As a Dog was coursing on the banks of the Nile, he grew thirsty; but, fearing to be seized by the monsters of that river, he would not stop to satiate his draught, but lapped as he ran. A Crocodile, raising his head above the surface of the water, asked him, "why he was in such a hurry? he had often," he said, "wished for his acquaintance, and should be glad to embrace the present opportunity." "You do me great honour," returned the Dog, "but it is to avoid such companions as you that I am in so much haste." REFLECTION. We can never be too carefully guarded against a connection with persons of an ill character. A PRODIGAL young Spendthrift, who had wasted his whole patrimony in taverns and gaming houses among idle company, was taking a melancholy walk near a brook. It was in the month of January, and happened to be one of those warm sunshiny days, which sometimes smile upon us even in that wintry season of the year; and to make it the more flattering, a Swallow, which had made its appearance, by mistake, too soon, flew skimming along upon the surface of the water. The giddy youth, observing this, without any farther consideration, concluded that summer was now come, and that he should have little or no occasion for clothes, so went and pawned them at the broker's, and ventured the money for one stake more, among his sharping companions. When this too was gone the same way with the rest, he took another solitary walk in the same place as before. But the weather, being severe and frosty, had made every thing look with an aspect very different from what it did before; the brook was quite frozen over, and the poor Swallow lay dead upon the bank of it, the very sight of which cooled the young spark's brains, and coming to a kind of sense of his misery, he reproached the deceased bird, as the author of all his misfortunes. "Ah, wretch that thou wert !" says he, "thou hast undone both thyself and me, who was so credulous as to depend upon thee." REFLECTION. Some will listen to no conviction but what they derive from fatal experience. Still blind to reason, nature, and his God, A DILIGENT Ass, daily loaded beyond his strength by a severe Master, whom he had long served, and who fed him very sparingly, happened one day in his old age to be oppressed with a more than ordinary burthen of earthen-ware. His strength being much impaired, and the road deep and uneven, he unfortuately made a trip, and unable to recover himself, fell down and broke all the vessels to pieces. His Master, transported with rage, began to beat him most unmercifully. Against whom the poor Ass, lifting up his head as he lay on the ground, thus strongly remonstrated: "Unfeeling wretch! to thy own avaricious cruelty, in first pinching me of food, and then loading me beyond my strength, thou owest the misfortune which thou so unjustly imputest to me." |