YOUTH
Samuel Ullman

Youth is not a time of life; it is a state of mind; it is not a matter of rosy cheeks, red lips and supple knees; it is a matter of the will, a quality of the imagination, a vigor of the emotions; it is the freshness of the deep springs of life.

Youth means a temperamental predominance of courage over timidity of the appetite, for adventure over the love of ease. This often exists in a man of sixty more than a body of twenty. Nobody grows old merely by a number of years. We grow old by deserting our ideals.

Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. Worry, fear, self-distrust bows the heart and turns the spirit back to dust.

Whether sixty or sixteen, there is in every human being's heart the lure of wonder, the unfailing child-like appetite of what's next, and the joy of the game of living. In the center of your heart and my heart there is a wireless station; so long as it receives messages of beauty, hope, cheer, courage and power from men and from the Infinite, so long are you young.

When the aerials are down, and your spirit is covered with snows of cynicism and the ice of pessimism, then you are grown old, even at twenty, but as long as your aerials are up, to catch the waves of optimism, there is hope you may die young at eighty.

青春不是年華，而是一種心態(tài)，不是玫瑰般的臉龐，紅潤的嘴唇和敏捷的雙腿，而是堅韌的意志，豐富的想象力，以及無窮的激情；青春是生命深處的一股清泉。

青春意味著勇氣多于怯弱，青春意味著喜歡冒險而討厭安逸。擁有此種品質(zhì)的人之中，六十歲的老人往往多于二十歲的年輕人。沒有人只因年齡的增長而年老，人們往往因放棄理想而年老。

歲月可使肌膚長滿皺紋，但放棄激情可使心靈布滿灰塵。焦慮、疑惑、猜疑、恐懼和沮喪———都會挫傷心靈，磨損意志。

不管是白發(fā)老人還是青春少年，每個人的心里皆有其喜歡之新奇事物，對星星和類似星星的東西皆有好奇之心，敢干挑戰(zhàn)，對未知事物和孩子般的渴求之心，樂于享受生活帶來的樂趣。

我們因充滿信心而變得年輕；因心存疑慮而年老。因自信而年輕，因心存恐懼而年老；因充滿希望而年輕，因滿懷沮喪而年老。

人人心里都有一座無線電臺，只要接收到來自地球，人類和宇宙的美好、希望、勇氣、莊嚴(yán)及力量，就會變得年輕。

當(dāng)心靈的天線倒下，心如大雪般的悲觀，如冰塊般的憤世嫉俗時，那時，惟有那時，我們將真正老去。

Watch the world go by與世界擦身而過