Rensselaer Republican, Volume 27, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 January 1895 — To Grow Old Gracefully. [ARTICLE]

To Grow Old Gracefully.

Brookline Chronicle How weak and foolish we are tc war with time and destiny! Why de we try to hide from the world and from our friends that which it is fan possible to hide? Shall wc ever learr how to grow old gracefully and naturally? We are conscious that the flying years are leaving their telltale stories on our faces; we know we are “growing old,” yet we prink anc and powder, rouge and rage, as though we were successfully deceiving pur friends. We trim down graj streaks or dye the hair and beard; wt wear young and “natty” clothes and do the “kitten act” whenever wc think it will tell, and so we cometc think of this thing seriously, and realize that it is unnatural not tc ripen into the full corn in the car. we see how foolish all this fear and deceit is. If we would only see and act upon these inexorable laws, how much better should we be—what s load of anxiety and sin would be lifted from our hearts! Some then have been who were wise enough tc build upon this foundation, and they have received their reward. The writer has in mind some happy beings who, instead of insisting that they were in theirprime, when it was patent to all that the shades of life’s evening were upon them, withdrew from competition with youth and gracefully and heartily retired be fore the bloom was, in some cases, fairly off the rose, One particulai case was a singer, who. surprising even herself by her brilliant wort one evening at a concert, decidec then and there never to sing again in public, thus leaving in the memo ry of her hearers only theimpressiot of her imposing beauty and her gio rious voice. How much better sucl a course is we may gather from being witnesses, some time or other, t< artists who have held on and sun; once too many times. Orestes, a suburb of Alexandria, wanti to incorporate with eight hundred population. Alexandria will oppose the move menu