s in time,
and that the present is the point of contact between the world as
subject and the world as object.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Translator's Note_.--By this remark Schopenhauer means
that _will_, which, as he argues, forms the inner reality underlying
all the phenomena of life and nature, is not in itself affected
by time; but that, on the other hand, time is necessary for the
objectification of the will, for the will as presented in the passing
phenomena of the world. Time is thus definable as the condition of
change, and the present time as the only point of contact between
reality and appearance.]

Again, why is it that in youth we can see no end to the years that
seem to lie before us? Because we are obliged to find room for all
the things we hope to attain in life. We cram the years so full of
projects that if we were to try and carry them all out, death would
come prematurely though we reached the age of Methuselah.

Another reason why life looks so long when we are young, is that we
are apt to measure its length by the few years we have already
lived. In those early years things are new to us, and so they appear
important; we dwell upon them after they have happened and often call
them to mind; and thus in youth life seems replete with incident, and
therefore of long duration.

Sometimes we credit ourselves with a longing to be in some distant
spot, whereas, in truth, we are only longing to have the time back
again which we spent there--days when we were younger and fresher than
we are now. In those moments Time mocks us by wearing the mask of
space; and if we travel to the spot, we can see how much we have been
deceived.

There are two ways of reaching a great age, both of which presuppose
a sound constitution as a _conditio sine qua non_. They may be
illustrated by two lamps, one of which burns a long time with very
little oil, because it has a very thin wick; and the other just as
long, though it has a very thick one, because there is plenty of oil
to feed it. Here, the oil is the vital energy, and the difference in
the wick is the manifold way in which the vital energy is used.

Up to our thirty-sixth year, we may be compared, in respect of the way
in which we use our vital energy, to people who live on the interest
of their money: what they spend to-day, they have again to-morrow. But
from the age of thirty-six onwards, our position is like that of the
investor who begins to entrench upon his capital