Base is the man who pines amidst his store,
And fat with plenty, griping covets more.
Excessive greediness, in the end, mostly misses what it aims at, and
he that catches at more than belongs to him, justly deserves to lose
what he has. Yet nothing is more common, and, at the same time more
pernicious, than this selfish principle. It prevails from the king
to the peasant; and all orders and degrees of men are more or less
infected with it. Great monarchs have been drawn in by this greedy
humour to grasp at the dominions of their neighbours; not that they
wanted any thing more to feed their luxury, but to gratify their
insatiable appetite for vain glory; and many states have been reduced
to the last extremity by attempting such unjust encroachments. He that
thinks he sees the estate of another in a pack of cards, or a box and
dice, and ventures his own in the pursuit of it, should not repine, if
he finds himself a beggar in the end.
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