The same instruction we may get
From another couple, smaller yet.A dove came to a brook to drink,
When, leaning o'er its crumbling brink,
An ant fell in, and vainly tried,
In this, to her, an ocean tide,
To reach the land; whereat the dove,
With every living thing in love,
Was prompt a spire of grass to throw her,
By which the ant regain'd the shore.A barefoot scamp, both mean and sly,
Soon after chanced this dove to spy;
And, being arm'd with bow and arrow,
The hungry codger doubted not
The bird of Venus, in his pot,
Would make a soup before the morrow.
Just as his deadly bow he drew,
Our ant just bit his heel.
Roused by the villain's squeal,
The dove took timely hint, and flew
Far from the rascal's coop;--
And with her flew his soup.

[18] Aesop.

XIII.--THE ASTROLOGER WHO STUMBLED INTO A WELL.[19]

To an astrologer who fell
Plump to the bottom of a well,
'Poor blockhead!' cried a passer-by,
'Not see your feet, and read the sky?'This upshot of a story will suffice
To give a useful hint to most;
For few there are in this our world so wise
As not to trust in star or ghost,
Or cherish secretly the creed
That men the book of destiny may read.
This book, by Homer and his pupils sung,
What is it, in plain common sense,
But what was chance those ancient folks among,
And with ourselves, God's providence?
Now chance doth bid defiance
To every thing like science;
'Twere wrong, if not,
To call it hazard, fortune, lot--
Things palpably uncertain.
But from the purposes divine,
The deep of infinite design,
Who boasts to lift the curtain?
Whom but himself doth God allow
To read his bosom thoughts? and how
Would he imprint upon the stars sublime
The shrouded secrets of the night of time?
And all for what? To exercise the wit
Of those who on astrology have writ?
To help us shun inevitable ills?
To poison for us even pleasure's rills?
The choicest blessings to destroy,
Exhausting, ere they come, their joy?
Such faith is worse than error--'tis a crime.
The sky-host moves and marks the course of time;
The sun sheds on our nicely-measured days
The glory of his night-dispelling rays;
And all from this we can divine
Is, that they need to rise and shine,--
To roll the seasons, ripen fruits,
And cheer the hearts of men and brutes.
How tallies this revolving universe
With human things, eternally diverse?
Ye horoscopers, waning quacks,
Please turn on Europe's courts your backs,
And, taking on your travelling lists
The bellows-blowing alchemists,
Budge off together to the land of mists.
But I've digress'd. Return we now, bethinking
Of our poor star-man, whom we left a drinking.
Besides the folly of his lying trade,
This man the type may well be made
Of those who at chimeras stare
When they should mind the things that are.

[19] Aesop. Diogenes Laertius tells the story of this fable of Thales of Miletus. "It is said that once he (Thales) was led out of his house by an old woman for the purpose of observing the stars, and he fell into a ditch and bewailed himself. On which the old woman said to him--'Do you, O Thales, who cannot see what is under your feet, think that thou shalt understand what is in heaven?'"--_Diogenes Laertius, Bohn's edition._

Fables of La Fontaine � a New Edition, with Notes by Gibbs, J. W. M., La Fontaine, Jean de, 1621-1695, Wright, Elizur, 1804-1885

XII.--THE DOVE AND THE ANT.[18]

XIII.--THE ASTROLOGER WHO STUMBLED INTO A WELL.[19]

XIV.--THE HARE AND THE FROGS.[20]