first favourable glance of spring, will ever be the readiest to droop beneath the frowns of winter." REFLECTION. He who is puffed up with the least gale of prosperity, will as suddenly sink beneath the blasts of misfortune. Gout DEATH, the king of terrors, was determined to choose a prime minister; and his pale courtiers, the ghastly train of diseases, were all summoned to attend; when each preferred his claim to the honour of this illustrious office. Fever urged the numbers he destroyed; cold Palsy set forth his pretensions, by shaking all his limbs ; and Dropsy, by his swelled unwieldly carcase. hobbled up, and alleged his great power in racking every joint; and Asthma's inability to speak, was a strong, though silent argument in favour of his claim. Stone and Cholic pleaded their violence; Plague, his rapid progress in destruction; and Consumption, though slow, insisted that he was sure. In the midst of this contention, the Court was disturbed with the noise of music, dancing, feasting, and revelry; when immediately entered a lady, with a bold lascivious air, and a flushed and jovial countenance; she was attended on one hand by a troop of cooks and bacchanals; and on the other by a train of wanton youths and damsels, who danced half naked to the softest musical instruments; her name was Intemperance. She waved her hand, and thus addressed the crowd of diseases: "Give way, ye sickly band of pretenders, nor dare to vie with my superior merits in the service of this great monarch. Am not I your parent? the author of your beings? Do ye not derive your power of shortening human life, almost wholly from me? who then so fit as myself for this important office?" The grisly monarch grinned a smile of approbation, placed her at his right hand, and she immediately became his prime favourite, and principal minister. REFLECTION. Intemperance is the great and original cause that generally shortens human life. THE Lion took a fancy to hunt in company with the Asses; and to make them the more useful, gave them instructions to hide themselves in a thicket, and then to bray in the most frightful manner that they could possibly contrive. "By this means," says he, "you will rouse all the beasts within the hearing of you; while I stand at the outlets, and take them as they are making off." This was done and the stratagem took effect accordingly. The Asses brayed most hideously; and the timorous beasts, not knowing what to make of it, began to scour off as fast as they could; when the Lion, who was posted at a proper avenue, seized and devoured them as he pleased. Having got his belly full, he called out to the Asses, and bid them leave off, telling them, they had done enough. Upon this, the long-eared brutes : came out of their ambush, and approaching the Lion, asked him, with an air of conceit, how he liked their performance?" Prodigiously!" says he; "you did it so well, that I protest, had I not known your nature and temper, I might have been frightened myself." REFLECTION. A bragging, cowardly fellow may impose upon people that do not know him; but is the greatest jest imaginable to those that do. There are many men, who appear very terrible and big in their manner of expressing themselves, and, if you could be persuaded to take their own word for it, are perfect lions; who, if one takes the pains to inquire a little into their true nature, are as arrant asses as ever brayed. |