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To attempt by device or 'magic' to recover longevity is thus a supreme folly and wickedness of 'mortals'. Longevity or counterfeit 'immortality' (true immortality is beyond Ea) is the chief bait of Sauron – it leads the small to a Gollum, and the great to a Ringwraith.

Tolkien, J.R.R. The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Ed. Humphrey Carpenter and Christopher Tolkien. (London: HarperCollins, 2006.) 286 (L212)

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Elves and Men were called the 'children of God', because they were, so to speak, a private addition to the Design, by the Creator, and one in which the Valar had no part. (Their 'themes' were introduced into the Music by the One, when the discords of Melkor arose.) The Valar knew that they would appear, and the great ones knew when and how (though not precisely), but they knew little of their nature, and their foresight, derived from their pre-knowledge of the Design, was imperfect or failed in the matter of the deeds of the Children. The uncorrupted Valar, therefore, yearned for the Children before they came and loved them afterwards, as creatures 'other' than themselves, independent of them and their artistry, 'children' as being weaker and more ignorant than the Valar, but of equal lineage (deriving being direct from the One); even though under their authority as rulers of Arda. The corrupted, as was Melkor/Morgoth and his followers (of whom Sauron was one of the chief) saw in them the ideal material for subjects and slaves, to whom they could become masters and 'gods', envying the Children, and secretly hating them, in proportion as they became rebels against the One (and Manwë his Lieutenant in Eä).

Tolkien, J.R.R. The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Ed. Humphrey Carpenter and Christopher Tolkien. (London: HarperCollins, 2006.) 285 (L212)

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It was because of their love of Eä, and because of the part they had played in its making, that they /wished to/, and /could/, incarnate themselves in visible physical forms, though these were comparable to our clothes (in so far as our clothes are a personal expression) not to our bodies. Their forms were thus expressions of their persons, powers, and loves. They need not be anthropomorphic (Yavanna wife† of Aulë would, for instance, appear in the form of a great Tree.) But the 'habitual' shapes of the Valar, when visible or clothed, were anthropomorphic, because of their intense concern with Elves and Men. † It is the view of the Myth that in (say) Elves and Men 'sex' is only an expression in physical or biological terms of a difference of nature in the 'spirit', not the /ultimate/ cause of the difference between femininity and masculinity.

Tolkien, J.R.R. The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Ed. Humphrey Carpenter and Christopher Tolkien. (London: HarperCollins, 2006.) 285 (L212)

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Since I have written so much (I hope not too much) I might as well add a few lines on the Myth on which all is founded, since it may make clearer the relations of Valar, Elves, Men, Sauron, Wizards &c. The Valar or 'powers, rulers' were the first 'creation': rational spirits or minds without incarnation, created /before/ the physical world. (Strictly these spirits were called Ainur, the Valar being only those from among them who entered the world after its making, and the name is properly applied only to the great among them, who take the imaginative but not the theological place of 'gods'.) The Ainur took part in the making of the world as 'sub-creators': in various degrees, after this fashion. They interpreted according to their powers, and completed in detail, the Design propounded to them by the One. This was propounded first in musical or abstract form, and then in an 'historical vision'. In the first interpretation, the vast Music of the Ainur, Melkor introduced alterations, not interpretations of the mind of the One, and great discord arose. The One then presented this 'Music', including the apparent discords, as a visible 'history'. At this stage it had still only a validity, to which the validity of a 'story' among ourselves may be compared: it 'exists' /in/ the mind of the teller, and derivatively in the minds of hearers, but not on the same plane as teller or hearers. When the One (the Teller) said Let it Be,* then the Tale became History, on the same plane as the hearers; and these could, if they desired, enter into it. Many of the Ainur did enter into it, and must bide in it till the End, being involved in Time, the series of events that complete it. These were the Valar, and their lesser attendants. They were those who had 'fallen in love' with the vision, and no doubt, were those who had played the most 'sub-creative' (or as we might say 'artistic') part in the Music. *Hence the Elves called the World, the Universe, Eä – It Is.

Tolkien, J.R.R. The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Ed. Humphrey Carpenter and Christopher Tolkien. (London: HarperCollins, 2006.) 284 (L212)