Here are Three Calamities in One: First, The _Foxes_ falling into a Pit,
and not being able to get out again. Secondly, The Misery of being put
to beg Relief of an Enemy, for want of a Friend. Thirdly, The Affront
of the Refusal, as it was accompanied with Raillery and Scorn. ’Twere
well if we had not too many of these Brutal Mockeries in our Daily
Conversations; for we have Banterers in Religion, in Point of Honour, and
upon all the Distresses of Human Life. He that has no Pity or Compassion
for the Miserable, is not in Truth of a Reasonable Make; for Tenderness
of Nature is but a kind of Lay-Charity; and a Body can be no more a Good
Man without the One, then a Good Christian without the other. Let a Man
be never so Wicked, ’tis a Base and an Unmanly thing to Insult upon him
in his Calamity. His Punishment may be Just; and when he suffers Justice,
’tis all that a Good and a Generous Man can wish for in the Case.
The Scomms of Great Men, or Buffons of Quality, are every jot as Wolvish
in Conversation, as they are here in the Fable; tho’ ’tis looked upon, I
know, as a Mark of Breeding, and the Indication of a Man that has Notable
Skill in the World, to turn the Earnest of all Things and Duties, Sacred
and Civil, into a Jest, and to put the Common Principles of Faith, Truth,
Justice and Respect, out of Countenance. Now in all these Cases, the
Precedent is as Dangerous, as the Practice is Odious, where the Quality
of the Droll serves to Authorise the Indignity: But from a _Fox_, that’s
made up of Trick and Treachery, there’s no better to be Expected.