The Scope of this Fable, is to divert People from Contentious, Expensive
and Vain Law-Suits. _Agree, Agree_, (says the Old Saw,) _the Law is
Costly_. The whole Bus’ness of the World is about _Meum & Tuum_; either
by Right, in Good Earnest, or by Wrong, under the colour of Right: And
while the Clients are Contending about the Title, the Council runs away
with the Estate. This Litigious Humour, where Men are as well Stubborn
and Wilful, as Captious and Quarrelsome, burns like the Fire of Hell; for
’tis never to be Quench’d: Beside, that whoever is given to Wrangling,
can never want Matter or Occasion for’t. And this is not only the Case in
Matters of Propriety, and in Legal Claims before a Bench of Justice, but
it works in a Thousand Instances of Vain Disputations, Competitions, and
other Tryals of Mastery and Skill, where there’s little more then Pride,
Stomach, Will and Vanity, to uphold the Contest. Nay, and he that has the
better on’t at last, is only the more Fortunate Fool of the Two. Let but
any Man set before him the Vexatious Delays, Quirks and Expences of most
of our _Barretry Suits at Law_, and ’tis odds he finds at the Foot of the
Account, the _Play not worth the Candle_.