An Ass congratulated a Horse on being so ungrudgingly and carefully provided for, while he himself had scarcely enough to eat and not even that without hard work. But when war broke out, a heavily armed soldier mounted the Horse, and riding him to the charge, rushed into the very midst of the enemy. The Horse was wounded and fell dead on the battlefield. Then the Ass, seeing all these things, changed his mind, and commiserated the Horse.
Credits
Aesop was an ancient Greek storyteller, believed to have lived around 620–564 BCE, whose fables have shaped moral literature across the world for over two millennia. "The Ass and the Charger" is one of his shorter, sharper parables, using the contrast between a working animal and a warhorse to explore envy and the hidden dangers of an enviable life.
