A CHAPTER FOR OLD MEN 429 



they hold no communion with the manly virtues, and 

 they cast a mist before the eye of reason. The little 

 relish which old age leaves for enjojntnents merely 

 sensual, instead of being a disparagement to that period 

 of life, considerably enhances its value." 



Says Parise, a distinguished French physician, in 

 his work on old age: 



"Love, at the decline of life, should take quite a 

 moral character, freed from all its animal propensities. 

 In the elderly man, it is paternal, conjugal, patriotic 

 attachment, which, without being so energetic as the 

 love experienced in youth, still warms old hearts and 

 old age; and, believe me, these have their sweet privi- 

 leges, as well as sometimes their bitter realities. These 

 autumn roses are not without perfume; perhaps less 

 intoxicating than that arising from first love, but pre- 

 senting none of its dangers. 



** Unfortunately, there are those who, either more 

 infatuated, more helplessly drifting on the tide of pas- 

 sion, or more depraved, use all their endeavors to 

 realize desires which it is no longer possible to satisfy, 

 unless by a forced compliance of the organs. Not only 

 has the energy, the superfluous vitality of early days, 

 disappeared, but the organic power of reproduction is 

 nearly obliterated. Is all over then! Credat Judaeus, 

 non ego. It is now that Venus Impudica lavishes on her 

 used-up votaries her appetizing stimulants to vice and 

 debauchery. The imagination, polluted with impuri- 

 ties, seeks pleasure which reason and good sense re- 

 pudiate. There are instances of debauched and shame- 

 less old age which, deficient in vital resources, strives 

 to supply their place by fictitious excitement ; a kind of 

 brutish lasciviousness, that is ever the more cruelly 

 punished by nature, from the fact that the immediately 



