age of hope

"Or is this same Age of Hope itself but a simulacrum; as Hope too often is?" - Thomas Carlyle » The French Revolution » Book 1.II. The Paper Age

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, ca 1827

"It has been well said: 'Man is based on Hope; he has properly no other possession but Hope; this habitation of his is named the Place of Hope.'" - Ibid.