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Aesop's Fables: Phaedrus

Book II - III. Aesopus ad Quendam de Successu Improborum (Perry 64)

Laceratus quidam morsu vehementis canis,
tinctum cruore panem misit malefico,
audierat esse quod remedium vulneris.
Tunc sic Aesopus: 'Noli coram pluribus
hoc facere canibus, ne nos vivos devorent,
cum scierint esse tale culpae praemium'.
Successus improborum plures allicit.

The Man and the Dog (trans. C. Smart)

Torn by a Cur, a man was led
To throw the snappish thief some bread
Dipt in the blood, which, he was told,
Had been a remedy of old.
Then Esop thus: - "Forbear to show
A pack of dogs the thing you do,
Lest they should soon devour us quite,
When thus rewarded as they bite."
One wicked miscreant's success
Makes many more the trade profess.


Latin text from Phaedrus at The Latin Library (Ad Fontes), English translations from The Fables of Phaedrus Translated into English Verse by Christopher Smart (London: 1913). Ben Perry, Babrius and Phaedrus (Loeb), contains the Latin texts of Phaedrus, with a facing English translation, along with a valuable appendix listing all the Aesop's fables attested in Greek and/or in Latin. Invaluable.