Laudator Temporis Acti

Gilbert Highet (1906-1978), Explorations (New York: Oxford University Press, 1971), pp. 97-98:

I am not a professional linguist, but I have learned and can read eight languages besides English. I have failed with two—Russian and Hebrew: Russian because it is too complex for me to learn it from a handbook without a teacher, and Hebrew because I have a block about the alphabet and the vowel points; but I'll master them both yet! And I still remember the excitement with which, at the age of eleven, I started learning French and Latin and ancient Greek. (Of course, that is the age when foreign languages should be instilled into the young: eleven at latest; ten or nine would be even better. At that period the young mind is flexible and the young character is pretty docile. It is perfectly ridiculous to postpone the study of languages to the high school age, when the mind begins to lose its concentration and the emotions are constantly interfering with its activities.)