The ancients knew they couldn’t turn back time
The singer Cher, now 75, has announced that, because she refuses to appear old, she is not going to allow her hair to go grey. But the ancient view was that there was nothing inherently wrong with old age, as long as one prepared for it, accepted it and respected it for what it was, limitations and all. As Cicero pointed out, ‘each stage of life has its place in the nature of things, for harvesting in its time’. So, he went on, the child is weak, the young man self-assertive, becoming authoritative in his middle years and mature in old age. Each stage made different demands. Not to acknowledge