Vomit!

September 29th, 2018| Topic: RaMbLeS | 0

The other day a Morgan County, Tennessee, correctional facility inmate escaped quite easily. But getting back in was another problem. He was caught doing so. Yes, caught attempting to sneak back in.

Robert Fusco, 37, was serving a 68-year sentence for especially aggravated kidnapping, when he decided to break out and then … break back in, two days later, accompanied by loads of contraband: drugs, cell phones, tobacco, and the like.

Apparently he was trying to sneak in his cache of illicit goods to sell on the prison’s black market, when he was caught.

We weren’t told how the guy managed to escape. But he did have help. Seven others, including two former correctional officers, were indicted along with Fusco as conspirators in the contraband scheme. Each of them was attempting to smuggle in stuff as well. Jarrett Tolley, 30 (now Alyssa Tolley), one of Fusco’s former cellmates tried to bring in hacksaw blades. Josh Sexton, 34, ex-president of the local correctional officers’ union, attempted to slide in unspecified contraband “under his groin,” reported the local news. And so on …

Fusco is now being held as a maximum-security inmate.

That bizarre scheme reminds me of this:

Like a dog that returns to its vomit
Is a fool who repeats his folly.
Proverbs 26:11

This proverb is also cited in the New Testament by Peter, applying it to false teachers:

For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world
by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,
they are again entangled in them and are overcome,
the last state has become worse for them than the first.
For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness,
than having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them.
It has happened to them according to the true proverb, “A dog returns to its own vomit,”
and, “A sow, after washing, returns to wallowing in the mire.”
2 Peter 2:20–24

Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936) employs Proverbs 26:11 in his poem, “The Gods of the Copybook Headings,” as an example of repeated folly:

As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began.
That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
And the burnt Fool’s bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire.”

The verses on either side of Proverbs 26:11 also deals with fools:

Like an archer who wounds everyone,
So is he who hires a fool or who hires those who pass by.
Do you see a man wise in his own eyes?
There is more hope for a fool than for him.
Proverbs 26:10, 12

In fact, Proverbs has a lot to say about fools and folly (ungodly persons and ungodly behavior).

The way of a fool is right in his own eyes,
But a wise man is he who listens to counsel.
Proverbs 12:15

A wise man is cautious and turns away from evil,
But a fool is arrogant and careless.
Proverbs 14:16

A fool does not delight in understanding,
But only in revealing his own mind.
Proverbs 18:2

Better is a poor man who walks in his integrity
Than he who is perverse in speech and is a fool.
Proverbs 19:1

He who trusts in his own heart is a fool,
But he who walks wisely will be delivered.
Proverbs 28:26

So, stay away from fools and folly:

Leave the presence of a fool,
Or you will not discern words of knowledge.
Proverbs 14:7