rting on his shoulders a live ox. Whether, then, would you rather
have this strength of body, or Pythagoras' strength of intellect,
bestowed upon you? In a word, enjoy that blessing while you have it;
when it is gone, do not lament it, unless, indeed, young men ought to
lament the loss of boyhood, and those a little advanced in age the
loss of adolescence. There is a definite career in life, and one way
of nature, and that a simple one; and to every part of life its own
peculiar period has been assigned; so that both the feebleness of
boys, and the high spirit of young men, and the steadiness of now fixt
manhood, and the maturity of old age, have something natural which
ought to be enjoyed in their own time. I suppose that you hear,
Scipio, what your grandfather's host, Masinissa,[8] is doing at this
day, at the age of ninety. When he has commenced a journey on foot, he
never mounts at all; when on horseback, he never dismounts; by no
rain, by no cold, is he prevailed upon to have his head covered; that
there is in him the greatest hardiness of frame; and therefore he
performs all the duties and functions of a king. Exercise, therefore,
and temperance, even in old age, can preserve some remnant of our
pristine vigor.

Is there no strength in old age? neither is strength exacted from old
age. Therefore, by our laws and institutions, our time of life is
relieved from those tasks which can not be supported without strength.
Accordingly, so far are we from being compelled to do what we can not
do that we are not even compelled to do as much as we can. But so
feeble are many old men that they can not execute any task of duty or
any function of life whatever; but that in truth is not the peculiar
fault of old age, but belongs in common to bad health. How feeble was
the son of Publius Africanus, he who adopted you. What feeble health,
or rather no health at all, had he! and had that not been so, he would
have been the second luminary of the state; for to his paternal
greatness of soul a richer store of learning had been added. What
wonder, therefore, in old men if they are sometimes weak when even
young men can not escape that.

We must make a stand, Scipio and Laelius, against old age, and its
faults must be atoned for by activity; we must fight, as it were,
against disease, and in like manner against old age. Regard must be
paid to health; moderate exercises must be adopted; so much of meat
and drink must be taken that the