Youth should begin where
age left off. Had the old lady remembered a faded dogs-eared volume
labelled "Oddments" that for many years had rested undisturbed upon its
shelf in her great library, and opening it had turned to the letter E,
she would have read recorded there, in her own precise thin penmanship,
this very wise reflection:
"Experience is a book that all men write, but no man reads."
To which she would have found added, by way of complement, "Experience is
untranslatable. We write it in the cipher of our sufferings, and the key
is hidden in our memories."
And turning to the letter Y, she might have read:
"Youth comes to teach. Age remains to listen," and underneath the
following:
"The ability to learn is the last lesson we acquire."
Mrs. Denton had long ago given up the practice of jotting down her
thoughts, experience having taught her that so often, when one comes to
use them, one finds that one has changed them. But in the case of Joan
the recollection of these twin "oddments" might have saved her
disappointment. Joan knew of a new road that avoided Mrs.
Pages:
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72