When little folks will ape the great,
'Tis easy to foresee their fate.
A Frog, a well fed Ox had seen,
And envying much his goodly mien;
She puff'd and swell'd her wrinkl'd hide;
And to her brood in triumph cried,
"Well! do I equal him in size?"
"Ah, no!" a little one replies.
Again her stretch'd-out sides dilate;
The difference still, they said, was great.
One effort more, in fate's despight,
She desperate made with all her might:
'Twas all in vain. The reptile, curst
With envy and ambition, burst.
Source: Boothby - Phaedrus 1.23.
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