It is better to pursue the dictates of one’s own reason, than attempt to please every body; for to do this is next to impossible. Therefore we ought to decide according to the best of our judgment, and correct our mistakes from our own experience. Wise men are instructed by reason; men of less understanding by experience; the most ignorant by necessity; and beasts by instinct. When a man so neglects himself, as not to make a just use of his reason and his mental powers, in combating with prejudice and folly, as well as the caprice of others, he will ever be led on in a maze of error, wavering and embarrassed about pursuing this or that path, until between them he is lost in a labyrinth, from which he will never be able to extricate himself as long as he lives.
A commonwealth of Ants, having, after a busy summer, provided every thing for their wants in the winter, were about shutting themselves up for that dreary season, when a Grasshopper in great distress, and in dread of perishing with cold and hunger, approached their avenues, and with great humility begged they would relieve his wants, and permit him to take shelter in any corner of their comfortable mansion. One of the Ants asked him how he had disposed of his time in summer, that he had not taken pains and laid in a stock, as they had done? Alas! my friends, says he, I passed away the time merrily and pleasantly, in drinking, singing, and dancing, and never once thought of winter. If that be the case, replied the Ant, all I have to say is this: that they who drink, sing, and dance in the summer, run a great risk of starving in the winter.
As summer is the season in which the industrious laborious husbandman lays up his supplies for the winter, so youth and manhood are the times of life which we should employ in laying in such a stock as may suffice for helpless old age; yet there are many whom we call rational creatures, who squander away in a profuse prodigality, whatever they get in their younger days, as if the infirmity of age would require no supplies to support it, or at least would find them administered to it in some miraculous way. From this Fable we learn this admirable lesson, never to lose the present opportunity of fairly and honestly providing against the future evils and accidents of life; and while health and the vigour of our faculties remain firm and entire, to lay them out to the best advantage; so that when age and infirmities despoil us of our strength and abilities, we may not have to bewail that we have neglected to provide for the wants of our latter days: for it should always be remembered, that “a youth of revels breeds an age of care,” and that temperance in youth lays the foundation of health and comfort for old age.