W.C. Hazlitt, comp. English Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases. 1907.
Folly and learning to Goats
Folly and learning often dwell together.
Folly, as well as wisdom, is justified by its children.
Folly grows without watering.
Gli pazzi crescono senza inaffiarli. Ital.—R.
Folly is a bony dog.
Folly is the product of all countries.
Folly it is to spurn against a prick.
Folly tolls the bell, and a number long to hear it rung out.
See Armin’s Nest of Ninnies, 1608.
Fool, at ’em!
See Tales and Jests of Mr. Hugh Peters, 1660, sign. A 4. “I remember he [Peters] was once in company with some ladies, and extreme bashful; whereupon a gentleman reproved him in this wise, Fool at’em; and ever since sprung up that proverbial word, Fool, a-tum” (sic).—Epistle Dedicatory.
Foolish fear doubleth danger.
Foolish pity / spoils a city.
Foolish tongues talk by the dozen.
Fools are all the world over, as he said that shoo’d the goose.
Fools are pleased with their own blunders.
Fools are wise men in the affairs of women.
Fools build houses, and wise men live in them.
Optimum est alienâ frui insaniâ.—Cato.
Fools fat and foul make thick doings for the devil’s diet.
See Armin’s Nest of Ninnies, 1608.
Fools give, to please all but their own.
Fools haste is no speed.
Fools have fortune.
Googe’s Eglogs, 1563; Witts Recreations, 1640, repr. 155. The Scots say, Fools are aye fortunate.
Fools lade out all the water, and wise men take the fish.
Fools laugh at their own sport.
Fools live poor to die rich.
Fools make feasts, and wise men eat them.
Les fols font la fête et les sages le mangent. Fr. The same almost word for word. So in the Spanish, Los locos hazen los banquetes, y los sabios los comen.—R.
Fools no Latin know.
Fools refuse favours.
Fools set far trysts.
Fools set stools for wise men to stumble at.
Fools should not see half-done work.
Fools tie knots, and wise men loose them.
Fools will be meddling.
Fools will not part with their bauble for all Lombard Street.
Footman’s inn.
Apparently old slang for gaol. See The Penniles Parliament of Threadbare Poets, 1608, repr. 1842, p. 48.
Foppish dressing tells the world the outside is the best of the puppet.
For a flying enemy make a silver bridge.
For a good morrow.
Said of the former propensity of the Welsh to take offence, as they would quarrel if one wished another good morrow. When one marketwoman meets a second, she often seems to shake her fists at her; it is meant for a greeting, but looks like an invitation to fight.
For all the loves.
Gammer Gurton’s Needle, 1575 (Hazlitt’s Dodsley, iii. 254).
For all the world.
Still’s Gammer Gurton’s Needle, (1566), iii. 2.
For company, as Kit went to Canterbury.
Skeat’s ed. of Pegge’s Kenticisms, 86; and see the note.
For fashion’s sake, as dogs go to church.
But the Highland shepherde take their dogs with them to the kirk, and the animals lie down very quietly till the congregation rises. It has been proved by experience that they judge from that that the business is over. A Romanist is said to have had a dog, who imitated his master by fasting on Fridays.
For his death there is many a wet eye in Groby pool. Leicestershire.
He is so little respected that no one laments his loss.—R.
For ill do well, / then fear not hell.
For mad words deaf ears.
For my own pleasure, as the man said when he struck his wife.
For my part, burn the kiln boldly.
For my peck of malt set the kiln on fire.
“This is used in Cheshire and the neighbouring counties. They mean by it, I am little concerned in the thing mentioned: I care not much, come on it what will.”—R. But it occurs in Walker’s Parœm., 1672, p. 14.
For one good turn another doth itch; claw my elbow, &c.
For the least choice the wolf took the sheep.
For the long lane or perhaps for Long Lane [Smithfield].
An expression used of anything borrowed without much intention of repayment or restoration. Long Lane was one of the haunts of the old clothes and other second-hand dealers.
For the rose the thorn is often plucked.
Per la rosa spesso il spin se coglie. Ital.—R.
For whom does the blind man’s wife paint herself?
La muger del ciego, para quien se afeyta. Span.
Forbear not sowing because of birds.
Forbearance [or sufferance] is no quittance.
Arden of Faversham, 1592, ed. Bullen, 36; T. Heywood’s Second Part of Q. Elizabeth’s Troubles, 1606, repr. 151; Thoresby’s Correspondence, 1683.
Forbid a fool a thing, and that he’ll do.
Forbidden fruit is sweet.
Force without forecast is of little avail.
Fordwich trout.
Skeat’s ed. of Pegge’s Kenticisms, 89–90, and see the long and curious note.
Forecast is better than work-hard.
Foremost take up hindmost.
See John Chamberlain’s Letters, edit. Bruce, p. 21.
Forewarn’d, fore-armed.
A mere translation of the Latin, Præmonitus, præmunitus. Arden of Faversham, 1592, ed. 1887, p. 25.
Forgive and forget.
Forsake not the market for the toll.
Fortune can take from us nothing but what she gave us.
Fortune favours fools.
Or fools have the best luck. Fortuna favet fatuis. ’Tis but equal, Nature having not, that Fortune should do so.—R. The saving is quoted in the Tales and Jests of Mr. Hugh Peters, 1660, Dedic.
Fortune favours the brave.
Fortune follows every one to his end.
Langland’s Poem on the Deposition of Richard II. (Camd. Soc., p. 13). The reading in the original is:
Fortune gives her hand to a bold man.
Fortune helps them that help themselves.
Fortune is like the market, where, if you bide your time, the price will fall.
Fortune knocks once at least at every man’s gate.
Fortune wearies with carrying one and the same man always.
Forty, save one, the age of Roden’s colt.
Forward wedlock soon brings a man to his nightcap.
Taming of a Shrew, 1594.
Foul water as soon as fair will quench hot fire.
Four eyes see more than two.
MS. Ashmole, 1153.
Four rogues and a blackguard.
The Four Georges and William IV. S. T. Coleridge used to call the last “the Blackguard King.” There is a copy of satirical verses upon the four personages of the former name, and praying that we may be spared from any more. But time has wrought a change.
Foxes dig not their holes.
Foxes prey farthest from their earths.
Foxes, when sleeping, have nothing fall into their mouths.
A regnard endormi rien ne cheut en la guele.—Fr.
Foxes, when they cannot reach the grapes, say they are not ripe.
“He discommends costly clothes, as the foxe did the grapes.”—The Rich Cabinet, by T. G., 1616, fol. 34 verso.
France is a meadow that cuts thrice a year.
Fraud and deceit are always in haste.
Free of her lips, / free of her hips.
French leave.
i.e., No leave at all.
French of Stratford-at-Bow.
R. Morris’s ed. of Chaucer,
Fresh fish and new come guests smell in three days.
Walker’s Parœm., 1672, p. 20. “L’hoste et le poisson passé trois jours puent. Fr. Piscis nequam est nisi recens.—Plaut. Ordinary friends are welcome at first, but we soon grow weary of them.”—R.
Friars observant spare their own and eat other men’s.
Friday in the week / is seldom a leek.
i.e., alike. So Chaucer:
Friendless are the dead, quoth Hendyng.
Rel. Ant., i. 116.
Friends are like fiddlestrings, they must not be screwed too tight.
Friends fail fliers.
Friendship consists not in saying, What’s the best news?
Friendship increases in visiting friends, but more in visiting them seldom.
Friendship is not to be bought at a fair.
Friendship that flames goes out in a flash.
Frindsbury clubs. Kent.
Skeat’s ed. of Pegge’s Kenticisms, 90–91. See Hazlitt’s Faiths and Folklore, 1905, v. Frindsbury.
From a bad paymaster get what you can.
From a choleric man withdraw a little; from him that says nothing; for ever.
From fame to infamy is a beaten road.
From hand to mouth.
From hearing comes wisdom; from speaking, repentance.
“1. Hand Napping; that is, when the criminal was taken in the very fact.
“2. Buck Bearing; that is, when the cloth was found upon him.
“3. Tongue Confessing, which needs no explanation.
“The fact likewise was to be committed within the liberties or precincts of the forest of Hardwick; and the value of the goods stolen was to be above thirteenpence half-penny.”—Tour in England and Wales, 1742, quoted in Brady’s Varieties of Literature, 1826, p. 4. Elland, the “Hell” of the saying, is within a walk of Halifax, and is another of the places where a gibbet was erected.
From Lincoln Heath God help un! / where should un’?
This is the same class of saving as Chipperfield, Where d’ye think? and several others scattered through these pages. Lincoln Heath, like Chipperfield, was celebrated for its cherries.
From our ancestors come our names, but from our virtues our honours.
From pillar to post (or post to pillar).
Vox Populi, Vox Dei (1547), in Hazlitt’s Popular Poetry, ii. 274. Appius and Virginia, 1575, Hazlitt’s Dodsley, xii. 374.
From saving / comes having.
From the crown of the head to the sole of the foot.
Middleton’s A Mad World my Masters, 1608, edit. 1640, sign. B 2; Walker’s Parœm., 1672.
From th’ eggs to th’ apples.
From the ire of the Drummonds, the pride of the Græmes, the greed of the Campbells, and the wind of the Murrays, Good Lord, deliver us.
Dean Ramsay’s Reminiscences, 1871, p. 157.
From [whipping] post to pillory.
Whether the phrase, From pillar to post, is a corruption of this, or an independent saying, it is difficult to say, more especially as From post to pillar is in Heywood, 1562.
From words to deeds is a great space.
Frost and fraud both end in foul.
Camden’s Remaines, 1614. p. 306 (differently). “A saying ordinary in the mouth of Sir Thomas Egerton, Lord Chancellor.”—R.
Frugality is an estate alone.
Fruit ripens not well in the shade.
Full bellies make empty skulls.
Full guts neither run well nor fight well.
Full of courtesy and full of craft.
“Chi te fa piu carezza che non vuole, o ingannato t’ ha, o inganner te vuole. Ital. He that makes more of you than you desire or expect, either he hath cozened you, or intends to do it.”—R.
Full of fun and fooster, like Mooney’s goose.
Full pigeons find cherries bitter.
Furniture and mane make the horse sell.
Further than the wall he cannot go.
Gadding gossips shall dine on the pot-lid.
Game is cheaper in the market than in the fields and woods.
Does this allude to the cost of preserving game, which makes that shot by private sportsmen so dear?
Garlands are not for every brow.
Gather thistles, / expect prickles.
Gear is easier gain’d than guided.
Geese with geese, and women with women.
Generally we love ourselves more than we hate others.
Gentlemen and rich men are venison in heaven.
I pray God the olde prouerbe be not found true, that gentlemen and riche men are venison in Heauen (that is) very rare and daintie to haue them come thither.—Northbrooke’s Treatise against Dauncing (1577), ed. 1843, p. 22.
Gentry by blood is bodily gentry.
Gentry sent to market will not buy one bushel of corn.
Get thy spindle and thy distaff ready, and God will send the flax.
Getting out well is a quarter of the journey.
Ghosts never appear on Christmas Eve.
So says Shakespear: and the truth thereof few now-a-days will call in question. Grose observes, too, that those born on Christmas Day cannot see spirits.—D.
Giff Gaff was a good fellow.
Giff-gaff is one good turn for another.—R.
Gifts make beggars bold.
Gip! quoth Gilbert to his mare.
Gip with an ill rubbing, quoth Badger, when his mare kicked.
Gip = Gee-up; Badger = pedlar.
Give a clown your finger, and he will take your hand.
Give a dog an ill name and hang him.
So in Nobody and Somebody (1606), sign. B 4:—
Give a dog an ill name, and his work is done.
Give a dog roast, and beat him with the spit.
Give a loaf and beg a shive.
Give a man fortune and cast him into the sea.
Give a poor man sixpence, and not a bottle of wine.
Give a thief rope enough, and he’ll hang himself.
Give a woman luck, and cast her into the sea.
Rowley’s Woman never Vext, 1632 (Hazlitt’s Dodsley, xii). “Give a man luck and throw him into the sea,” was the title of a drama no longer known (under such a title), licensed to Richard Olive, 23rd July, 1600. See Hazlitt’s Manual of Old Plays, 1892, p. 96.
Give a Yorkshireman a halter, and he’ll find a horse.
Give advice to all, but be security for none.
Give and spend, / and God will send.
Give cob a hat and a pair of shoes, and he’ll last for ever. S. Devon.
Provide a stone foundation and a slate coping for a cob [mud] wall.—S
Give gave is a good fellow.
Comp. Giff Gaff.
Give him an inch, and he’ll take an ell.
“Give me an inch to-day, I’ll give thee an ell to-morrow, and weele to hell together.” Armin’s Nest of Ninnies, 1608. “Give an inch, and you will take an ell.”—Camden.
Give him his due, though he were the devil.
Give him the other half egg and burst him.
Give losers leave to talk.
Taylor’s Arrant Thiefe, 1622. “I, but I can giue the loser leaue to speake.”—First Part of the Contention between Lancaster and York, 1594. “I will giue loosers leaue to talke.”—Nash’s Pierce Penilesse, 1592.
Give neither counsel nor salt till you are asked for it.
Give not St. Peter so much, to leave St. Paul nothing.
Give the devil his due.
Nash’s Have with you to Saffron Walden, 1596, repr. 1869, p. 37.
Give the piper a penny to play, and twopence to leave off.
Given is dead, and Restored is nought.
“Selde cometh lone lahynde home, quoth Hendyng.” Reliq. Antiq., i. 113.
Giving much to the poor / doth increase a man’s store.
The Scriptural maxim.
Glasses and lasses are brittle ware.
Glowing coals sparkle oft.
When the mind is heated with any passion, it will often break out in words and expressions. Psalm xxxix. 1.—R.
Gluttony kills more than the sword.
Gnaw the bone which is fallen to thy lot.
Go and be hanged!
Go day, come day, God send Sunday.
Journal of Thomas Isham of Lamport, Northamptonshire, 1671–3, ed. Rye, p. 18. It seems to be significant of a solicitude to get through working days and enjoy that of rest. Comp. Comiday.
Go down the ladder when thou marriest a wife; go up when thou choosest a friend.
Go farther and fare worse.
Go fiddle for shives / among old wives.
Go fiddle-meddle with your old shoes.
Go forward and fall, / go backward and mar all.
A fronte precipitium, a tergo lupi.—R.
Go here away, go there away, quoth Madge Whitworth when she rode the mare in the tedder.
Go in God’s name! so ride no witches.
Go into the country to hear what news in town.
Go it, cripples; crutches are cheap.
Go pipe at Padley, there’s a peascod feast.
Some have it, Go pipe at Colston, &c. It is spoken in derision to people that busy themselves about matters of no concernment.—R.
Go steal horse, and you’ll die without being sick.
Go to another door, for this will not be opened.
Go to Battersea to be cut for the simples.
People not over-burthened with wit are recommended to go to Battersea to be cut for the simples. In former times the London apothecaries used to make a summer excursion to Battersea, to see the medicinal herbs, called simples, cut at the proper season, which the market gardeners in that neighbourhood were distinguished for cultivating.—R.
Go to bed with the lamb, and rise with the lark.
Go to Bungay to get new-bottomed. E. Anglia.
In allusion to the fortunes acquired there by persons unsuccessful elsewhere. The late Mr. H. Stopes, an East-Anglian, told me that there is another saying: “Go to Bungay on a pig,”—equivalent to a mandate to go to Jericho. Mr. S. supposed this to be the origin of the proverb, “To go to Putney on a pig,” but the two may have been coexistent, or it may have been applied to any place, to which people did not care to go themselves.
Go to the end of the rainbow, and you’ll find a crock of money. Sussex.
Cooper’s Sussex Vocab., 2nd ed., p. 40. Current, says Mr. Cooper, in Surrey, Kent, and Suffolk, as well as Sussex.
Goats are not sold at every fair.