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.

"Certainly. When you find a diamond that belongs to nobody , it is yours. When you discover an island that belongs to nobody, it is yours. When you get an idea before anyone else, you take out a patent on it: it is yours. So with me: I own the stars, because nobody else before me ever thought of owning them."

"If I ordered a general to fly from one flower to another like a butterfly, or to write a tragic drama, or to change himself into a sea bird, and if the general did not carry out the order that he had received, which one of us would be in the wrong?" the king demanded. "The general, or myself?"

"You ," said the little prince firmly.

"Exactly. One must require from each one the duty which each one can perform," the king went on. " Accepted authority rests first of all on reason. If you ordered your people to go and throw themselves into the sea, they would rise up in revolution. I have the right to equire obedience because my orders are reasonable."