Letter (1798-10-27) [Letters of Jane Austen -- Brabourne Edition]
Letters
“No wonder that my remembrance fails me, for I shall complete my 70 years next Sunday (the 22); — and during these 70 years I have had a happy life; which still remains happy because of hope and content.”
Letter of Faraday to Christian Friedrich Schönbein (19 September 1861); see also The Letters of Faraday and Schoenbein 1836-1862 (1899), edited by Georg W. A. Kahlbaum and Francis V. Darbishire, p. 349 http://www.archive.org/details/lettersoffaraday00fararich
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Michael Faraday 30
English scientist 1791–1867Related quotes
“[My husband Emilio] found the last remaining virgin in the '70s -- and that was me.”
Good Morning America radio interview (October 26, 2006)
2007, 2008
On being told his son had joined the Communist Party, as quoted in Try and Stop Me (1944) by Bennet Cerf
A statement similar in theme has also been attributed to Clemenceau:
A young man who isn't a socialist hasn't got a heart; an old man who is a socialist hasn't got a head.
As quoted in "Nice Guys Finish Seventh" : False Phrases, Spurious Sayings, and Familiar Misquotations (1992) by Ralph Keyes.
W. Gurney Benham in A Book of Quotations (1948) cites a statement by François Guizot as the earliest known expression of this general idea, stating that Clemenceau merely adapted the saying substituting socialiste for republicain:
N'être pas républicain à vingt ans est preuve d'un manque de cœur ; l'être après trente ans est preuve d'un manque de tête.
Not to be a republican at twenty is proof of want of heart; to be one at thirty is proof of want of head.
Variations on this general idea have also been attributed or misattributed to many others, most commonly Winston Churchill, who is not known to have actually made any similar statement.
Post-Prime Ministerial
“To be 70 years young is sometimes far more cheerful and hopeful than to be 40 years old.”
Almost certainly attributable to Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., who is, in various sources, credited with having said this in letters to Harriet Beecher Stowe (who turned 70 in 1881) and Julia Ward Howe (who turned 70 in 1889), as well as having made the commented about himself. Holmes, Sr. reached the age of 70 in 1879, while Holmes, Jr. reached that age in 1911, some time after the earliest reports of this quote.
Misattributed
“We've had 70 years of making records. Now, we sample them.”
The Times, 1992.
as quoted by de:Wolf-Dieter Dube, in Expressionism, de:Wolf-Dieter Dube; Praeger Publishers, New York, 1973, p. 89