A bad King suddenly changed his behavior to good. Asked why he relates a story about animals coming to bad ends when they try to do bad things. Aha!
Whomever does what he ought not to receives what he does not want.
JBR Collection
There was once a certain King who did nothing but tyrannise over his people, ruining the rich and maltreating the poor, so that all his subjects, day and night, implored deliverance from his evil rule. One day, returning from the chase, he called his people together and said, “Good people, I know that during my whole reign I have been a hard and tyrannical master to you, but I assure you that from hence-forward you shall live in peace and at ease, and nobody shall dare to oppress you.” The people were overjoyed at this good news, and forbore to pray for the King’s death as formerly. In a word, this Prince made such an alteration in his conduct that he gained the name of “The Just,” and every one began to bless the felicity of his reign. One day one of his courtiers presumed to ask him the reason of so sudden and remarkable a change, and the King replied: “As I rode hunting the other day, I saw a dog in pursuit of a fox, and when he had overtaken him he bit off one of his feet; however, the fox, lame as he was, managed to escape into a hole. The dog, not being able to get him out, left him there; but he had hardly gone a hundred paces, when a man threw a great stone at him and cracked his skull. At the same instant the man met a horse that trod on his foot and lamed him for ever; and soon after the horse’s foot stuck so fast between two stones that he broke his leg in trying to get it out. Then said I to myself. ‘Men are used as they use others. Whosoever does that which he ought not to do, receives that which he is not willing to receive.'”
