The Vanity of heaping up Riches. [ 405]
IT is a great deal of care and pains that the Spider takes in weaving her web, she runneth much, and often up and down, she fetcheth a compass this way and that way,* 1.1 and returneth often to the same point, she spendeth her self in multitudes of fine threads, to make her self a round Cabinet, she exenterateth her self, and worketh out her own bowels, to make an artificial and curious piece of work; which when it is made, is apt to be blown away with every pusse of wind; she hang∣eth it up aloft, she fastneth it to the roof of the house, she strengthneth it with many a thread,* 1.2 wheeling often round about, not sparing her own bowels, but spen∣ding them willingly upon her work; And when she hath done all this, spun her fine threads, weaved them one within another, wrought her self a fine Canopy, hanged it aloft, and thinks all's sure; on a sudden, in the twinckling of an eye, with a little sweep of a Beesom all falls to the ground, and so her labour perisheth: But here is not all; Poor Spider, she is killed either in her own web, or else she is taken in her own snare, haled to death, and trodden under foot; Thus the silly Ani∣mal may be truly said either to weave her own winding sheet, or to make a snare to hang her self. Just so do many Men wast and consume themselves to get prefer∣ment, to enjoy pleasures, to heap up riches, and encrease them; and to that end they spend all their wit, and oftentimes the health of their bodies, running up and down,* 1.3 labouring and sweating, carking and caring; And when they have done all this, they have but weaved the Spiders web to catch flyes, yea, oftentimes are caught in their own nets, are made instruments of their own destruction, they take a great deal of pains with little success, to no end or purpose.