While the injured party in the debate between the man and the fly took the moral stance that an unprovoked attack merited a severe response, the fly argued that to make too much of a slight annoyance invites ridicule. For Phaedrus "This example shows that to err by accident is pardonable, but to do damage deliberately deserves any punishment, in my opinion."[10] While the prose versions by George Fyler Townsend[11] and Vernon Jones[12] omit the moral, they do include the man’s vigorous defiance.