210 FABLES. 



APPLICATION. 



WE ought never to supplicate the divine power, 

 but through motives of religion and virtue. Prayers 

 dictated by blind self-interest, or to gratify some 

 misguided passion, cannot, it is presumed, be ac- 

 ceptable to the Deity: and of all the involuntary 

 sins which men commit, scarcely any are more 

 frequent than their praying absurdly and impro- 

 perly, as well as unseasonably, when their time 

 might have been employed to a better purpose. 

 Would men, as they ought to do, obey the com- 

 mands, of Omnipotence, by fulfilling their moral 

 duties, and endeavour with all their might to live 

 as justly as they can, a just Providence would give 

 them what they ought to have; but stupidity and 

 ignorance, until better informed, and divested of 

 superstition and bigotry, will continue to form 

 their notions of the Supreme Being from their own 

 poor shallow conceptions; and nothing contributes 

 more to keep up this injudicious practice among 

 simple, but perhaps well-meaning people, than the 

 numerous collections of those crude rhapsodies, 

 the offspring of itinerant bigotry, with which the 

 country overflows; while most of those prayers 

 are neglected which have been composed with due 

 reflection and matured deliberation, by the most 

 learned and pious of men. This Fable also teaches 

 us, that frequently the gratification of our vain 

 prayers w r ould only lead us into dangers and evils, 

 of the existence of which we had no previous sus- 

 picion. 



