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His honest heart was fill'd with pain,
To see the farmer lose his grain,
So, 'lighting gently on a shock,
He thus the foragers bespoke :

'Believe me, Sirs, you're much to blame, ''Tis strange that neither fear nor shame • Can keep you from your usual way "Of stealth, and pilf'ring every day. 'No sooner has th' industrious swain 'His field turn'd up, and sow'd the grain, 'But ye come flocking on the wing,

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Prepar❜d to snatch it ere it spring :

And, after all his toil and care,

'Leave ev'ry furrow spoil'd and bare: 'If aught escapes your greedy bills, 'Which nurs'd by summer grows and fills, 'Tis still your prey: and, tho' ye know 'No Rook did ever till or sow, 'Ye boldly reap without regard "To justice, industry's reward, "And use it freely as your own, 'Tho' men and cattle should get none. 'I never did, in any case, 'Descend to practices so base,

'Tho' stung with hunger's sharpest pain, 'I still have scorn'd to touch a grain, · E'en when I had it in my power

'To do't with safety every hour :

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For, trust me, nought that can be gain'd

Is worth a character sustain'd.'

Thus, with a face austerely grave,
Harangued the hypocritic knave;
And, answering from amidst the flock,
A Rook with indignation spoke :

'What has been said is strictly true,
'Yet comes not decently from you;
'For sure it indicates a mind

'From selfish passions more than blind, 'To miss your greater crimes, and quote 'Our lighter failings thus by rote. 'I must confess we wrong the swain, 'Too oft by pilf'ring of his grain : 'But is our guilt like yours, I pray, 'Who rob and murder every day? 'No harmless bird can mount the skies, 'But you attack him as he flies; "And when, at eve, he lights to rest, 'You stoop, and snatch him from his nest. 'The husbandman, who seems to share 'So large a portion of your care,

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Say is he ever off his guard,

'While you are hov'ring o'er the yard?
'He knows too well your usual tricks,
'Your ancient spite to tender chicks,
' And that you, like a felon, watch
'For something to surprize and snatch.'
At this rebuke so just, the Kite
Surpriz'd, abash'd, and silenc'd quite,
And prov'd a villain to his face,

Straight soar'd aloft, and left the place.

FABLE XXIII.

THE GRASSHOPPER AND THE GLOW-WORM.

By Wilkie.

WHEN Ignorance possess'd the schools,
And reign'd by Aristotle's rules,
Ere Verulam, like dawning light,
Rose to dispel the Gothic night:
A man was taught to shut his eyes,
And grow abstracted to be wise.
Nature's broad volume fairly spread,
Where all true science might be read,
The Wisdom of th' Eternal Mind,
Declar'd and publish'd to mankind,
Was quite neglected, for the whims
Of mortals and their airy dreams:
By narrow principles and few,
By hasty maxims, oft untrue,
By words and phrases ill-defin'd,
Evasive, Truth they hop'd to bind,
Which still escap'd them, and the elves
At last caught nothing but themselves.
Nor is this folly modern quite,
'Tis ancient too; the Stagirite *
Improv'd at first, and taught his school

By rules of art to play the fool.

Aristotle.

E'en Plato, from example bad,

Would oft turn Sophist and run mad ; :

Make Socrates himself discourse

Like Clarke and Leibnitz, oft-times worse;
'Bout quirks and subtilties contending,
Beyond all human comprehending.
From some strange bias men pursue
False knowledge still in place of true;
Build airy systems of their own,

This moment rais'd, the next pull'd down;
While few attempt to catch those rays
Of Truth which Nature still displays
Throughout the universal plan,

From moss and mushrooms up to man.
This sure were better, but we hate
To borrow when we can create;
And, therefore, stupidly prefer,
Our own conceits, by which we err,
To all the wisdom to be gain'd
From Nature and her laws explain'd.

One ev❜ning, when the sun was set,
A Grasshopper and Glow-worm met,
Vain and conceited of his spark,
Which brighten'd as the night grew dark,
The shining reptile swell'd with pride
To see his rays on every side,

Mark'd by a circle on the ground

Of livid light some inches round.

Quoth he,If Glow-worms never shone, 'To light the earth when day is gone,

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In spite of all the stars that burn, • Primeval darkness would return : 'They're less and dimmer, one may see, Besides much farther off than we; 'And, therefore, thro' a long descent "Their light is scatter'd quite and spent : 'While ours, compacter, and at hand,

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Keeps night and darkness at a stand,
'Diffus'd around in many a ray,
"Whose brightness emulates the day.'
This pass'd, and more, without dispute,
The patient Grasshopper was mute :
But soon the east began to glow,
With light appearing from below,
And level from the ocean's streams
The moon emerging shot her beams,
To gild the mountains and the woods,
And shake and glitter on the floods.
The Glow-worm, when he found his light
Grow pale and faint and vanish quite
Before the moon's prevailing ray,

Began his envy to display.

'That globe,' quoth he,' which seems so fair, 'Which brightens all the earth and air,

And sends its beams so far abroad,

'Is nought, believe me, but a clod;
'A thing, which, if the sun were gone,
'Has no more light in't than a stone,
Subsisting merely by supplies

"From Phœbus in the nether skies:

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