good qualities! Nestor saw before him the third generation of men, and yet he did not need to be afraid of seeming unduly conceited or garrulous if he paid truthful tribute to himself. ’speech sweeter than honey flowed from his tongue,’ says Homer. Now, this sweetness in no way depended upon physical strength – and yet the great leader of the Greeks never prays for ten men like Ajax, but for ten men like Nestor: if he had them, added Agamemnon, he knew full well that Troy would quickly fall.

But to return to myself: I am in my eighty-fourth year, and I wish I could make the same boast as Cyrus! I must admit, however, that I no longer have the energy I had as a private soldier and then a quaestor in the Second Punic War, or later as consul in Spain; or as military tribune four years later, serving in the Thermopylae campaign² under the consul Manius Acilius Glabrio. Still, this I can say: age has not altogether shattered or undermined me – as you yourselves can see. For the Senate and the platform, for my friends and dependants and guests, my strength is still always available. I never agreed with that much-praised ancient proverb which advises taking to old age early, if you want it to last long. Personally, I should rather stay old for a shorter time than become old prematurely! Consequently, I have never yet refused an appointment to anyone who wanted to see me.

True, I have less physical strength than either of yourselves. But neither have you the strength of the centurion Titus Pontius. So does that make him the better person? A man must husband his powers properly and exert himself in accordance with their capacity, and then he will never find them very deficient. Milo is said to have walked from end to end of the race-course at Olympia with an ox on his back; well, which would you prefer to be given, Milo’s physical vigour, or the intellectual might of Pythagoras? In short, enjoy the blessing of strength while you have it, and have no regrets when it has gone -any more than young men should regret the end of boyhood, or those approaching middle age lament the passing of youth. Life’s course is invariable – nature has one path only, and you cannot travel along it more than once. Every stage of life has its own characteristics: boys are feeble, youths in their prime are aggressive, middle-aged men are dignified, old people are mature. Each one of these qualities is ordained by nature for harvesting in due season.

I expect you sometimes hear news of Masinissa,1 Scipio. He is ninety now, yet once he has started a journey on foot, he still never mounts a horse; and having set out on horseback he never dismounts. Even on the coldest and stormiest days he goes bareheaded. With his extraordinary physique, he carries out all his royal duties and functions in person. That shows how exercise and self-control enable a man to preserve a good deal of his former strength even after he has become old.

So advancing years bring a certain diminution of vigour? But vigour is not even expected of them. That is why law and custom exempt men of my age from public duties requiring bodily strength. In fact, we are not only spared duties that are beyond us, we are even excused functions which would be within our powers. For many old men are supposed to be too infirm to engage in activities, public or otherwise. But weakness of such a kind, far from being peculiar to age, is a product of poor health in general. Your adoptive father,² Scipio – the son of Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus – was completely enfeebled by ill-health, indeed his health practically did not exist. If that had not been so, he would have been the second glory of our nation: for he possessed his father’s heroic qualities, and a wider range of learning besides. Since, therefore, even the young cannot always escape physical infirmity, we should not be surprised if old men are sometimes sufferers too.

Age has to be fought against; its faults need vigilant resistance. We must combat them as we should fight a disease – following a fixed regime, taking exercise in moderation, and enough food and drink to strengthen yet not enough to overburden. However the mind and spirit need even more attention than the body, for old age easily extinguishes them, like lamps when they are not given oil. And whereas exercises can wear the body out, they stimulate the mind. When Caecilius Statius writes of’ foolish old men in comedies’,1 he is referring to the credulous, forgetful, and slovenly type. But these are faults not of old age in general but only when it has allowed itself to become slack, sluggish, and somnolent. The same applies to the bad qualities of youth. Wrongheadedness and sensuality are more prevalent in young men than in old; yet they are not found in all young men, but only in youths of inferior character. Likewise senile imbecility, what is called ‘dotage’, does not occur in all old men but only in those of feeble mind.

Appius Claudius was blind and aged, yet he maintained control of four vigorous sons, five daughters, a great household, and a host of dependants. For instead of inertly capitulating to old age he kept his mind as taut as a bow. He not only directed his home, he ruled it; his slaves feared him, his children venerated him, he was loved by everyone, and beneath his roof prevailed ancestral custom and discipline. Age will only be respected if it fights for itself, maintains its own rights, avoids dependence, and asserts control over its own sphere as long as life lasts. For just as I like a young man to have something old about him, so I approve of the old man who has a touch of youth. If that is his aim, whatever the age of his body, in spirit he will never be old.

I am at work on the seventh book of my Origins.² This involves collecting all the records of our early history. And what I am particularly engaged upon at the moment is the revision of all the speeches I have delivered in famous cases. I am also preparing a treatise on augural, pontifical, and civil law. I am an active student of Greek literature; and to keep my memory in training I adopt the practice of the Pythagoreans and, every evening, run over in my mind all that I have said and heard and done during the day. That is my intellectual exercise, my running-track for the brain – and while I sweat and toil at the task I do not greatly miss my bodily strength. I also give my friends legal assistance, and I often attend the Senate, where after long and careful thought I offer topics for discussion and argue my point of view concerning them.

All this is done by strength of mind, not of body. And even if the effort were more than I could manage, I should still find satisfaction at my reading-couch: I could lie on this and think about the activities which were now beyond me. That they are not beyond me is due to the life I have led. For the man whose whole life consists of study and activity of this kind does not notice old age creeping up on him. Instead, he grows old by slow stages, imperceptibly; there is no sudden break-up, only a gradual process of extinction.