If the kind enquiries after the sick were all to be interpreted with as
much frankness as those in the Fable, the porters of the great might
commonly answer with the strictest propriety, that their masters were
much better than was wished or desired. The charitable visits which
are made to many sick people, proceed from much the same motive with
that which induced the hungry Wolves to make their enquiries after
the sick Ass, namely, that they may come in for some share of their
remains, and feast themselves upon the reversion of their goods and
chattels. The sick man’s heir longs for his estate; one friend waits
in anxious expectation of a legacy, and another wants his place; it,
however, does not unfrequently happen, that the mask of these selfish
visitants, and their counterfeit sorrow, are seen through, and their
impertinent officiousness treated with the contempt it so justly
deserves.
[Illustration: ’Tis \the\ a world! floating about, like an illumined
mote, in the immensity of endless space--and is inhabited by nations of
proud pismires.--]
[Illustration] [Page 77]