THE LION, THE TIGER, AND THE WOLF.
A Lion and a Tiger, at the same instant seized on a young Fawn, which they immediately killed. This they had no sooner performed, than they fell to fighting, in order to decide whose property it should be. The battle was so obstinate, that they were both compelled, by weariness and loss of blood, to desist and lie down breathless and quite disabled. A Wolf passing that way, perceiving how the case stood, very impudently stepped up and seized the booty, which they had all this while been contending for, and carried it off. The two combatants, who beheld this without being able to prevent it, could only make this reflection: How foolish, said they, has been our conduct! Instead of being contented, as we ought, with our respective shares, our senseless rage has rendered us unable to prevent this rascally Wolf from robbing us of the whole.
APPLICATION.
When people go to law about an uncertain title, and have spent the value of their whole estate in the contest, nothing is more common than to find that some unprincipled attorney has secured the object in dispute to himself. The very name of law seems to imply equity and justice, and that is the bait which has drawn in many to their ruin. If we would lay aside passion, prejudice, and folly, and think calmly of the matter, we should find that going to law is not the best way of deciding differences about property; it being, generally speaking, much safer to trust to the arbitration of two or three honest sensible neighbours, than at a vast expence of money, time, and trouble, to run through the tedious frivolous forms, with which, by the artifices of greedy lawyers, a court of judicature is contrived to be attended. Or if a case should happen to be so intricate that a man of common sense cannot distinguish who has the best title, how easy would it be to have the opinion of the best counsel in the land, and agree to abide by his decision. If it should appear dubious, even after that, how much better would it be to divide the thing in dispute, rather than go to law, and hazard the losing, not only of the whole, but costs and damages into the bargain!