The ant iz a menny footted insekt.

They live about one thousand five hundred and fifty of them (more or less), in the same hole in the ground, and hold their property in common.

They hav no holydays, no eight-hour sistem, nor never strike for enny higher wages.

They are cheerful little toilers, and hav no malice, nor back door to their hearts.

Their iz no sedentary loafers amung them, and yu never see one out ov a job.

They git up arly, go tew bed late, work all the time, and eat on the run.

Yu never see two ants argueing sum phoolish question that neither ov them didn’t understand; they don’t kare whether the moon iz inhabited, or not; nor whether a fish weighing two pounds, put into a pail ov water allreddy phull, will make the pail slop over, or weigh more.

They ain’t a-hunting after the philosopher’s stone, nor gitting crazy over the cauze of the sudden earthquakes.

They don’t care whether Jupiter iz 30 or 31 millions ov miles up in the air, nor whether the arth bobs around on its axes or not, so long az it don’t bob over their korn krib and spill their barley.

They are simple, little, bizzy aunts, full ov faith, working hard, living prudently, committing no sin, prazeing God by minding their own bizzness, and dieing when their time cums, tew make room for the next crop ov aunts.

They are a reproach to the lazy, an encouragement tew the industrious, a rebuke tew the viscious, and a studdy to the Christian.

If yu want tew take a lesson in arkitekture, go and set down bi the side ov their hole in the ground, and wonder how so menny kan liv so thick.

If yure pashunce needs consolashun, watch the ants, and be strengthened.

If man had (added tew hiz capacity) the pashunce and grit ov theze little atoms ov animated natur, every mountin on the buzzum ov the arth would, before this, hav bin levelled, and every inch ov surface would scream with fruitfulness, and countless lots ov human critters would hav bin added to the inhabitants ov the universe, and bin fed on corn and other sass.

I hav sot by the hour and a haff down near an aunt-hill, and marvelled; hav wondered at their instinkts, and hav thought how big must be the jackass who waz satisfied to beleave that even an ant, the least ov the bugs, could hav been created, made bizzy, and sot to work by chance.

Oh, how i do pity the individual who beleaves that all things here are the work ov an acksident! He robs himself ov all plezzure on earth, and all right in Heaven.

I had rather be an ant (even a humbly, bandy-legged, profane swearing ant), than to look upon the things ov this world az i would on the throw ov the dice.

Ants are older than Adam.

Man (for very wize reasons) want bilt untill all other things were finished, and pronounced good.

If man had bin made fust he would hav insisted upon bossing the rest ov the job.

He probably would hav objekted to having enny little bizzy aunts at all, and various other objekshuns would hav bin offered, equally green.

I am glad that man waz the last thing made.

If man hadn’t hav bin made at all, you would never hav heard me find enny fault about it.

I haven’t much faith in man, not bekauze he kant do well but bekauze he wont.

Ants hav bye laws, and a constitushun, and they mean sumthing.

Their laws aint like our laws, made with a hole in them, so that a man kan steal a hoss and ride thru them on a walk.

They don’t hav enny whisky ring, that iz virtewous, simply, bekauze it hooks bi the millyun, and then legalizes its own ackts.

They don’t hav enny legislators that yu kan buy, nor enny judges, laying around on the haff shell, reddy tew be swallered.

I rather like the aunts, and think now I shall sell out mi money and real estate, and jine them.

I had rather jine them than the bulls or the bears, i like their morals better.

The bulls and the bears handle more money, it iz true, and make a grate deal more noize in Wall street, one ov them sticking his horn into a flabby piece ov Erie and tossing it up into the air, and the other ketching it when it cums down, and trampling it under hiz paws.

This may be phun for the bulls and the bears, but it iz wuss than the cholera morbust for poor Erie.

Ants never disturb Erie; yu couldn’t sell one eny Erie, enny more than you could sell one skrip on the cod-fish banks ov Nufoundland.

Ants are a honest, hard-tugging little people, but whether they marry, and giv in marriage, iz beyond my strength; but if they don’t they are no wuzz oph than they are out west (near the city of Chicago), where they marry to-day and apply for an injunkshun to-morrow; and are reddy the next day to fite it out agin on sum other line.

Wedlok out west (near the grate grain mart Chicago) iz one ov them kind ov locks that almost enny boddy kan pick.