Cui Bono?

WHAT is hope? A smiling rainbow
Children follow through the wet.
’Tis not here—still yonder, yonder;
Never urchin found it yet.

What is life? A thawing iceboard
On a sea with sunny shore.
Gay we sail; it melts beneath us;
We are sunk, and seen no more.

What is man? A foolish baby;
Vainly strives, and fights, and frets;
Demanding all, deserving nothing,
One small grave is what he gets!

Thomas Carlyle.