Preface to Shakespeare

ACT III. SCENE i. (III. i. 32-4.)

Thou hast nor youth, nor age:
But as it were an after dinner's sleep,
Dreaming on both.

This is exquisitely imagined. When we are young we busy ourselves in forming schemes for succeeding time, and miss the gratifications that are before us; when we are old we amuse the languour of age with the recollection of youthful pleasures or performances; so that our life, of which no part is filled with the business of the present time, resembles our dreams after dinner, when the events of the morning are mingled with the designs of the evening.