Read "The Child and the Sage" by Thomas Hardy online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
YOU say, O Sage, when weather-checked, / "I have been favoured so / With cloudless skies, I must expect / This dash of rain or snow."
"Since health has been my lot," you say, / "So many months of late, / I must not chafe that one short day / Of sickness mars my state."
You say, "Such bliss has been my share / From Love's unbroken smile, / It is but reason I should bear / A cross therein awhile."
And thus you do not count upon / Continuance of joy; / But, when at ease, expect anon / A burden of annoy.
But, Sage-this Earth-why not a place / Where no reprisals reign, / Where never a spell of pleasantness / Makes reasonable a pain?