Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations. 1989.
NUMBER:
1099
AUTHOR:
Jessie Belle Rittenhouse (18691948)
QUOTATION:
I bargained with Life for a penny, And Life would pay no more, However I begged at evening When I counted my scanty store; For Life is a just employer, He gives you what you ask, But once you have set the wages, Why, you must bear the task. I worked for a menials hire, Only to learn, dismayed, That any wage I had asked of Life, Life would have paid.
ATTRIBUTION:
JESSIE B. RITTENHOUSE, My Wage, The Door of Dreams, p. 25 (1918).