Even if we live to be a hundred, the first twenty five years are ‘the longest half’ of our lives. They appear so while they are passing; they seem to have been so as we look back on them; and they take up more room in our memories than all the years that succeed them.
- paraphrased from a quote by Robert Southey, English Romantic Poet
Southey (1774 – 1843) was born in Wine Street, Bristol. He was expelled from school for writing an article in The Flagellant condemning flogging. He went to Oxford, of which he later said, “All I learnt was a little swimming and a little boating.” A good start, then, but as he grew older he ‘sold out for money and respectability’, proving his own saying that the first twenty five years are your best.
Bewilderbeast Droppings 