=Man proposes, God disposes.=[523]
"There's a divinity that shapes men's ends,
Rough hew them how they will."
=He that reckons without his host must reckon again.=
=Don't reckon your chickens before they are hatched.=
Some of the eggs may be addled. Remember the story of Alnaschar.
=Sune enough to cry "chick" when it's out o' the shell.=--_Scotch._
=Gut nae fish till ye get them.=--_Scotch._
"Cry no herring till you have it in the net" (Dutch).[524] "First catch
your hare," says Mrs. Glasse, and then you may settle how you will have
it cooked. The Greeks and Romans thought it not wise "To sing triumph
before the victory."[525] It is a rash bargain "To sell the bird on the
bough" (Italian);[526] or "The bearskin before you have caught the
bear" (Italian),[527] as Æsop has demonstrated. Finally, "Unlaid eggs
are uncertain chickens" (German).[528]
=Praise a fair day at night.=
=It is not good praising a ford till a man be over.=
=Don't halloo till you are out of the wood.=
"Don't cry 'Hey!' till you are over the ditch" (German).[529] "Look
to the end" (Latin).[530] "No man can with certainty be called happy
before his death," as the Grecian sage told Crœsus. "Call me not olive
till you see me gathered" (Spanish)."[531]
=To build castles in the air.=
To let imagination beguile us with visionary prospects. The metaphor
is intelligible to everybody, but that in the French equivalent,
"To build castles in Spain,"[532] requires explanation. The Abbé
Morellet ascribes the origin of this phrase to the general belief
in the boundless wealth of Spain after she had become mistress of
the mines of Mexico and Peru. This is plausible but wrong, for the
"Roman de la Rose," which was published long before the discovery
of America, contains this line, _Lors feras chasteaulx en Espagne._
M. Quitard says that the proverb dates from the latter part of the
eleventh century, when Henri de Bourgogne crossed the Pyrenees at the
head of a great number of knights to win glory and plunder from the
Infidels, and received from Alfonso, king of Castile, in reward for
his services, the hand of that sovereign's daughter, Theresa, and the
county of Lusitania, which, under his son Alfonso Henriquez, became
the kingdom of Portugal. The success of these illustrious adventurers
excited the emulation of the warlike French nobles, and set every man
dreaming of fiefs to be won, and castles to be built in Spain. Similar
feelings had been awakened some years before by the conquest of England
by William of Normandy, and then the French talked proverbially of
"Building castles in Albany,"[533] that is, in Albion. It is worthy of
remark that previously to the eleventh century there were hardly any
castles built in Christian Spain, or by the Saxons in England. The new
adventurers had to build for themselves.
=Don't tell the devil too much of your mind.=
Be not too forward to proclaim your intentions. "Tell your business,
and leave the devil alone to do it for you" (Italian).[534] "A wise
man," Selden tells us, "should never resolve upon anything--at least,
never let the world know his resolution, for if he cannot arrive at
that he is ashamed. How many things did the king resolve, in his
declaration concerning Scotland, never to do, and yet did them all!
A man must do according to accidents and emergencies. Never tell
your resolution beforehand, but when the cast is thrown play it as
well as you can to win the game you are at. 'Tis but folly to study
how to play size ace when you know not whether you shall throw it or
no." "Muddy though it be, say not, 'Of this water I will not drink'"
(Spanish).[535] "There is no use in saying, 'Such a way I will not go,
or such water I will not drink'" (Italian).[536]
=There's many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip.=
"Between the hand and the mouth the soup is often spilt" (French).[537]
"Wine poured out is not swallowed" (French).[538] These three proverbs
are derived from the same Greek original, the English one being
nearest to it in form. A king of Samos tasked his slaves unmercifully
in laying out a vineyard, and one of them, exasperated by this ill
usage, prophesied that his master would never drink of the wine of that
vineyard. Eager to confute this prediction, the king took the first
grapes produced by his vines, pressed them into a cup in the slave's
presence, and derided him as a false prophet. The slave replied, "Many
things happen between the cup and the lip;" and these words became a
proverb, for just then a cry was raised that a wild boar had broken
into the vineyard, and the king, setting down the untested cup, went to
meet the beast, and was killed in the encounter.
=God send you readier meat than running hares.=
=A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.=
=Better a wren in the hand than a crane in the air.=--_Irish_ and
_French_.[539]
Cranes were in much request for the table down to the end of the
fourteenth century, if not later. "Better a leveret in the kitchen than
a wild boar in the forest" (Livonian). "Better is an egg to-day than a
pullet to-morrow" (Italian).[540] "One here-it-is is better than two
you-shall-have-it's" (French).[541]
=Possession is nine points of the law.=
And there are only ten of them in all. Others reckon possession
as eleven points, the whole number being twelve. "Him that is in
possession God helps" (Italian).[542] "Possession is as good as title"
(French).[543]
=I'll not change a cottage in possession for a kingdom in reversion.=
=Better haud by a hair nor draw by a tether.=--_Scotch._
=He that waits for dead men's shoes may long go barefoot.=
=He gaes lang barefoot that wears dead men's shoon.=--_Scotch._
"He hauls at a long rope who desires another's death" (French).[544]
"He who waits for another's trencher eats a cold meal" (Catalan).[545]
=Live, horse, and you'll get grass.=[546]
"Die not, O mine ass, for the spring is coming, and with it clover"
(Turkish). Unfortunately, "For the hungry, _wait_ is a hard word"
(German);[547] and
=While the grass grows the steed starves.=
=The old horse may die waiting for new grass.=
=Hope holds up the head.=
=Hope is the bread of the unhappy.=
=Were it not for hope the heart would break.=
=He that lives on hope has a slim diet.=
Aubrey relates that Lord Bacon, being in York House garden, looking on
fishers as they were throwing their net, asked them what they would
take for their draught. They answered so much. His lordship would offer
them only so much. They drew up their net, and in it were only two or
three little fishes. His lordship then told them it had been better for
them to have taken his offer. They replied, they hoped to have had a
better draught; but, said his lordship,--
="Hope is a good breakfast, but a bad supper."=
"Hope and expectation are a fool's income" (Danish).[548]
=Hopes deferred hang the heart on tenter hooks.=
"He gives twice who gives quickly" (Latin);[549] and "A prompt refusal
has in part the grace of a favour granted" (Latin).[550]
=All is not at hand that helps.=
We cannot foresee whence help may come to us, nor always trace back to
their sources the advantages we actually enjoy. "Water comes to the
mill from afar" (Portuguese).[551] On the other hand, "Far water does
not put out near fire" (Italian);[552] and "Better is a near neighbour
than a distant cousin" (Italian).[553] "Friends living far away are no
friends" (Greek).[554]