This Fable hits the Humour of the World to a Hair, and it holds from him
that sits upon the Throne, to the poor Devil that has scarce a Tatter
to his Breech. Men are easie to Pardon Offences committed against other
People; but when they come to be Touch’d Once in their Own Copy-Hold,
the _Lion’s Fat-Goose_ weighs down all the _Cocks_ and _Hens_ in the
Country: And in that Case the _Wolf_ leaves his Brother _Fox_ at the
Gallows. The Rogue has Stoll’n a _Prerogative-Goose_, says he, and the
King will never Pardon him. This is according to Practice, how contrary
soever to the true Measures of Generosity, Honour and Justice. _That’s
the veriest Villain in Nature_, cries one, _for I’ll tell ye how he
Us’d Me. As Worthy a Man_, says another, _as ever trod upon a Shoe of
Leather; for really I have been much Beholden to him_. In short, there
is such an Affinity betwixt our Prudentials and our Appetites, that they
are like two _Unison Strings_, if you Touch the One, the Other Moves
by Consent. There was a certain _Filacer_ (an Officer of the Common
Pleas,) that in _Oliver_’s Days was mightily concern’d upon the Subject
of the Government, and Dilating in a kind of Rhetorical _Climax_ upon
the Iniquity of the Times: Well (says he,) here’s the Best Church upon
the Face of the Earth Destroy’d; the Nobility and Gentry trampled under
Foot, and begger’d; the Commonalty Enslaved; the Laws Overturn’d; the
Constitution of Parliaments Dissolv’d; a most Pious, Gracious King
Murder’d; And now to _Consumate the Villany_, they say they are putting
down the _Filacers_. When it comes once to the _Filacers_, it Touches to
the Quick.