Some old people are oppressed by the fear of death. 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 things that life has to offer. But in
an old man who has known human joys and sorrows, and has achieved whatever work it was in him to
do, the fear of death is somewhat abject and ignoble. The best way to overcome it -- so at least it
seems to me -- is to make your interests gradually wider and more impersonal, until bit by bit the
walls of the ego recede, and your life becomes increasingly merged in the universal life. 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. Gradually the river grows wider,
the banks recede, the waters flow more quietly, and in the end, without any visible break, they
become merged in the sea, and painlessly lose their individual being. The man who, in old age, can
see his life in this way, will not suffer from the fear of death, since the things he cares for
will continue. And if, with the decay of vitality, weariness increases, the thought of rest will be
not unwelcome. I should wish to die while still at work, knowing that others will carry on what
I can no longer do, and content in the thought that what was possible has been done.