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Dissatisfied

Happy Thought

The world is so full of a number of things,

I’m sure we should all be as happy as kings.

Robert Louis Stevenson

Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894), author of Treasure Island amongst much else, wrote this poem for his classic collection of verse for children, A Child’s Garden of Verses (1885). Deceptively short and simple, a Victorian child here obediently but imperfectly imitates adult moral exhortation to count your blessings, making this poem simultaneously sweet and sardonic, sincere and comic.