Stephen Crane on maturity

Do not weep, maiden, for war is kind.
Because your lover threw wild hands toward the sky
And the affrighted steed ran on alone,
Do not weep.
War is kind.

In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial,
Who, squatting upon the ground,
Held his heart in his hands,
And ate of it.
I said, “Is it good, friend?”
“It is bitter⁠—bitter,” he answered;
“But I like it
“Because it is bitter,
“And because it is my heart.”

The cold passed reluctantly from the earth, and the retiring fogs revealed an army stretched out on the hills, resting.

Maturity is a bitter disappointment for which no remedy exists, unless laughter can be said to remedy anything.

Kurt Vonnegut1922–2007Cat’s Cradle (1963), Chapter 88

• Laughter

Immoderate desire is the mark of a child, not a man.

Democritus460–360 BCFreeman (1948), p. 152

I live in that solitude which is painful in youth, but delicious in the years of maturity.

Albert Einstein1879–1955Out of My Later Years (1950), Ch. 2 “Self-Portrait” (1936), p. 5

• Age