Fables of Æsop and Other Eminent Mythologists/Fable CCCXX
Fab. CCCXXI.
A Mouse and a Kite.
A Simple Mouse had the Fortune to be near at hand, when a Kite was taken in a Net. The Kite begg’d of her to try it she could help her out. The Mouse Gnaw’d a Hole in’t, and set her at Liberty; and the Kite Eat up the Mouse for her Pains.
The MORAL.
Save a Thief from the Gallows and he’ll Cut your Throat.
REFLEXION.
’TIS No New Thing in the World to Return Evil for Good. Nay, there are some Natures so sowre, and so Ungrateful, that they are never to be Oblig’d. All Kites of This Humour do not Wear Feathers: Neither do All such Mice wear Long Tayls. There are Cases, wherein our Very Tenderness, and Charity, becomes a Snare to us, and there are People too, that fancy No Blood so sweet, as That of the Person to whom they stand Indebted for their Lives and Fortunes: But then if One Man should Cease to be Generous, and Charitable, because Another Man is Sordid, and Ungrateful. It would be much in the Power of the Basest of Vices to Extinguish the most Christian, and Humane of Vertues. These Lewd Examples May however, and Ought to Recommend Prudence and Caution to us; but without Killing, or Quenching Good Nature. There are, ’tis true, some People so Harden’d in Wickedness, as to have No Sense at all of the most Friendly Offices, or the Highest Benefits. Now in These Desperate Cases, a Man is little Better then Felo-de-se, that for the Helping of Another Ventures the Undoing of Himself. Nay, and ’tis somewhat more then a Venture too, when a Mouse lays it self at the Mercy of a Kite.