Age Touches Only the Surface

I suppose the mere fact of being walled in gave the Wood part of its peculiar quality, for when a thing is enclosed, the mind does not willingly regard it as common. As I went forward over the quiet turf I had the sense of being received. The trees were just so wide apart that one saw uninterrupted foliage in the distance but the place where once stood seemed always to be a clearing; surrounded by a world of shadows, one walked in mild sunshine. Except for the sheep whose nibbling kept the grass so short and who sometimes raised their long, foolish faces to stare at me, I was quite alone; and it felt more like the loneliness of a very large room in a deserted house than like any ordinary solitude out of doors. I remember thinking, "This is the sort of place which, as a child, one would have been rather afraid of or else would have liked very much indeed." A moment later I thought, "But when alone - really alone -everyone is a child: or no one?" Youth and age touch only the surface of our lives.

-- C.S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength

P.S. I am going to be doing a series of posts from That Hideous Strength, basically some of the parts that stood out to me for various reasons. Some may be more obvious, others not so. But I just really like the ending of this paragraph, it's more true than I know, and everytime I think about it, I see more.