p some answer that will not expose their
ignorance. And oh, what wretched work they sometimes make with their
answers. They make perfect fools of themselves.

People never appear well, among those of good sense, who attempt to
pass themselves off as knowing more than they do. It is not to be
expected that any one person can know everything; and why should you,
or anybody else, be ashamed to own that you can't tell all about this
thing, or that thing? Why it is often one part of wisdom to see that
you can't understand a particular subject, and another part of wisdom
to confess that you can't understand it.

I think that the dog, who figures with a certain vain, self-conceited
monkey, in the fable, showed a good deal of wisdom in his remarks.

The monkey, you must know, belonged to a very learned astronomer. The
animal often watched his master, while he was looking through his
telescope. "There must be something delightful in that," he thought,
and one day, when the astronomer was absent, the monkey looked through
the instrument for a long time. But he saw nothing strange or
wonderful; and so he concluded that his master was a fool, and that
the telescope was all nonsense. Not long after that, he met Rover,
the family dog, and he told him what he thought of his master. "And
what do _you_ think of the matter, friend Rover?" he added.

"I don't know the use of the telescope," said the dog, "and I don't
know how wise our master may be. But I am satisfied of two things."

"What are they?" the monkey asked.

"First," said the dog, "that telescopes were not made for monkeys to
look through; and second, that monkeys were not made to look through
telescopes."

[Illustration: THE LEARNED GEESE.]

XI.

THE LEARNED GEESE.

A FABLE.

A company of geese used to meet together very often, to talk about the
affairs of the nation, and to contrive ways and means to do the public
good. They were full of learning; had read all the valuable books that
ever were printed in the goose language; and had got the notion into
their heads that when they died, wisdom would perish in the earth.
They looked down upon the great mass of goosehood about them with
feelings of pity--almost of contempt. At their public meetings--which
were held pretty often, for they had much more public than private
business to attend to--they occupied a great share of their time in
discussing questions which were so deep and muddy, that nobody but
t