8o FABLES. 



my former mild master, to become the servant of 

 one, who, after working me to death, will not spare 

 my very hide after I am dead. 



APPLICATION. 



THE man that carries about with him the plague 

 of a restless mind, can never be pleased ; he is ever 

 shifting and changing, and is in truth not so weary 

 of his condition as of himself. Seldom or never 

 contented with his lot, he is ever hunting after 

 happiness where it is not to be found, without ever 

 looking for it Avhere it is. He indulges in the 

 strange propensity of his nature, which leads him 

 to suppose that his own lot is the most miserable, 

 and therefore concludes that any change he can 

 make must be for the better. He loses sight of the 

 virtues of patience, constancy, and resignation, and 

 seems not to know that every station in life has its 

 real or imaginary inconveniences ; and that it is 

 better to bear with those which we are accustomed 

 to endure, and of which we know the utmost extent, 

 than by aiming at the seeming advantages of 

 another way of life, to subject ourselves to all its 

 hidden miseries. 



