The Intimate Causes of Old Age. 205 



execution of Charles I., one hundred and thirty-two years 

 before. 



What is known as to this subject goes to show that if 

 the data of experience are normally assimilated with one's 

 existent knowledge and incorporated as such knowledge 

 in the mind, no confusion will result from their progress- 

 ive accumulation. 



In the aged, too, recollections of youthful years often 

 appear to be revived and to grow vivid, although it is a 

 matter of common experience that our memory of past 

 events fades with the lapse of time. 



Closely associated with the above theory of old-aging is 

 the psychic theory, namely, that we age and die because 

 after the purely animal or sensory cycle of brain develop- 

 ment is accomplished in mating and procreation, there fol- 

 lows a period or condition of non-development. A new, 

 higher cycle of mind growth is not initiated, and does not 

 begin, with its new interests, new ambitions and fresh in- 

 centives to live and act. The brain neurons do not take 

 a fresh start to live, and hence the stasis of advanced age 

 ensues, with its common conviction that life has been 

 lived, and that naught remains but to exist for a few 

 years more and die. 



According to this view, if it were the fixed belief of 

 human beings, the current faith, that after the age of 

 forty-five, a new- cycle of life was to begin, a new, later 

 course of study and preparation for another life effort 



