Some honeycombs being claimed by a swarm of Wasps, the right owners protested against their demand, and the cause was referred to a Hornet. Witnesses being examined, they deposed that certain winged creatures, who had a loud hum, were of a yellowish colour, and somewhat like bees, were observed a considerable time hovering about the place where this nest was found. But this did not sufficiently decide the question; for these characteristics, the Hornet observed, agreed no less with the Bees than with the Wasps. At length a sensible old Bee offered to put the matter upon this decisive issue: Let a place be appointed by the court, said he, for the plaintiffs and defendants to work in. It will then soon appear which of us are capable of forming such regular cells, and afterwards of filling them with so delicious a fluid. The Wasps refusing to agree to this proposal, sufficiently convinced the judge on which side the right lay, and he decreed the honeycombs accordingly.
Fable XXVII.
Fortune and the School-boy.
We are always ready to censure Fortune for the ill effects of our own carelessness.
A School-boy, fatigued with play, threw himself down by the brink of a deep pit, where he fell fast asleep. Fortune happening to pass by, saw him in this dangerous situation, and kindly gave him a pat on the shoulder: My dear child, said she, if you had fallen into this pit, I should have borne the blame; though in fact the accident would have been wholly owing to your own carelessness.
Misfortune, said a celebrated Cardinal, is but another word for imprudence. The maxim is by no means absolutely true: certain, however, it is, that mankind suffer more evils from their own imprudence, than from events which it is not in their power to controul.
Fable XXVIII.
The Belly and the Limbs.
It is a folly even to wish to withhold our part from the support of civil government.
Menenius Agrippa, a Roman Consul, being deputed by the senate to appease a dangerous tumult and sedition of the people, who refused to pay the taxes necessary for carrying on the business of the state, convinced them of their folly by delivering to them the following fable:—