quote · Source-linked selection
Old age is courteous—no one more: For time after time he knocks at the door, But nobody says, "Walk in, sir, pray!" Yet turns he not from the door away, But lifts the latch, and enters with speed, And then they cry, "A cool one, indeed."
Old age is courteous—no one more: For time after time he knocks at the door, But nobody says, "Walk in, sir, pray!" Yet turns he not from the door away, But lifts the latch, and enters with speed, And then they cry, "A cool one, indeed."
Approximate author period: c. 1790 AD · early modern
Meaning not yet available
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- Author or tradition
- Goethe
Attribution: attributed - Country attributed
- Not established
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- Approximate author period: c. 1790 AD · early modern
author lifetime midpoint (1749–1832)
An author lifetime, approximate period or collection date is not necessarily the date when these words were first written or spoken. - Recorded source
- Hoyt’s New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations (1922) (1922 AD)
Printed page 14 · quotation 5 · Goethe · Old Age.
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The voice behind the words.
Listed in the author section of Bartlett’s ninth-edition anthology, in the linked 1905 printing. Dates reflect that historical edition and may differ from modern scholarship.
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