Page:Fables of Aesop and other eminent mythologists.djvu/112

58 Age Overtakes them, and they are e’en Glad to take up in a Mill at lat with Grains and Thitles, and there pend the Remainder of a Wretched Life in a Circulation of Miery and Labour. If any Man of War, or State hall find This Cae to be his Own, and Himelf Touch’d in the Moral of This Fable, let him keep his Own Councel, and learn to be Wier here-after. And we may learn This Leon of the Hore too, not to Sacrifice our Honour, Liberty, and Concience, to a Freak.

Wo Young Fellows Slipt into a Cooks Shop, and while the Mater was Buie at his Work, One of them Stole a piece of Fleh, and Convey'd it to the Other. The Mater Mis'd it immediately, and Challeng’d them with the Theft, He that Took it, Swore He had None on’t. And He that Had it, Swore as Deperately that He did not Take it, The Cook Reflecting upon the Conceit: Well, My Maters, (ays he) Thee Frauds and Fallacies may pas upon men; but there's an Eye Above that ees thorough them,

Fable concerns thoe that think to Deceive God with Fallacies of Words, Equivocations, Mental Reervations, and Double Meanings; but though Frauds and Perjuries may pas upon Men for a Seaon, they are as Open as the Light yet to Him that Searches the Heart. A Man had Better be a Downright Atheit, then in uch a Cae as This, an Equivocating Hypocrite: For He that Denies a Providence, or Doubts whether there be any God at all, is much more Pardonable, then Another that Acknowledges, and Confees an All-Seeing, and an Almighty Power; and yet at the Same Time, mot Blaphemouly Affronts it. 'Tis a Great Unhappines that Children hould be o much Addicted (as we ee they are) to This Way and Humour of Shuffling: But it is a Greater Shame and Michief, for Parents, Governours, and Tutors, to Encourage, and Allow them in’t, and o (Effectually) to Train them up to One of the mot Dangerous Corruptions they are Capable of, in Countenancing the very Ground-Work of a Fale and Treacherous Life, There mut be No Paradoxing or Playing Tricks with Things Sacred. Truth is the Great Leon of Reaonable Nature, both in Philoophy, and in Religion. Now there is a