You know you’re getting old when all the names in your black book have M. D. after them.
—Arnold Palmer (b.1929) American Sportsperson
If I would be a young man again and had to decide how to make my living, I would not try to become a scientist or scholar or teacher. I would rather choose to be a plumber or a peddler in the hope to find that modest degree if independence still available under present circumstances.
—Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born Physicist
When grace is joined with wrinkles, it is adorable. There is an unspeakable dawn in happy old age.
—Victor Hugo (1802–85) French Novelist
As life runs on, the road grows strange with faces new—and near the end. The milestones into headstones change, Neath everyone a friend.
—James Russell Lowell (1819–91) American Poet, Critic
I’m not interested in age. People who tell me their age are silly. You’re as old as you feel.
—Henri Frederic Amiel (1821–81) Swiss Moral Philosopher, Poet, Critic
We lose our hair, our teeth! Our bloom, our ideals.
—Samuel Beckett (1906–1989) Irish Novelist, Playwright
He who is of a calm and happy nature will hardly feel the pressure of age, but to him who is of an opposite disposition youth and age are equally a burden.
—Plato (428 BCE–347 BCE) Ancient Greek Philosopher, Mathematician, Educator
Old age is like everything else. To make a success of it, you’ve got to start young.
—Fred Astaire (1899–1987) American Actor, Dancer, Singer
When I grow up, I want to be a little boy.
—Joseph Heller (1923–99) American Novelist
One of the aged greatest miseries is that they cannot easily find a companion able to share the memories of the past.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
A healthy old fellow, who is not a fool, is the happiest creature living.
—Richard Steele (1672–1729) Irish Writer, Politician
The surest sign of age is loneliness.
—Amos Bronson Alcott (1799–1888) American Teacher, Writer, Philosopher
Be wise with speed; a fool at forty is a fool indeed.
—Edward Young (1683–1765) English Poet
Old age is always wakeful; as if, the longer linked with life, the less man has to do with aught that looks like death.
—Herman Melville (1819–91) American Novelist, Short Story Writer, Essayist, Poet
In old age there is a coming into flower. My body wanes; my mind waxes.
—Victor Hugo (1802–85) French Novelist
At twenty a man is a peacock, at thirty a lion, at forty a camel, at fifty a serpent, at sixty a dog, at seventy an ape, at eighty a nothing at all.
—Baltasar Gracian (1601–58) Spanish Scholar, Prose Writer
The real sadness of fifty is not that you change so much but that you change so little.
—Max Lerner (1902–92) Russian-born American Journalist
Age. That period of life in which we compound for the vices that remain by reviling those we have no longer the vigor to commit.
—Ambrose Bierce (1842–1913) American Short-story Writer, Journalist
By the time we hit fifty, we have learned our hardest lessons. We have found out that only a few things are really important. We have learned to take life seriously, but never ourselves.
—Marie Dressler (1868–1934) American-Canadian Actress
It’s all that the young can do for the old, to shock them and keep them up to date.
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
He was then in his fifty-fourth year, when even in the case of poets reason and passion begin to discuss a peace treaty and usually conclude it not very long afterwards.
—Georg Christoph Lichtenberg (1742–99) German Philosopher, Physicist
It can be set down as a broad, general principle that we cannot indulge in idleness and abundance during both the first and second half of our life. Study, application, industry, enthusiasm while we are young usually enable us to enjoy life when we grow older. But unless we toil and strive and earn all we can in the first half, the second half of our life is liable to bring disappointment, discomfort, distress. The time to put forth effort is when we are most able to do it, namely, in the years of our greatest strength. The law of compensation hasn’t ceased to function.
—B. C. Forbes (1880–1954) Scottish-born American Journalist, Publisher
Age does not make us childish, as some say; it finds us true children.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
Twenty years a child; 20 years running wild; 20 years a mature man—and after that, praying.
—Irish Proverb
Whatever poet, orator, or sage may say of it, old age is still old age.
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–82) American Poet, Educator, Academic
Old age is an insult. It’s like being smacked.
—Lawrence Durrell (1912–90) British Biographer, Poet, Playwright, Novelist
Our prejudices are our mistresses; reason is at best our wife, very often heard indeed, but seldom minded.
—Earl of Chesterfield (1694–1773) English Statesman, Man of Letters
Study until twenty five, investigate until forty, profession until sixty, at which age I would have him retired on a double allowance.
—William Osler (1849–1919) Canadian Physician
What old people say you cannot do, you try and find that you can. Old deeds for old people, and new deeds for new.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–62) American Philosopher
But an old age serene and bright, and lovely as a Lapland night, shall lead thee to thy grave.
—William Wordsworth (1770–1850) English Poet
By the time you’re eighty years old you’ve learned everything. You only have to remember it.
—George Burns (1896–1996) American Comedian
The mind that is wise mourns less for what age takes away; than what it leaves behind.
—William Wordsworth (1770–1850) English Poet
How confusing the beams from memory’s lamp are;
One day a bachelor, the next a grampa.
What is the secret of the trick?
How did I get so old so quick?
—Ogden Nash (1902–71) American Writer of Sophisticated Light Verse
That man never grows old who keeps a child in his heart.
—Richard Steele (1672–1729) Irish Writer, Politician
A man is as old as he feels and a woman as old as she looks.
—Common Proverb
The troubles of the young are soon over; they leave no external mark. If you wound the tree in its youth the bark will quickly cover the gash; but when the tree is very old, peeling the bark off, and looking carefully, you will see the scar there still. All that is buried is not dead.
—Olive Schreiner (1855–1920) South African Writer, Feminist
You are young at any age if you are planning for tomorrow.
—Unknown
When I was young I was amazed at Plutarch’s statement that the elder Cato began at the age of eighty to learn Greek. I am amazed no longer. Old age is ready to undertake tasks that youth shirked because they would take too long.
—W. Somerset Maugham (1874–1965) British Novelist, Short-Story Writer, Playwright
An old-timer is one who remembers when it cost more to run a car than to park it.
—Unknown
The better part of maturity is knowing your goals.
—Arnold Glasow (1905–98) American Businessman
How incessant and great are the ills with which a prolonged old age is replete.
—Juvenal (c.60–c.136 CE) Roman Poet
I will never be an old man. To me, old age is always 15 years older than I am.
—Bernard M. Baruch (1870–1965) American Financier, Economic Consultant
Age is a matter of feeling, not of years.
—George William Curtis (1824–92) American Essayist, Public Speaker, Editor, Author
Childhood itself is scarcely more lovely than a cheerful, kindly, sunshiny old age.
—Lydia Maria Child (1802–80) American Abolitionist, Writer
Discern of the coming on of years, and think not to do the same things still; for age will not be defied.
—Francis Bacon (1561–1626) English Philosopher
Age that lessens the enjoyment of life, increases our desire of living.
—Oliver Goldsmith (1730–74) Irish Novelist, Playwright, Poet
Avarice, in old age, is foolish; for what can be more absurd than to increase our provisions for the road the nearer we approach to our journey’s end?
—Cicero (106BCE–43BCE) Roman Philosopher, Orator, Politician, Lawyer
As winter strips the leaves from around us, so that we may see the distant regions they formerly concealed, so old age takes away our enjoyments only to enlarge the prospect of the coming eternity.
—Jean Paul (1763–1825) German Novelist, Humorist
With care, and skill, and cunning art, She parried Time’s malicious dart, And kept the years at bay, Till passion entered in her heart and aged her in a day!
—Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850–1919) American Poet, Journalist
A child becomes an adult when he realizes that he has a right not only to be right but also to be wrong.
—Thomas Szasz (1920–2012) Hungarian-American Psychiatrist, Psychoanalyst