"As a clownish Fellow was driving his cart along a deep miry lane, the wheel stuck so fast in the clay, that his horse could not draw it out. Upon this he fell a bawling and praying to Hercules to come and help him. Hercules, looking down from a cloud, bid him not to lie there like an idle, dastardly booby as he was, but get up and whip his horse, and clap his shoulder stoutly to the wheel, adding that this was the only way for him to obtain assistance."

 The Fables of Æsop: "Hercules and the Carter."