PREFACE. THE ear of self-love, too sensitive to bear the direct voice of truth, can tolerate only its reverberation, from a fable. Rebuke a courtier for his sycophancy, a lawyer for his cunning, a prelate for his pride, and he would shrink with disgust, evade with dexterity, or resent with indignation: yet the one, can censure the duplicity of the ape; the second, astutely impugn the fox; the third, sententiously anathematize the peacock; until the moral, like a glass, presents to each original, the fabled personification of his own vice, and like an awkward swordsman, he suddenly finds himself wounded by the blow, beneath which he expected to prostrate his opponent. |