The Little Prince

By Antoine de Saint Exupery

http://cs.swan.ac.uk/~cswill/The_little_prince.pdf

**Chapter 20**
*Page 55*

But it happened that after walking for a long time through sand, and rocks,
and snow, the little prince at last came upon a road. And all roads lead to the
abodes of men.
“Good morning,” he said.
He was standing before a garden, all a-bloom with roses.
“Good morning,” said the roses.
The little prince gazed at them. They all looked like his flower.
“Who are you?” he demanded, thunderstruck.
“We are roses,” the roses said.
And he was overcome with sadness. His flower had told him that she was
the only one of her kind in all the universe. And here were five thousand of
them, all alike, in one single garden!
“She would be very much annoyed,” he said to himself, “if she should see
that. . . she would cough most dreadfully, and she would pretend that she was
dying, to avoid being laughed at. And I should be obliged to pretend that I
was nursing her back to life– for if I did not do that, to humble myself also, she
would really allow herself to die. . . ”
Then he went on with his reflections: “I thought that I was rich, with a
flower that was unique in all the world; and all I had was a common rose. A
common rose, and three volcanoes that come up to my knees– and one of them
perhaps extinct forever. . . that doesn’t make me a very great prince. . . ”
And he lay down in the grass and cried.


**Chapter 21**
*Page 57 - 60*

It was then that the fox appeared.
“Good morning,” said the fox.
“Good morning,” the little prince responded politely, although when he
turned around he saw nothing.
“I am right here,” the voice said, “under the apple tree.”
“Who are you?” asked the little prince, and added, “You are very pretty to
look at.”
“I am a fox,” said the fox.
“Come and play with me,” proposed the little prince. “I am so unhappy.”
“I cannot play with you,” the fox said. “I am not tamed.”
“Ah! Please excuse me,” said the little prince.
But, after some thought, he added: “What does that mean– ‘tame’?”
“You do not live here,” said the fox. “What is it that you are looking for?”
“I am looking for men,” said the little prince. “What does that mean–
‘tame’?”
“Men,” said the fox. “They have guns, and they hunt. It is very disturbing.
They also raise chickens. These are their only interests. Are you looking for
chickens?”
“No,” said the little prince. “I am looking for friends. What does that
mean– ‘tame’?”
“It is an act too often neglected,” said the fox. It means to establish ties.”
“ ‘To establish ties’?”
“Just that,” said the fox. “To me, you are still nothing more than a little
boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need
of you. And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you, I am nothing more
than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we
shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I
shall be unique in all the world. . . ”
“I am beginning to understand,” said the little prince. “There is a flower. . . I
think that she has tamed me. . . ”
“It is possible,” said the fox. “On the Earth one sees all sorts of things.”
“Oh, but this is not on the Earth!” said the little prince.
The fox seemed perplexed, and very curious.
“On another planet?”
“Yes.”
“Are there hunters on this planet?”
“No.”
“Ah, that is interesting! Are there chickens?”
“No.”
“Nothing is perfect,” sighed the fox.
But he came back to his idea.
“My life is very monotonous,” the fox said. “I hunt chickens; men hunt
me. All the chickens are just alike, and all the men are just alike. And, in
consequence, I am a little bored. But if you tame me, it will be as if the sun
came to shine on my life. I shall know the sound of a step that will be different
from all the others. Other steps send me hurrying back underneath the ground.
Yours will call me, like music, out of my burrow. And then look: you see the
grain-fields down yonder? I do not eat bread. Wheat is of no use to me. The
wheat fields have nothing to say to me. And that is sad. But you have hair
that is the colour of gold. Think how wonderful that will be when you have
tamed me! The grain, which is also golden, will bring me back the thought of
you. And I shall love to listen to the wind in the wheat. . . ”
The fox gazed at the little prince, for a long time.
“Please– tame me!” he said.
“I want to, very much,” the little prince replied. “But I have not much time.
I have friends to discover, and a great many things to understand.”
“One only understands the things that one tames,” said the fox. “Men have
no more time to understand anything. They buy things all ready made at the
shops. But there is no shop anywhere where one can buy friendship, and so
men have no friends any more. If you want a friend, tame me. . . ”
“What must I do, to tame you?” asked the little prince. “You must be very
patient,” replied the fox. “First you will sit down at a little distance from me–
like that– in the grass. I shall look at you out of the corner of my eye, and you
will say nothing. Words are the source of misunderstandings. But you will sit
a little closer to me, every day. . . ”
The next day the little prince came back.
“It would have been better to come back at the same hour,” said the fox.
“If, for example, you come at four o’clock in the afternoon, then at three o’clock
I shall begin to be happy. I shall feel happier and happier as the hour advances.
At four o’clock, I shall already be worrying and jumping about. I shall show
you how happy I am! But if you come at just any time, I shall never know at
what hour my heart is to be ready to greet you. . . One must observe the proper
rites. . . ”
“What is a rite?” asked the little prince.
“Those also are actions too often neglected,” said the fox. “They are what
make one day different from other days, one hour from other hours. There is
a rite, for example, among my hunters. Every Thursday they dance with the
village girls. So Thursday is a wonderful day for me! I can take a walk as far
as the vineyards. But if the hunters danced at just any time, every day would
be like every other day, and I should never have any vacation at all.”
So the little prince tamed the fox. And when the hour of his departure drew
near–
“Ah,” said the fox, “I shall cry.”
“It is your own fault,” said the little prince. “I never wished you any sort of
harm; but you wanted me to tame you. . . ”
“Yes, that is so,” said the fox.
“But now you are going to cry!” said the little prince.
“Yes, that is so,” said the fox.
“Then it has done you no good at all!”
“It has done me good,” said the fox, “because of the color of the wheat
fields.” And then he added:
“Go and look again at the roses. You will understand now that yours is
unique in all the world. Then come back to say goodbye to me, and I will make
you a present of a secret.”
The little prince went away, to look again at the roses.
“You are not at all like my rose,” he said. “As yet you are nothing. No one
has tamed you, and you have tamed no one. You are like my fox when I first
knew him. He was only a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But I have
made him my friend, and now he is unique in all the world.” And the roses were
very much embarrassed.
“You are beautiful, but you are empty,” he went on. “One could not die
for you. To be sure, an ordinary passerby would think that my rose looked
60 CHAPTER 21.
just like you– the rose that belongs to me. But in herself alone she is more
important than all the hundreds of you other roses: because it is she that I have
watered; because it is she that I have put under the glass globe; because it is she
that I have sheltered behind the screen; because it is for her that I have killed
the caterpillars (except the two or three that we saved to become butterflies);
because it is she that I have listened to, when she grumbled, or boasted, or even
sometimes when she said nothing. Because she is my rose.
And he went back to meet the fox.
“Goodbye,” he said.
“Goodbye,” said the fox. “And now here is my secret, a very simple secret:
It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible
to the eye.”
“What is essential is invisible to the eye,” the little prince repeated, so that
he would be sure to remember.
“It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important.”
“It is the time I have wasted for my rose–” said the little prince, so that he
would be sure to remember.
“Men have forgotten this truth,” said the fox. “But you must not forget it.
You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed. You are responsible
for your rose. . . ”
“I am responsible for my rose,” the little prince repeated, so that he would
be sure to remember.

Maybe you're on the wrong website "to get to know someone first and see where things go?"

This place strikes me as a place where people are expected to know what they want and what they're looking for.

I gave someone the benefit of a doubt "who wanted to get to know someone first online" and they said "I had a bad day at work," and got pissed off that I was hurt when my queries on how I could help were rejected.

That's not a good submissive. And I've decided that anyone "who wants to get to know someone online first" is probably just fucking around.

Sorry, but I'm sick of "hook ups," and I'm tired of "let's talk and talk and talk, and maybe, if you don't offend me by doing that one little normal thing that always bothers me but I never talk about, I'll fucking kick you to the curb so fast you won't know what hit you!"

If you really want to know someone first, try a poetry group. Or a group about horses. Or foals. Or trains. Or computer games.  Hell, pick your favorite fucking fairy tale and join a group about that if you really want to get to know people before you get to know them!

Hell, that's how I "got to know someone online first." I met them through a group of group administrators who were all bitching about how the fucking services were broken!

And you know how I got to know them? By working with them for years to get our groups more visible.

While all our efforts came to naught, our relationship certainly did not! Now I'm living with her, in the happiest relationship I've ever had!

But don't come to me on a website where I'm clearly telling you I want you to move in and fuck me silly, and I believe only the most cursory examination should work to determine if we'll get along, and tell me "it will take months or years."

Fuck, man. The only way I'll spend that much time getting to "know" you is if we're being fucking platonic!

That's right! I'll friend zone your ass if you try it!

Not one - and I mean this whole heartedly - not one of my real friends said to me, "Let's spend months getting to know each other, first!"

We just did it.

And you should, too.

Fucking millenial numpties.

I'm sorry.  When I tell you facts you can't discount them as if they're opinions.

I'm sorry, but you can't say "Guess what?" then say "I don't want to talk about the 'guess what.'"  Because that's just plain rude.

Don't say "I really showed them up!"  Then not explain in any way, shape or form exactly how you did it.

Don't say "I had a bad day at work."  And expect that to be the end of it.

Those lines are hooks.  They're used to start conversation, not finish it!

And you can't seem to take constructive criticism at all.

You say "I feel miserable," and I start asking how we can make you feel better, and you get mad at me as if I'm doing something wrong!

I'm sorry, but asking how you can help someone you love and care for is not doing something wrong!

I wondered how such a darling could be alone.

Well ...  Now I know.