It is very imprudent, as well as uncivil, to affront any one, and we should always reflect, before we rally another, whether we can bear to have the jest retorted. Whoever takes the liberty to exercise his witty talent in that way, must not be surprised if he meet reprisals in the end. Indeed, if all those who are thus paid in their own coin, would take it with the same frankness that the Fox did, the matter would not be much; but we are too apt, when the jest comes to be turned home upon ourselves, to think that insufferable in another which we looked upon as pretty and facetious when the humour was our own. The rule of doing as we would be done by, so proper to be our model in every transaction of life, may more particularly be of use in this respect. People seldom or never receive any advantage by these little ludicrous impositions; and yet, if they were to ask themselves the question, would find, that they would receive the same treatment from another with a very bad grace.
THE COUNTRYMAN AND THE SNAKE.
A Villager found a Snake under a hedge, almost dead with cold. Having compassion on the poor creature, he brought it home, and laid it upon the hearth near the fire, where it had not lain long before it revived with the heat, and began to erect itself, and fly at the wife and children of its preserver, filling the whole cottage with its frightful hissings. The Countryman hearing an outcry, came in, and perceiving how the matter stood, took up a mattock, and soon dispatched the ingrate, upbraiding him at the same time in these words: Is this, vile wretch, the reward you make to him that saved your life? Die, as you deserve; but a single death is too good for you.
APPLICATION.
There are some minds so depraved, and entirely abandoned to wickedness, so dead to all virtuous feelings, that the tenderness and humanity of others, though exerted in their own favour, not only fail to make a proper impression of gratitude upon them, but are not able to restrain them from repaying benevolence with injuries. Moralists, in all ages, have incessantly declaimed against the enormity of this crime, concluding that they who are capable of injuring their benefactors, are not fit to live in a community; being such as the natural ties of parent, friend, or country are too weak to restrain within the bounds of society. Indeed, the sin of ingratitude is so detestable, that none but the basest tempers can be guilty of it. Men of low grovelling minds, who have been rescued from indigence by the hand of benevolence, or of charity, forget their benefactors, as well as their original wretchedness; and as soon as prosperity flows upon them, it too often serves only to rekindle their native rancour and venom, and they hiss and brandish their tongues against those who are so inadvertent or unfortunate as to have served them. But prudent people need not to be admonished on this subject; for they know how much it behoves them to beware of taking a snake into their bosom.
