X. INTRODUCTION 



war seem almost wholly to have occupied their time and 

 attention. Their kings ruled over them with despotic 

 sway, and the will of the prince was the only law: and 

 thus the barbarism of the subject and the tyranny of the 

 ruler went hand in hand together. That over-swollen 

 pride, which seems the natural accompaniment of despotic 

 power, blinds the understandings of its possessors, and 

 renders them wholly regardless of the important trust 

 reposed in them. The evils arising out of their bad 

 government, are felt, more or less, by the whole people 

 over whom they preside; and pride and arrogance pre- 

 vent the approach of sincerity and truth. The sycophant 

 and the slave then only find admission, and all other 

 men are kept at a distance. While kings and governors 

 were of this character, the voice of truth could only reach 

 their ears through allegory and fable, which took their rise 

 in the infancy of learning, and seem to have been the 

 only safe mode of conveying admonition to tyrants. This 

 pleasing method of instilling instruction into the mind, 

 has been found by experience to be the shortest and best 

 way of accomplishing that end, among all ranks and con- 

 ditions of men. 



The first Fable upon record, is that of Jotham and 

 the Trees, in the Bible; and the next, that of The Poor 

 Man and his Lamb, as related by Nathan to King David, 

 and which carried with it a blaze of truth that flashed 

 conviction on the mind of the royal transgressor. Lessons 

 of reproof, religion, and morality, were, we find, continually 

 delivered in this mode, by the sages of old, to the exalted 

 among mankind. 



It is asserted by authors, that Apologues and Fables 

 had their origin in the eastern world, and that the most 

 ancient of them were the productions of Yeeshnou Sarma r 

 commonly called Pilpay, whose beautiful collections of 

 Apologues were esteemed as sacred books in India and 

 Persia, whence they were spread abroad among other 

 nations, and were by them celebrated and holden in much 



