In the young there is a justification for this feeling. Young men who have reason to fear that they will be killed in battle may justifiably feel bitter in the thought that they have been cheated of the best thing that life has to offer. But in the old man who has known human joys and sorrows, the fear of death is somewhat object and ignoble, and the best way to overcome it is to make your interests gradually wider and more impersonal. An individual human existence should be like a river-small at first, narrowly contained within its banks, and rushing passionately past boulders and over waterfalls.