Thieves rob a fellow who then talks them into returning a large part of the money and the robbers complain bitterly.
L’Estrange version
There was a knot of Good Fellows that borrow’d a small sum of mony of a Gentleman upon the King’s Highway: When they had taken all they could find; Dam ye for a Dog, says one of the Gang, You have more mony about you sirrah, some where or other. Lord, brother, says one of his companions, can’t ye take the Gentleman’s mony civilly, but you must swear and call names! As they were about to part, pray by your favour Gentlemen, says the Traveller, I have so many miles to go, and not one peny in my pocket to bear my charges; you seem to be Men of some Honour, and I hope you’l be so good as only to let me have so much of my mony back again, as will carry me to my journeys end. Ay, Ay, the Lord forbid else, they cry’d, and so they open’d one of the bags, and bad him please himself. He took them at their word, and presently fetch’d out a handful, as much as ever he could gripe. Why how now, says ond of the Blades, ye confounded son of a whore, ha’ ye no conscience?
Moral
‘Tis a notable trade that many people drive in the world, of pretending to make a conscience of one sin, and taking out their penn’orths in another. Some there are that commute smearing for whoring, as if the forbearance of the one, were a dispensation for committing of t’other. We have heard of others too, that have been strict observers of the Lords Day, and yet made no scruple at all of robbing the Lord’s Altars. But a good Christian and an honest man, must be all of a piece; and these inequalities of proceeding, will never hold water.
