THE ANGLER AND THE LITTLE FISH.
An Angler caught a small Trout, and as he was taking it off the hook, and going to put it into his basket, it opened its little throat, and begged most piteously that he would throw it into the river again. The man demanded what reason it had to expect this indulgence? Why, says the Fish, because I am so young and so little, that it is not worth your while taking me now, and certainly I shall be better worth your notice, if you take me a twelvemonth afterwards, when I shall be grown a great deal larger. That may be, replied the Angler, but I am sure of you now; and I am not one of those who quit a certainty in expectation of an uncertainty.
APPLICATION.
They who neglect the present opportunity of reaping a small advantage, in the hope that they shall obtain a greater afterwards, are far from acting upon a reasonable and well advised foundation. We ought never thus to deceive ourselves, and suffer the favourable moment to slip away; but secure to ourselves every fair advantage, however small, at the moment that it offers, without placing a vain reliance upon the visionary expectation of something better in time to come. Prudence advises us always to lay hold of time by the forelock, and to remember that “a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.”
A MAN BITTEN BY A DOG.
A Man, who had been sadly torn by a Dog, was advised by some Old Woman, as a cure, to dip a piece of bread in the wound, and give it to the Cur that bit him. He did so, and Æsop happening to pass by just at the time, asked him what he meant by it? The man informed him. Why then, says Æsop, do it as privately as you can, I beseech you; for if the rest of the Dogs of the town were to see you, we should all be eaten up alive by them.