Which best identifies a motif in gerard manley hopkins's poem "spring and fall"?

The recurring image of the falling leaves reinforces the idea that everything dies eventually

The best motif for this poem would be innocence. The author purposefully asks Margaret about her deep concern  for fall's dead leaves. Then he tries to comfort the girl. Through the motif of innocence, the author makes readers realize that a child must know about death. But he stresses with a comforting tone, that knowledge of death doesn't end innocence. 

The answer is "he was bad enough in all conscience, but the devil himself could not temp him to turn slave-trader. satirical is a synonym for sarcastic. so when the author says that tom walker could not be tempted by the devil he does not literally mean "the devil" but he means that he is too morally upright to become a slave-trader.