TH FABLE LXIV. The Collier and the Fuller. 'HE Collier and the Fuller, being old acquaintance, happened upon a time to meet together; and the latter, being but ill provided with a habitation, was invited by the former to come and live in the same house with him. I thank you, my dear friend, replies the Fuller, for your kind offer, but it cannot be; for if I were to dwell with you, whatever I should take pains to scour and make clean in the morning, the dust of you and your coals would blacken and defile, as bad as ever before night. MORALS. We commonly imbibe the principles and manners of those with whom we associate. With vice allied, however pure, Shun then the traitress and her wiles, REFLECTION. It is of no small importance in life, to be cautious what company we keep, and with whom we enter into friendships. For though we are ever so well disposed ourselves, and happen to be ever so free from vice and debauchery, yet, if those with whom we frequently converse are engaged in a lewd, wicked course, it will be almost impossible for us to escape being drawn in with them. If we are truly wise, and would shun those siren rocks of pleasure upon which so many have split before us, we should forbid ourselves all manner of commerce and correspondence with those who are steering a course which, reason tells us, is not only not for our advantage, but must end in our destruction. All the virtue we can boast of will not be sufficient to ensure us, if we embark in bad company. For though our philosophy were such, as that we could preserve ourselves from being tainted and infected with their manners, yet their character would twist and entwine itself along with ours in so intricate a fold, that the world would not take the trouble to unravel and separate them. Reputations are of a subtle insinuating texture like water; that which is derived from the clearest spring, if it chances to mix with a foul current, runs on, undistinguished, in one muddy stream for the future, and must for ever partake of the colour and condition of its associate. A FABLE LXV. The Boy and his Mother. LITTLE Boy, who went to school, stole one of his school-fellow's horn-books, and brought it home to his mother; who was so far from correcting and discouraging him upon account of the theft, that she commended and gave him an apple for his pains. In process of time, as the child grew up to be a man, he accustomed himself to greater robberies; and at last, being apprehended and committed to gaol, he was tried and condemned for a felony. On the day. of his execution, as the officers were conducting him to the gallows, he was attended by a vast crowd of people, and among the rest by his mother, who came sighing and sobbing along, and deploring extremely her son's unhappy fate; which the criminal observing, he called to the sheriff, and begged the favour of him, that he would give him leave to speak a word or two to his poor afflicted mother. The sheriff (as who would deny a dying man so reasonable a request) gave him permission; and the felon, while every one thought he was whispering something of importance to his mother, bit off her ear, to the great offence and surprise of the whole assembly. What, say they, was not this villain contented with the impious acts which he has already committed, but he must increase the number of them, by doing this violence to his mother? Good people, replied he, I would not have you be under a mistake; that wicked woman deserves this, and even worse at my hands; for if she had chastised and chid, instead of rewarding and caressing me, when in my infancy I stole the horn-book from the school, I had not come to this ignominious untimely end. MORALS. Youthful minds, like the pliant wax, are susceptible of the most lasting impressions, and the good or evil bias they then receive is seldom or ever eradicated. Fathers and Mothers! train your children's youth To virtue, honour, honesty, and truth; Dreadful! to bring about your child's damnation, REFLECTION. Notwithstanding the great innate depravity of mankind, one need not scruple to affirm, that most of the wickedness, which is so frequent and so pernicious in the world, arises from a bad education; and that the child is obliged either to the example or connivance of its parents, for most of the vicious habits which it wears through the course of its future life. The mind of one that is young is, like wax, soft and capable of any impression which is given it; but it is hardened by time, and the first signature grows so firm and durable, that scarce any pains or application can erase it. It is a mistaken notion in people, when they imagine that there is no occasion for regulating or restraining the actions of very young children, which though allowed to be sometimes very naughty in those of a more advanced age, are in them, they suppose, altogether innocent and inoffensive. But, however innocent they may be, as to their intention then, yet, as the practice may grow upon them unobserved, and root itself into a habit, they ought to be checked and discountenanced in their first efforts towards anything that is injurious or dishonest; that the love of virtue and the abhorrence of wrong and oppression may be let into their minds, at the same time that they receive the very first dawn of understanding, and glimmering of reason. Whatever guilt arises from the actions of one whose education has been deficient as to this point, no question but a just share of it will be laid, by the great Judge of the world, to the charge of those who were, or should have been, his instructors. |