=Enough is enough of bread and cheese.=
=Enough is as good as a feast.=
"A bird can roost but on one branch; a mouse can drink no more than its
fill from a river" (Chinese). "He is rich enough who does not want"
(Italian).[317] But the difficulty is to determine to a nicety the
point at which there is neither want nor surplus. Practically there is
no such point, however it may exist in theory; for
=There's never enough where nought is left.=
=Of enough men leave.=
Where all is eaten up it is pretty certain that the commons were but
short. "There is not enough if there is not too much" (French).[318]
Beaumarchais makes Figaro, in speaking of love, to utter the
charming hyperbole which has passed into a proverb, "Too much is not
enough."[319] Even without being in love, everybody must agree with
Voltaire in considering
"Le superflu, chose très nécessaire."
=Better leave than lack.=
=All covet, all lose.=
=Covetousness brings nothing home.=
"It bursts the bag" (Italian).[320] Like the dog in the fable, it
grasps at the shadow, and lets fall the substance. "He that embraces
too much holds nothing fast" (Italian, French).[321] A statue was
erected to Buffon in his lifetime, with the inscription, _Naturam
amplectitur omnem_ ("He embraces all nature"). Somebody remarked upon
this, "He that embraces too much," &c. Buffon heard of the sarcasm, and
had the inscription obliterated.
=It is hard for a greedy eye to hae a leal heart.=--_Scotch._
Covetousness is scarcely consistent with honesty.
=Much would have more.=
=A greedy eye never had a fu' weam [belly].=--_Scotch._
"The dust alone can fill the eye of man" (Arab); _i.e._, the dust of
the grave can alone extinguish the lust of the eye and the cupidity
of man. Among the Arabs, the phrase, "His eye is full," signifies he
possesses every object of his desire. The Germans say, "Greed and the
eye can no man fill."[322] The Scotch say of a covetous person,--
=He'll get enough ae day when his mouth's fu' o' mools [mould].=
=The greedy man and the gileynoar [cheat] are soon agreed.=--_Scotch._
"The sharper soon cheats the covetous man" (Spanish).[323]
=The grace of God is gear enough=.--_Scotch._
This is the northern form of the proverb which Launcelot Gobbo speaks
of as being well parted between Bassanio and Shylock. "You [Bassanio]
have the grace of God, and he [Shylock] has enough."
=Too much is stark nought.=--_Welsh._
=Too much of one thing is good for nothing.=
"One may be surfeited with eating tarts" (French).[324] "Nothing too
much!" (Latin.)[325]
=Better a wee fire to warm us than a meikle fire to burn us.=--_Scotch._
It is better to be content with a moderate fortune than attempt to
increase it at the risk of being ruined. "Give me the ass that carries
me, rather than the horse that throws me" (Portuguese).[326]
=Little sticks kindle a fire, but great ones put it out.=
=Fair and softly goes far in a day.=
=Hooly and fairly men ride far journeys.=--_Scotch._
"Who goes softly goes safely, and who goes safely goes far"
(Italian).[327] "Take-it-easy and Live-long are brothers" (German).[328]
=Fools' haste is no speed.=
=The more haste the worse speed.=
This seems to be derived from the Latin adage, _Festinatio tarda
est_ ("Haste is slow"). It defeats its own purpose by the blunders
and imperfect work it occasions. A favourite saying of the Emperors
Augustus and Titus was, _Festina lente_ ("Hasten leisurely"), which
Erasmus calls the king of adages. The Germans have happily translated
it,[329] and it is well paraphrased in that saying of Sir Amyas Paulet,
"Tarry a little, that we may make an end the sooner." A thing is done
"Fast enough if well enough" (Latin).[330]
=Naething in haste but gripping o' fleas.=--_Scotch._
=Nothing should be done in haste except catching fleas.=
=Haste trips up its own heels.=
"He that goes too hastily along often stumbles on a fair road"
(French).[331] "Reason lies between the bridle and the spur"
(Italian).[332]
=Draw not your bow till your arrow is fixed.=
=He that rides ere he be ready wants some o' his graith.=--_Scotch._
He leaves some of his accoutrements behind him. Perhaps one reason why
"It is good to have a hatch before your door" is, that it may act as
a check upon such unprofitable haste. Sydney Smith adopted a similar
expedient, which he called a _screaming gate_. "We all arrived once,"
he said, "at a friend's house just before dinner, hot, tired, and
dusty--a large party assembled--and found all the keys of our trunks
had been left behind. Since then I have established a screaming gate.
We never set out on our journey now without stopping at a gate about
ten minutes' distance from the house, to consider what we have left
behind. The result has been excellent."
=Two hungry meals make the third a glutton.=
Excess in one direction induces excess in the opposite direction.
=Soft fire makes sweet malt.=
=More flies are caught with a drop of honey than with a tun of vinegar.=
"Gentleness does more than violence" (French).[333] "The gentle calf
sucks all the cows" (Portuguese).[334]
=Ower hot, ower cauld.=--_Scotch._
"It may be a fire--on the morrow it will be ashes" (Arab). Violent
passions are apt to subside quickly. "Soon fire, soon ashes" (Dutch).
=A man may love his house weel, and no ride on the riggin [roof]
o't.=--_Scotch._
No one will believe that he loves it the more for any such extravagant
demonstration.
=Many irons in the fire, some will cool.=
=Too many cooks spoil the broth.=
=Ower mony greeves [overseers] hinder the wark.=--_Scotch._
"Too many tirewomen make the bride ill dressed" (Spanish).[335] "If the
sailors become too numerous the ship sinks" (Arab).
=A bow o'erbent will weaken.=
=All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.=
"This nation, the northern part of it especially, is given to believe
in the sovereign efficacy of dulness. To be sure, dulness and solid
vice are apt to go hand in hand. But then, according to our notions,
dulness is in itself so good a thing--almost a religion. Now, if ever a
people required to be amused, it is we sad-hearted Anglo-Saxons. Heavy
eaters, hard thinkers, often given up to a peculiar melancholy of our
own, with a climate that for months together would frown away mirth if
it could--many of us with very gloomy thoughts about our hereafter. If
ever there were a people who should avoid increasing their dulness by
all work and no play, we are that people. 'They took their pleasure
sadly,' says Froissart, 'after their fashion.' We need not ask of what
nation Froissart was speaking."--(_Friends in Council._)
=The mill that is always grinding grinds coarse and fine
together.=--_Irish._
"The pot that boils too much loses flavour" (Portuguese).[336]
=Play's gude while it is play.=--_Scotch._
Beware of pushing it to that point at which it ceases to be play.
"Leave off the play (or jest) when it is merriest" (Spanish).[337]
Never let it degenerate into horse play. "Manual play is clowns' play"
(French).[338]
=A man may make his own dog bite him.=
It is not wise to overstrain authority, or to drive even the weakest or
most submissive to desperation.
=A baited cat may grow as fierce as a lion.=
=Put a coward on his mettle and he'll fight the devil.=
=Make a bridge of gold for the flying enemy.=
=Extremes meet.=
A proverb of universal application in the physical as well as the moral
world. Every one knows the saying of Napoleon, "From the sublime to the
ridiculous is but a step."
=Too far east is west.=
=No feast to a miser's.=