Note 31 — THE PHILOSOPHY OF PROVERBS.
Reading edition
One of the fruit trenchers, for such these roundels are called in the Gent. Mag. for 1798, p. 398, is engraved there, and the inscriptions of an entire set given.—See also the Supplement to that volume, p. 1187. The author of the “Art of English Poesie,” 1589, tells us they never contained above one verse, or two at the most, but the shorter the better. Two specimens may suffice the reader. One, under the symbol of a skull, thus morally discourses:—