This may be Apply’d to well-nigh All sorts of Vain Persons and Humours:
As Those that Assume to Themselves the Merit of Other Mens Services.
Those that Talk, and Think, and Bussle, as if Nothing were done without
them. All Meddlers, Boasters, and Impertinents, that Steal away the
Reputation of Better Men for their Own Use. The World is Full, in fine,
of these Pragmatical _Flies_, that Value themselves for being In at Every
thing, and are found Effectually, at last to be just good for Nothing.
It is the Fortune, and it is the Humour of Weak and Trifling Men to Value
themselves upon Idle and Trivial Matters; and many times, in Truth, upon
Just Nothing at all: That is to say, upon a False Perswasion that they
Do Things, which they do Not do, and Govern Affairs wherein they have
No Manner of Interest. They Place a Reputation also upon Things that a
Sober Man would be out of Countenance to Own, and Contend for the Credit
of being the Authors of Fooleries. _What a Dust do I Raise?_ says the
silly _Fly_, And have we not Millions of Vain, Empty Pretenders in the
World, that Talk at the same Rate, and with as Little Colour, either of
Truth, or of Reason? ’Twas [I] carry’d such a Cause; such a Debate, such
a Question. ’Twas [I] that Advis’d, Brought about, or Prevented This and
That; when yet upon the Upshot, This same [I] was no more then the Fool,
that fancy’d he play’d upon the _Organ_, when he only Drew the _Bellows_.
Whence comes it now that Men Arrogate to Themselves thus, where they have
Nothing to do, and Claim a Title, as Matter of Credit, to the Weakest
Things in the World; but for want of Understanding the True Measures of
Honour and Virtue: The Moral of This Vanity runs through All Degrees of
Men, and All Functions. There’s Nothing so Great; There’s Nothing so
Little, as not to Afford Subject for This Busie and Over-Weening Conceit
to Work upon? No, not from the Modelling of Common-wealths; the Winning
of Battels; the Saving, or the Recovery of Kingdoms, to the very _Flies_
Raising the Dust here in the Fable.