“Everyone wants to get old; and everyone complains once they have,” wrote Cicero in his De Senectute (On Old Age). “So great is the inconstancy and perversity of foolishness.” The De Senectute was one of the most commonly assigned books in American high schools a century ago; you can still find the old textbooks moldering in second-hand bookshops. It is one of the most thoroughly relevant books ever written, as we invariably get old if we do not die young: Why not consider what makes old age a worthwhile stage of our lives? It is a book we could wish more Americans would read, as this year’s election cycle only seems to confirm that America is an old country. The book’s message is easily conveyed: Nature is not your enemy. “In this we are wise,” Cicero writes, “we follow nature, as our best guide, almost as our god.” Cicero uses a theatrical metaphor: “Old age is the final scene in life’s drama.” The drama is penned by Nature herself: “The rest of the play is well designed; do you believe Nature neglected to consider how it all would end?”
John Byron Kuhner, “Marlene Dietrich’s War on Nature”, First Things, 2024-02-05.
