An ant spent all the summer running about the fields and collecting grains of wheat and barley to store for the winter. A beetle which saw it expressed amazement at its industry in working hard even during the season when other creatures had a holiday and rested from their labours. At the time, the ant held its peace. But later on, when winter set in and the rain washed away the dung, the beetle came famished with hunger and begged the ant for a share of its food. “You should have worked,” the ant replied, “when I was hard at work, instead of sneering at me. If you had done so, you would not be short of food now.”
The ant teaches men to take thought for the morrow in a season of abundance, lest, when times change, they suffer dire distress.
It was winter time; the ants’ store of grain had got wet and they were laying it out to dry. A hungry cicada asked them to give it something to eat. “Why did you not gather food in the summer, like us?” “I hadn’t time,” it replied, “I was busy making sweet music.” The ants laughed at it. “Very well,” they said, “since you piped in summer, now dance in winter.”
In everything beware of negligence, if you want to escape distress and danger.
