The Frog and the Ox

The story related by Phaedrus has a frog motivated by envy of the ox, illustrating the moral that 'the needy man, while affecting to imitate the powerful, comes to ruin'.

[4] Horace places a different version of the story towards the end of a long conversation on the demented behaviour of mankind (Satires II.3) where Damasippus accuses the poet of trying to keep up with his rich patron Maecenas.

His telling follows the Babrius version in which an ox has stepped on a brood of young frogs and the father tries equaling the beast in size when told of it.

[5] The folly of trying to keep up with the Joneses is the conclusion drawn by La Fontaine's Fables from the Phaedrus version of the tale, applying it to the artistocratic times in which La Fontaine lived ("The frog that wished to be as big as the ox", Fables I.3): Two similar stories existed in Greek sources but were never adopted in the rest of Europe.

'[8] There are also African variations on the theme, including one related among the Fon people of Benin in which a frog competes similarly against an ox until it bursts.