an would do all
the good he might within an hour's walk from his house, he would live
the happier and the longer: for nothing is so conducive to longevity
as the union of activity and content. But, like children, we deviate
from the road, however well we know it, and run into mire and puddles
in despite of frown and ferule.

_Rochefoucault._ Go on, M. La Fontaine! pray go on. We are walking in
the same labyrinth, always within call, always within sight of each
other. We set out at its two extremities, and shall meet at last.

_La Fontaine._ I doubt it. From deficiency of care proceed many
vices, both in men and children, and more still from care taken
improperly. Mr. Hobbes attributes not only the order and peace of
society, but equity and moderation and every other virtue, to the
coercion and restriction of the laws. The laws, as now constituted, do
a great deal of good; they also do a great deal of mischief. They
transfer more property from the right owner in six months than all the
thieves of the kingdom do in twelve. What the thieves take they soon
disseminate abroad again; what the laws take they hoard. The thief
takes a part of your property: he who prosecutes the thief for you
takes another part: he who condemns the thief goes to the tax-gatherer
and takes the third. Power has been hitherto occupied in no employment
but in keeping down Wisdom. Perhaps the time may come when Wisdom
shall exert her energy in repressing the sallies of Power.

_Rochefoucault._ I think it more probable that they will agree; that
they will call together their servants of all liveries, to collect
what they can lay their hands upon; and that meanwhile they will sit
together like good housewives, making nets from our purses to cover
the coop for us. If you would be plump and in feather, pick up your
millet and be quiet in your darkness. Speculate on nothing here below,
and I promise you a nosegay in Paradise.

_La Fontaine._ Believe me, I shall be most happy to receive it there
at your hands, my lord duke.

The greater number of men, I am inclined to think, with all the
defects of education, all the frauds committed on their credulity, all
the advantages taken of their ignorance and supineness, are disposed,
on most occasions, rather to virtue than to vice, rather to the kindly
affections than the unkindly, rather to the social than the selfish.

_Rochefoucault._ Here we differ: and were my opinion the same as
yours, my book would