"The thing that is
important is the thing that is not seen . . ."
"Yes, I know . . ."
"It is just as it is with
the flower. If you love a flower that lives on a star, it is
sweet to look at the sky at night. All the stars are a-bloom
with flowers . . ."
"Yes, I know . . ."
"It is just as it is with
the water. Because of the pulley, and the rope, what you gave me
to drink was like music. You remember--how good it was."
"Yes, I know . . ."
"And at night you will
look up at the stars. Where I live everything is so small that I
cannot show you where my star is to be found. It is better, like
that. My star will just be one of the stars, for you. And so you
will love to watch all the stars in the heavens . . . they will
all be your friends. And, besides, I am going to make you a
present . . ."
He laughed again.
"Ah, little prince, dear
little prince! I love to hear that laughter!"
"That is my present. Just
that. It will be as it was when we drank the water . . ."
"What are you trying to
say?"
"All men have the
stars," he answered, "but they are not the same things
for different people. For some, who are travelers, the stars are
guides. For others they are no more than little lights in the
sky. For others, who are scholars, they are problems. For my
businessman they were wealth. But all these stars are silent.
You--you alone--will have the stars as no one else has
them--"
"What are you trying to
say?"
"In one of the stars I
shall be living. In one of them I shall be laughing. And so it
will be as if all the stars were laughing, when you look at the
sky at night . . . You--only you--will have stars that can
laugh!"
And he laughed again.
"And when your sorrow is
comforted (time soothes all sorrows) you will be content that
you have known me. You will always be my friend. You will want
to laugh with me. And you will sometimes open your window, so,
for that pleasure . . . And your friends will be properly
astonished to see you laughing as you look up at the sky! Then
you will say to them, 'Yes, the stars always make me laugh!' And
they will think you are crazy. It will be a very shabby trick
that I shall have played on you . . ."
And he laughed again.
-Antoine De Saint-Exupery
"The Little Prince",Ch
26