=Like a singed cat, better than likely.=
"Under a shabby cloak there is a good tippler" (Spanish).[471]
="Care not" would have it.=
Affected indifference is often a trick to obtain an object of secret
desire. "I don't want it, I don't want it," says the Spanish friar;
"but drop it into my hood."[472] "'It is nought, it is nought,' saith
the buyer; but when he is gone he vaunteth." The girls of Italy, who
know how often this artifice is employed in affairs of love, have a
ready retort against sarcastic young gentlemen in the adage, "He that
finds fault would fain buy."[473]
=He that lacks [disparages] my mare would buy my mare.=--_Scotch._
="Sour grapes," said the fox when he could not reach them.=
=Empty vessels give the greatest sound.=
=Shaal [shallow] waters mak the maist din.=--_Scotch._
=Smooth waters run deep=; _or_,
=Still waters are deep.=
This last proverb, we are told by Quintus Curtius, was current among
the Bactrians.[474] The Servians say, "A smooth river washes away
its banks;" the French, "There is no worse water than that which
sleeps."[475] "The most covered fire is the strongest" (French);[476]
and "Under white ashes there is glowing coal" (Italian).[477]
=Where God has his church the devil will have his chapel.=
So closely does the shadow of godliness--hypocrisy--wait upon the
substance. "Very seldom does any good thing arise but there comes
an ugly phantom of a caricature of it, which sidles up against the
reality, mouths its favourite words as a third-rate actor does a great
part, under-mimics its wisdom, overacts its folly, is by half the world
taken for it, goes some way to suppress it in its own time, and perhaps
lives for it in history."[478] Defoe says,--
"Wherever God erects a house of prayer,
The devil always builds a chapel there;
And 'twill be found upon examination
The latter has the largest congregation."
The proverb is found in nearly the same form in Italian.[479] The
French say, "The devil chants high mass,"[480] which reminds us of
another English adage, applied by Antonio to Shylock:--
=The devil can quote Scripture for his purpose.=
"The devil lurks behind the cross,"[481] say the Spaniards; and, "By
the vicar's skirts the devil gets up into the belfry."[482] "O the
slyness of sin," exclaim the Germans, "that puts an angel before every
devil!"[483] The same thought is expressed by the Queen of Navarre in
her thirteenth novel, where she speaks of "covering one's devil with
the fairest angel."[484]
=When the fox preaches beware of the geese.=
"The fox preaches to the hens" (French).[485] "When the devil says his
paternosters he wants to cheat you" (French).[486] "Never spread your
wheat in the sun before the canter's door" (Spanish).[487]
=A honey tongue, a heart of gall.=
=Mouth of ivy, heart of holly.=--_Irish._
=He can say, "My jo," an' think it na.=--_Scotch._
=Too much courtesy, too much craft.=
"The words of a saint, and the claws of a cat" (Spanish).[488] "The cat
is friendly, but scratches" (Spanish).[489] "Many kiss the hands they
would fain see chopped off" (Arab and Spanish).[490]
=He looks as if butter would not melt in his mouth.=
Said of a very demure person, sometimes with this addition, "And yet
cheese would not choke him." Of such a person the Spaniards say, "He
looks as if he would not muddy the water."[491] "Nothing is more like
an honest man than a rogue" (French).[492]
=They're no a' saints that get holy water.=--_Scotch._
"All are not saints who go to church" (Italian).[493] "Not all who
go to church say their prayers" (Italian).[494] "All are not hunters
who blow the horn" (French).[495] "All are not soldiers who go to the
wars" (Spanish).[496] "All are not princes who ride with the emperor"
(Dutch).[497]
=The chamber of sickness is the chapel of devotion.=
=The devil was sick, the devil a monk would be;=
=The devil grew well, the devil a monk was he!=[498]
"All criminals turn preachers when they are under the gallows"
(Italian).[499] "The galley is in a bad way when the corsair promises
masses and candles" (Spanish).[500]
=Satan rebukes sin.=[501]
=The friar preached against stealing when he had a pudding in his
sleeve.=
According to the Italian account of the affair the friar had a goose in
his scapulary on that occasion.[502] "Do as the friar says, and not as
he does" (Spanish).[503]
=To carry two faces under one hood.=
To be what the Romans called "double-tongued,"[504] or, in French
phrase, "To wear a coat of two parishes."[505] Formerly the parishes in
France were bound to supply the army with a certain number of pioneers
fully equipped. Every parish claimed the right of clothing its man
in its own livery, whence it followed that when two parishes jointly
furnished only one man, he was dressed in parti-coloured garments, each
parish being represented by a moiety which differed from the other in
texture and colour.
=To hold with the hare, and hunt with the hounds.=
To be "Jack o' both sides," true to neither. The Romans called this
"Sitting on two stools."[506] Liberius Mimus was one of a new batch
of senators created by Cæsar. The first day he entered the august
assembly, as he was looking about for a seat, Cicero said to him, "I
would make room for you were we not so crowded together." This was
a sly hit at Cæsar, who had packed the senate with his creatures.
Liberius replied, "Ay, you always liked to sit on two stools."
The Arabs say of a double dealer, "He says to the thief, 'Steal;' and
to the house-owner, 'Take care of thy goods.'" "He howls with the
wolves when he is in the wood, and bleats with the sheep in the field"
(Dutch).[507]
=If the devil is vicar, you'll be clerk.=
=If the deil be laird, you'll be tenant.=--_Scotch._
=The deil ne'er sent a wind out of hell but he wad sail with
it.=--_Scotch._
=The vicar of Bray will be vicar of Bray still.=
Simon Aleyn, or Allen, held the Vicarage of Bray, in Berkshire, for
fifty years, in the reigns of Henry VIII., Edward VI., Mary, and
Elizabeth, and was always of the religion of the sovereign for the time
being. First he was a Papist, then a Protestant, afterwards a Papist,
and a Protestant again; yet he would by no means admit that he was a
turncoat. "No," said he, "I have always stuck to my principle, which
is this--to live and die vicar of Bray." His consistency has been
celebrated in a song, the burden of which is,--
"For this is law I will maintain--
Unto my dying day, sir,
Whatever king in England reign,
I'll be the vicar of Bray, sir."
"Such are men, now o' days," says Fuller, "who, though they cannot turn
the wind, they turn their mills, and set them so that wheresoever it
bloweth, their grist should certainly be grinded."
During the Peninsular war many signboards over shops and hotels in
Spanish towns had on one side the arms of France, and on the other
those of Spain, which were turned as best suited the interests of their
owners and the feelings of the troops which alternately occupied the
place.
=It is hard to sit at Rome and fecht wi' the pope.=--_Scotch._
Prudence forbids us to engage in strife with those in whose power we
are. Oriental servility goes further than this. Bernier tells us that
it was a current proverb in the dominions of the Great Mogul, "If the
king saith at noonday, 'It is night,' you are to say, 'Behold the moon
and stars!'" The Egyptians say, "When the monkey reigns dance before
him." The philosopher desisted from controversy with the Emperor
Hadrian, confessing himself unable to cope in argument with the master
of thirty legions.
=There's nae gude in speaking ill o' the laird within his ain
bounds.=--_Scotch._
On this principle Baillie Nicol Jarvie thinks it well, when passing
the Fairies' Hill, to call them, as others do, men of peace, meaning
thereby to conciliate their good-will. "Speak not ill of a great
enemy," says Selden, "but rather give him good words, that he may use
you the better if you chance to fall into his hands. The Spaniard
did this when he was dying. His confessor told him (to work him to
repentance) how the devil tormented the wicked that went to hell. The
Spaniard replying, called the devil 'my lord.' 'I hope my lord the
devil is not so cruel.' His confessor reproved him. 'Excuse me,' said
the don, 'for calling him so. I know not into what hands I may fall;
and if I happen into his, I hope he will use me the better for giving
him good words.'"
=It is good to have friends everywhere.=
=It's gude to hae friends baith in heaven and hell.=--_Scotch._
Brantôme relates that Robert de la Mark had a painting executed, in
which were represented St. Margaret and the devil, with himself on his
knees before them, a candle in each hand, and a scroll issuing from
his mouth, containing these words: "If God will not aid me, the devil
surely will not fail me." This is quite in the spirit of Virgil's line,
"If I cannot bend the celestials to my purpose I will move hell."[508]
Others besides De la Mark have thought it prudent "To offer a candle
to God and another to the devil" (French);[509] or, "A candle to St.
Michael and one to his devil" (French),[510] lest the time might come
when the devil under the archangel's feet should get the upper hand.
Upon the same principle a discreet person in the early Christian times
took care never to pass a prostrate statue of Jupiter without saluting
it.
=One must sometimes hold a candle to the devil.=