The Bird-Catcher And The Blackbird

A Bird-catcher was setting his snares; a Blackbird, as he flew by, caught sight of him.

“For the love of God,” he said to him, “do tell me what you are building there?”

“I am founding a complete city.”

The Blackbird believed this deceitful answer, and alighted on the net. Scarcely had he touched it, before he found himself caught.

When the Bird-catcher came up the Blackbird said to him: “If this is the way you build your city, you won’t attract many inhabitants.”

All men shun tyrannical magistrates and oppressors, who, by their violence, scatter ruin around them.