Prisoners by Mary Cholmondeley

And no more turn aside and brood Upon Love's bitter mystery. -- W. B. YEATS.

It seems is if in the early childhood of all of us some tiny cell in the embryo brain remains dormant after the intelligence and other faculties have begun to quicken and waken. While that cell sleeps the child is callous to suffering, even ingenious in inflicting it. The little cell in the brain wakes and the cruelty disappears. And the same cell that was slow to quicken in the child is often the first to fall asleep in the old. The ruthless cruelty of old age is not more of a crime than the ruthless cruelty of young children. Childhood does not yet understand. Old age ceases to understand.