A PRESUMPTUOUS Scoffer at things sacred took a journey to Delphi, on purpose to try if he could put a trick upon Apollo. He carried a sparrow in his hand under his coat, and told the God, "I have something in my hand," says he: "Is it dead or living?" If the oracle should say it was dead, he could shew it alive; if living, it was but squeezing it, and then it was dead. He, that saw the iniquity of his heart, gave him this answer: "it shall even be which of the two thou pleasest: for it is in thy choice to have it either the one or the other, as to the bird, but it is not in thy power as to thyself;" and immediately struck the bold Scoffer dead, for a warning to others.

REFLECTION.

Presumption naturally leads people to infidelity, and

that by insensible degrees to atheism: for when men have once cast off a reverence for religion, they are come within one step of laughing at it.

That there's a God all nature loud proclaims,
Tho' the vile Athiest the great truth disclaims;
Or warp'd by prejudice, or sunk in sin,
His fright'ned conscience feels the lash within,

THE Dog sued the Sheep for a debt, of which the Kite and the Wolf were to be judges. They, without debating long upon the matter, or making any scruple for want of evidence, gave sentence for the plaintiff'; who immediately tore the poor Sheep in pieces, and divided the spoil with the unjust judges.

REFLECTION.

Deplorable are the times, when open bare-faced villainy is protected and encouraged, when innocence is obnoxious, honesty contemptible, and it is reckoned criminal to espouse the cause of virtue. Men originally entered into covenants and simple compacts with each other for the promotion of their happiness and wellbeing, for the establishment of justice and public peace.

How comes it then that they look stupidly on and tamely acquiesce, when wicked men pervert this end, and establish an arbitrary tyranny of their own upon the foundation of fraud and oppression? Among beasts, who are incapable of being civilised by social laws, it is no strange thing to see innocent helpless sheep fall a prey to Dogs, Wolves, and Kites: but it is amazing how mankind could ever sink down to such a low degree of base cowardice, as to suffer some of the worst of their species to usurp a power over them, to supercede the righteous laws of good government, and to exercise all kinds of injustice and hardship in gratifying their own vicious lusts.

AN Old Hound, who had been a good one in his time, and had given his master great sport and satisfaction in many a chase, at last, by the effect of years, became feeble and unserviceable. However, being in the field one day, when the stag was almost run down, he happened to be the first that came in with him, and seized him by one of his haunches; but his decayed and broken teeth not being able to keep their hold, the deer escaped, and threw him quite out. Upon which, his master, being in a great passion, was going to strike him, when the honest old creature is said to have barked out this apology: "Ah! do not strike your poor old servant; it is not my heart and inclination, but my strength and speed that fail me. If what I now am displeases, pray don't forget what I have been."

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