Though the poor Traveller in the fable was not guilty of any real crime
in what he did, yet one cannot help approving the honest simplicity of
the Satyr, who could not be reconciled to such double dealing. In the
moral sense of the fable, nothing can be more offensive to one of a
sincere heart, than he that blows with a different breath from the same
mouth; who flatters a man to his face, and reviles him behind his back.
Some again, just like this man, to serve a present view, will blow
nothing but what is warm, benevolent, and cherishing; and, when they
have raised the expectations of a dependent to a degree which they think
may prove troublesome, can, with putting on a cold air, easily chill and
blast all his blooming hopes. But such a temper, whether it proceeds
from a designed or natural levity, is detestable, and has been the cause
of much trouble and mortification to many a brave deserving man. Unless
the tenor of a man's life be always true and consistent with itself, the
less one has to do with him the better.