I Would Like To Tell You A Story

From Aesop's fables

 

Once upon a time Aesop was sitting by the road when a traveller stopped and asked him. “What sort of people lives in Athens?” “Tell me where you come from,” replied Aesop. “Oh,” said the traveller, frowning. “I come from Argos - a wretched place, full of liars and thieves and unfriendly people.”

 

Aesop said sadly, “I’m sorry to tell you friend, you’ll find the people of Athens just the same!”

 

Presently another traveller came by, and he too, asked what sort of people lived in Athens. To which Aesop again said. “Tell me where you come from.” “Oh,” said the traveller smiling. “I come from the kindest city in the world – Argos, where everyone was decent and easy to get on with…”

 

Aesop said, “Friend, I’m glad to say that you’ll find the people of Athens just the same!”

 

 

 

 

 

The Goods and Ills

 

There was a time in the youth of the world when Goods and Ills entered equally into the concerns of men, so that the Goods did not prevail to make them altogether blessed, nor the Ills to make them wholly miserable. But owing to the foolishness of mankind the Ills multiplied greatly in number and increased in strength, until it seemed as though they would deprive the Goods of all share in human affairs, and banish them from the earth.

 

The latter, therefore, betook themselves to heaven and complained to Jupiter of the treatment they had received, at the same time praying him to grant them protection from the Ills, and to advise them concerning the manner of their intercourse with men. Jupiter granted their request for protection, and decreed that for the future they should not go among men openly in a body, and so be liable to attack from the hostile Ills, but singly and unobserved, and at infrequent and unexpected intervals.

 

Hence it is that the earth is full of Ills, for they come and go as they please and are never far away; while Goods, alas! Come one by one only, and have to travel all the way from heaven, so that they are very seldom seen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Aesop embodies an epigram not uncommon in human history; his fame is all the more deserved because he never deserved it. The firm foundations of common sense, the shrewd shots at uncommon sense, that characterise all the Fables, belong not him but to all humanity.

 

These ancient and universal tales are mostly about animals; as the latest paintings discovered in the oldest pre-historic caverns are all of animals. Man, in his simpler state, always felt that he himself was something too mysterious to be drawn. But the legend he carved under these cruder symbols was everywhere the same; and whether fables began with Aesop or began with Adam, whether they were German and mediaeval as Reynard the Fox, or as French and Renaissance as La Fontaine. The message is always essentially the same: that superiority is always insolent, because it is always accidental. That pride goes before a fall; and that there is such a thing as being too clever by half.

You will not find any other legend but this written upon the rocks by any hand of man. There is every type and time of fable: but you will find there is only one moral to the fable; because there is only one moral to everything.

 

 

 

 

Everyone has a book in them

 

 

Isn’t it sad when people, having reached a certain birthday milestone, decide that life holds nothing new, exciting or even worthwhile for them anymore?

 

Far better, surely, to be like author Mary Ogilvie who, in the 1800’s and having just celebrated her ninety-third birthday, saw her first book published! It went by the grand sounding title of “A Scottish Childhood and What Happened After”

 

They do say that everyone has a book in them. Have you started yours yet? Mary Ogilvie did – and she finished it!

 

 

Neglect not the gift that is in thee…

 

1 Timothy 4:14