T1B4

What does man love more than life?
Fear more than death or mortal strife?
The poor have; the rich require?
That which contented men desire?
The miser spends, the spendthrift saves?
And all men carry to their graves?
This is a popular riddle, and I was thinking about it today. It's hard in the aspect that it is a negative in a way, and not a physical thing. For example, when you try to think what the poor have that the rich require at the same time, if it was a physical thing you might think it was the other way around. However, if you thought philosophically, it might be, for example, a moral value, perhaps, however, you may not think contented men desire it, for how could they be contented that way? The definition of a miser is a very thrifty person, and the definition of a spendthrift is one who spends a lot of money, so you may think what would the miser spend, yet the spendthrift, who never saves, would save? The answer is nothing, yet we don't realize that because of our determination to find a unique object, and unusual item that is "special". Because it is a riddle, we don't expect it to be simple. But by its simplicity and obvious truth, yet with its descriptions seemingly so diverse, it catches us in a completely unexpected way.