The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1901-10-11
HOW TO GROW OLD EASILY.
MRS. ELIZA BETH C4DY STAN
TON
In Her Eighty fl h Year S urveys Her
Own Experience.

| Own Experience.
How shall one grow old easily, hap
! PLY and gracefully? The answer in
wolves primal question as to the start
ing point How to reach the end of a
ten mile walk depends upon the vigor
with which one starts, the state Of the
road, the weather, the companions, and
the object Of the journey. So 1t is in
| life. With two generations of ances-
tors with sound minds in sound bodies,
with the advantages of good society
and thorough education, one is we'll
equipped for health and happiness and
success in life. What good founda-
| ton Is to fine edifce, that Is birth
and education to character though
great souls now and then appear to rise
| superior to all disadvantages.
I attribute my vigorous old age in
| part to advantageous circumstances, in
part to happy, hopeful temperament,
keen sense of humor, sympathies for
all my fellow-beings. and deep inter-
est in all the vital questio of the
hour. One must have an earnest pur-
pose in life beyond personal ambition
and family ACKNOWLEDGMENT Self-cen-
tered characters do not possess the ne
cessary elements Of a high develop
ment.
If one would have happy old age,
the first condition Is a sound body; to
that end we all know that exercise,
diet, dress, sanitary conditions are all
important. Born on the hills in Fulton
county, four hundred feet above the
Mohawk valley, I enjoyed pure air to
start with. With walks of five or ten
miles and rides on horseback Of many
more, ofetimes before breakfast; skat-
ing, coasting. sleigh-riding with boys
as we'll as girls, for In our old acade-
mics we had co-education everywhere,
we enjoyed abundant means for fun
and frolic
In those days the languages and
mathematics were not thought to be too
strong Intellectual pabulum for girls.
Five years in all my studies and plays
in the constant companionship of boys
I count as one of the happiest periods
of my girlhood. Thus the girls ac-
quired strength, courage and self-as-
sertion, and the boys courtesy, refine
ment and self control.\ Thus youth
passed with comparative freedom, and
the foundation was laid for health and
intellectual development.
Wifehood and motherhood brought
their duties, without the usual disabil-
tiles that feeble women ignorant Of the
laws of health, endure. Nature does
her best at all periods of womans life
to make each change one Of added
health and happiness. Those obedient
to her laws rejoice in every step from
youth to age. Fifty Is the heyday of
her intellectual life. Then the vital
forces used in reproduction are gar
nered in the brain. giving new ideas
and adding force, clearness and beauty
to thought. There comes eloquence of
expression, and she finds wider field
for her sympathies. She has new in
terests in the great world which Ia the
future home Of her children, In which
she Is now to labor to make 1t fit for
them to live in.
Now the wise woman sees she has
new duties in the state, to build up a
government for the benefit of the whole |
people. She has duties in the church |
to save her children from all the har-
rowing superstitions that have so long |
opposed the human mind. This work |
finds her able to meet 1t.
This is a happy picture Of my life,
and now, In my eighty-ffth' year, life
Is as sweet to me as ever. I have no
pains or aches, no regrets or forebod-
lngs for myself; all my sorrows are for
the troubles Of others. My philosophy
Is to live in the present; regrets for the
past are vain; the page Is turned; there
is no remedy for what Is done. AS to
the future, anxieties are equally vain;
we do not know what one day will
bring forth; what we hope or fear may
never occur; the present Is all that is
ours.
It Is the general opinion that with
age must come decreptude, that It's in
evitable accomplishments are wigs and
spectacles ear trumpets and false
teeth, weak knees, asthma, neuralgia
and rheumatism. This Is by no means
he case know sound old gentlemen
IN the shady side of eighty who read
without spectacles. whose hearing Is
is keen as a rabbits, who can walk as
,riskly as most men of forty, and have
rs keen a zest as ever In all there is in
life worth enjoying.
And If our senses are not so keen as
n youth, our spiritual eyes behold the
of many glories we never
saw before. We hear the music In the
lir, the harmonies of nature unheeded
n the early days, and the interior life
;rows brighter as the years roll on, the
lorizon of thought broadens, new Wis
as open to unknown paths, and we see
-isions and dream dreams of celestial
and happiness, and of the
complete fulfilment of all our earth
,orn plans and purposes. I
They are begun in youth in doubt and
weakness, but finished at last in faith :
nd victory:
FOR age Is opportunity no less
han youth itself, though in another
dress:
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