There is need of parsley here, was used to be said when any one was affected with a disease, for which there was no known remedy, and which would soon extinguish his life; alluding to the custom of scattering parsley over their graves, which was the ancient custom among the Grecians. They were also used to crown those who were conquerors in the Isthmian games, with this herb.

Weaving of cobwebs, which persons are said to do, who waste their time and money in frivolous pursuits; in procuring what will be of no use when obtained; in collecting butterflies, cockle-shells, etc. «et stultus labor est ineptiarum», and such like fooleries. Laws also, which by the great are easily evaded, and which seem only made entrap the poor, are, by common consent, called cobweb contrivances. They were so called by Anarcharis. «They catch», he said, «small flies, but wasps and hornets break them with impunity». «Hence little villains oft submit to fate, That great ones may enjoy the world in state».

Do not wear a ring, or a shoe, we say, that is too tight, which may impede you in walking, or in any other actions. Metaphorically, do not by imprudence waste your property, and contract debts, which will lead to the loss of your liberty; neither pay so much deference to the opinions of others, as to embrace them implicitly, without first submitting them to a careful examination. Persons who are so tractable are said to be led by the nose, and of such, artful men do not fail to take advantage. Also, be not ready to bind yourselves by vows, or oaths, to do, or to refrain from any act. If the thing be proper in itself, you will have sufficient incentive to do it, without laying such obligations or restrictions upon yourself; the necessity for which can only arise from imbecility, or inconstancy of mind, which you should rather endeavor to cure than to indulge.

Teaching an ass to obey the rein, which the ancients thought to be nearly as difficult as to wash a blackamoor white, or to do any other impossible thing, «Labour in vain». Though I think it is not now found to be so difficult, and those animals are made to serve for many useful purposes. The adage is used by Horace, and with much elegance, in his first Satire.
«At si cognatos nullo natura labore
Quos tibi dat, retinere velis, servareque amicos;
Infelix operam perdas; ut si quis asellum
In campo doceat parentem currere frœnis».
But if you expect to obtain the affection of your relations, or to preserve the esteem of your friends, without making any return for their kindness, you will find yourself, wretch that you are, miserably deceived, as he would be, who should attempt to reach an ass to be obedient to the rein.

More crafty than the cuckoo. The cuckoo is never at the pains of building a nest, but having found one belonging to some other bird, fit for her purpose, she throws out the eggs she finds in it, and deposits her own in their place. The owner of the nest, not perceiving the fraud, hatches the cuckoo's egg, and nurtures the young one, thus freeing its mother from all care for her offspring. The cuckoo is a bird of passage; it appears in this country in the month of April, and leaves it in June. The female lays only a single egg, usually in the nest of the hedge-sparrow, as we learn from the following distich.

«The hedge-sparrow fed the cuckoo so long,
That she had her head bit off by her young».
(Shakespeare, King Lear, Act 1, Scene 4)

Athos covers with its shade the Lemnian ox. The adage was used to be applied to any one injuring the character, or obscuring the fame of another. In the island of Lemnos, there was formerly the statue of an Ox, of an immense size. This, however, did not prevent its being obscured by the shadow of Mount Athos, which, though at a great distance, extended itself over a large portion of the island.

Against money or a bribe, reason or eloquence are of little avail, an apothegm no where more known or acknowledged than in this country, where, according to a saying imputed to Sir Robert Walpole, every man has its price. L' argento è un buon passeporto, money is a good passport, and Quien dinero tiene, haze lo que quiere, he who has money has friends, fame, and whatever he pleases: we are not therefore single in the homage we pay to it, and money, we say, is welcome every where. Ovid also long since, addressing himself to it, said

–––«Quid non mortalia pectora cogis,
Auri sacra fames».

What atrocities will not the cursed thirst after gold impel men to commit!

Listen and consider. Hear what is said to you, and weigh it in your mind, before you give your opinion. Or it may be said by a person speaking, «Listen attentively to what I am about to relate, you will find it deserving your serious consideration».

A man should either be born a king or an idiot, he should be at the top, or at the bottom of the wheel of fortune; at the least, there are men so ambitious, of such high and daring spirits, that they will venture every thing, their fortunes, and their lives, to attain to the highest rank in their country. They will be, «aut Caesar, aut nullus», either kings or beggars. O rico, o pinjada, rich, or hanged, neck, or nothing. Milton makes Lucifer say,
«To reign is worth ambition, though in hell.
Better to reign in hell, than serve in heaven».
But the adage seems to have a special reference to the respect usually paid to idiots. In Turkey, and in other parts of the east, they were held in such veneration, that it was thought to be no less than a sin to oppose, or control them in anything they were disposed to do. They had therefore equal liberty with kings, who say and do whatever they please. To a late period, it was usual with the nobles, in this, as well as in other countries of Europe, to entertain in their houses a fool, for their diversion, who often took the liberty of reproving their masters for their follies, and in much freer language than any other persons were permitted to use. When Jaques, in As you like it, proposed putting on a fool's coat, he says, «[...]I must have liberty Withal, as large a charter as the wind, To blow on whom I please; for so fools have». May it be added, what is currently said, Fools are fortunate. They also may be said to be happy, as they neither anticipate evil, nor even feel the full pressure of it when present. Dieu aide à trois sortes de personnes, aux fous, aux enfans, et aux ivrognes. God protects three sorts of persons, fools, infants, and drunkards, the latter rarely falling, it is said, into any danger, even when full of drink. The French also say, Tete de fou ne blanchit jamais, the head of the fool never becomes grey, which is probably not better founded than the former observation.

The covetous man begins to be considered with complacence when he ceases to exist, or never does well until he dies; they are like swine, «which are never good until they come to the knife». The prodigal who dissipates his fortune by living voluptuously, easily conciliates to himself the friendship or kindness of the persons with whom he associates; he contributes to the support of those who furnish him with the means of enjoying his diversions and amusements; he shares his fortune with his friends, his servants, and his dependants: he is therefore usually spoken of with complacency. «He is a generous, liberal, open-hearted fellow, and no one's enemy but his own»; and when his fall is completed, even those who suffer mingle some regret for his misfortune, with the concern they feel for their own loss. But the covetous man neither meets with, nor is entitled to the same consideration from the world: even the most harmless of them, those who either came to their fortune by inheritance, or who have acquired it by fair dealing, as they use it exclusively for their own benefit, are hardly looked on as forming a part of the community in which they live; no one interests himself in their welfare; their success is not congratulated, nor their losses commiserated. The prodigal robs his heir, the miser himself.

«When all other sins are old in us, and go upon crutches,
Covetousness does but then lay in her cradle.
Lechery loves to dwell in the fairest lodgings,
And covetousness in the oldest buildings».

The bæta is said to have been a kind of garment, made of skins, long, and sufficiently large to invest the whole body, equally calculated therefore to guard against the cold in winter, and the scorching rays of the sun in summer. The adage was applied by the anccients to any objects that might be made to answer a variety of useful purposes: to literature, which is both useful and ornamental to every age and station in life, and to philosophy, which may enable us to bear prosperity without insolence, and adversity without debasement.

You know them to be wise by their beards. This was used to be applied to persons who placed all knowledge and goodness in dress, and external appearance, or in the performance of certain ceremonies. «I fast twice a week», said the Pharisee, «and give tithes of all I possess», but he was not accepted. «Si philosophum oporteat ex barba metiri, hircos primam laudem ablaturos», if the beard made the philosopher, then the goat would have a just right to that title, or as the Greek epigrammatist has it,

«If beards long and bushy true wisdom denote,
Then Plato must yield to a shaggy he-goat».

«At non omnes monachi sunt, qui cuculo onerantur, nec omnes generosi, qui torquem gestant auream, aut reges, qui diadernate insigniuntur»; but all are not monks who wear a cowl, or gentlemen who are decorated with golden chains, or kings who are crowned. Those only in reality deserve the titles, who act consistently with the characters they assume. For there are many who talk of Robin Hood, who never shot with his how. Diga barba qua haga, let your beard advise you; that is, let it remind you that you are a man, and that you do nothing unbecoming that character.

Philosophers even to the beard. Oh, he is a wise man, you may see it by his beard, may be applied ironically to persons of grave and serious manners, who wish to pass themselves off for men of more learning, or knowledge, than they really possess. As the beard is not completely formed until the age of manhood, it has always been considered as an emblem of wisdom. Il est tems d'etre sage, quand on a la barbe au menton, it is time to be wise now that you have a beard on your chin; and, Hombre de barba, with the Spaniards, means a man of knowledge, or intelligence. Diga barba que haga, let your beard advise you what is befitting you to do, and a poca barba, poca virguenza, little beard, little shame, or modesty. Quixadas sin barbas no merecen ser honradas, chins without beards deserve no honour. Faire la barbe, among the French, means to deceive, or impose on anyone, by superior address or cunning; also, to excel in wisdom and sagacity. Among the Persians, and perhaps generally in the east, the beard is held in great reverence, and to speak of it slightingly or disrespectfully, would be resented, and for a stranger to violate it, by touching it, would probably be avenged by instant death.

Men with beards. The term was applied by the Romans to persons of plain, simple, and rustic or primitive manners, who still retained the customs of their ancestors. They had not learned to shave their beards, which only began to be practised among them four hundred and fifty years after the building of the city. The first barbers, Pliny tells us, were introduced there from the island of Sicily.

He that accepts a favour, forfeits his liberty. By receiving obligations, particularly if from persons of bad morals, you are precluded the liberty of censuring vices so freely as you might be disposed, or as the subject you are treating might require, especially those vices of which you know them to be guilty; and in public dissensions, you are restrained from maintaining your own opinion, unless it accords with that of your patron. Erasmus, who manifestly held the same opinions on many points of religion, as were taught by Luther and his followers, was yet restrained from openly espousing them, as he received nearly the whole of his income, from persons of the Romish persuasion. Fille qui prend, the French say, son corps vend. The maid who takes presents, has deprived herself of the power of saying «no», or must permit liberties to be taken with her, which she would other wise resist. «Springes to catch woodcocks», says the sententious Polonius, cautioning his daughter against giving credit to Hamlet's promises and presents.

Ancient persons are twice children, or as we say, Once a man, and twice a child. Age ordinarily induces a degree of imbecility, both in the mind and body, resembling childhood. Persons in a very advanced age become feeble and impotent, their legs tremble, obliging them to support themselves with a stick; their hands shake, so that they are unable to cut their food, and at length of even carrying in to their mouths. They become toothless, and are obliged, like children, to be fed with spoon-meats; their eyes become weak, incapacitating them from reading, and their organs of hearing dull and obtuse, so that they can no longer take a part in conversation. These two sources of information being cut off, the mind, no longer solicited by the surrounding objects, or excited by the acquisition of new materials, becomes languid and inert; the traces of the knowledge it had acquired, become faint, and are at length nearly obliterated, and thus is induced a complete second childhood, «and mere oblivion, sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans every thing».
«Ubi jam validis quassatum est viribus aevi
Corpus, et obtusis cecitlerunt viribus artus,
Claudicat ingenium, delirat linguaque mensque».
LUCRET. Lib.III, lin 452.
When age prevails, And the quick vigour of each member fails, The mind's brisk powers decrease, and waste apace, And grave and reverend folly takes the place." Trans, by CREECH.

One man's meat is another man's poison. One man's loss is another's gain, or one man makes a fortune by the ruin of another: this is universally the case in war, and not unfrequently in law likewise.

The good shepherd shears, but does not flay his sheep. The good master only exacts such a portion of labour from his servants, as they may perform without injuring themselves. Tiberius Cæsar used this proverb, of which he is reputed to be the author, to restrain the rapacity of his courtiers, advising him to levy further imposts upon one of the provinces, which had been previously largely taxed. Alexander the Great, on a similar occasion, is said to have given the following: «Olitorem odi qui radicitus herbas excidat», he is a bad gardener, who, instead of cropping, tears the plants up by the roots. The woman who killed the hen, that brought her a golden egg every day, in the hope of becoming more speedily rich, falls under the censure of this adage.

With good or evil omens. You began the business under favourable, or unfavourable auspices, or under a fortunate or unfortunate star. The Greeks and Romans frequently formed their opinion of the success of any enterprize in which they were about to engage, from the flight, or from the chattering, or singing of birds. The Augur, whose office it was to expound to the people the meaning of the omens, is supposed to have derived the name, or title of the office, from avis garritus, the chattering of birds. Our countryman, Churchill, has ridiculed this superstition with much humour.

«Among the Romans not a bird,
Without a prophecy was heard;
Fortunes of empires ofttimes hung
On the magician magpye's tongue,
And every crow was to the state,
A sure interpreter of fate.
Prophets embodied in a college,
(Time out of mind your seats of knowledge),
Infallible accounts would keep,
When it was best to watch or sleep,
To eat, or drink, to go, or stay,
And when to fight, or run away,
When matters were for action ripe,
By looking at a double tripe;
When emperors would live or die,
They in an asses skull could spy;
When generals would their stations keep,
Or turn their backs in hearts of sheep».

"The Gost".

Some vestiges of this superstition are still to be found in this country, and many of our farmers' wives would be disconcerted at hearing the croaking of a raven, at the moment they were setting out on a journey, whether of business, or of pleasure. The following lines from Walker's Epictetus are introduced, to shew that though the vulgar, in the early ages, might believe in these fooleries, yet there were not wanting then, as well as now, persons who were able to ridicule and despise them.

«The direful raven's, or the night owl's voice,
Frightens the neighborhood with boding noise;
While each believes the knowing bird portends
Sure death, or to himself, or friends;
Though all that the nocturnal prophet knows,
Is want of food, which he by whooting shews».

Epictetus is supposed to have lived in the time of the Emperor Nero, more than 1700 years ago.