A Dictionary of Proverbs (Oxford Paperback Reference)

Early uses of the proverb refer specifically to women.

1713 ADDISON Cato IV. i. When love once pleads admission to our hearts .. The

woman that deliberates is lost. 1865 TROLLOPE Can You forgive Her? II. x. It has often

been said of woman that she who doubts is lost .. never thinking whether or no there be

any truth in the proverb. 1878 J. H. BEADLE Western Wilds xxi. In Utah it is

emphatically true, that he who hesitates is lost—to Mormonism. 1887 BLACKMORE

Springhaven xlii. Dolly hesitated, and with the proverbial result. 2001 Washington Times

8 Nov. D6(Herb & Jamaal comic strip) ‘Sometimes he who hesitates is lost .. and ends up

several miles from the next freeway exit.’ decision and indecision

hid see LOVE and a cough cannot be hid.

Those who HIDE can find

Hide means ‘hide something’: the verb is used absolutely.

c 1400 Seven Sages of Rome (1845) 68 He may wel fynde that hyde him selven. 1639

J. CLARKE Parœmiologia Anglo-Latina 111 They that hide can find. 1842 MARRYAT

Percival Keene I. iii. ‘I could have told you where it was.’ ‘Yes, yes, those who hide can

find.’ 1922 JOYCE Ulysses 542 (She .. unrolls the potato from the top of her stocking.)

Those that hides knows where to find. 1979 ’E. PETERS’ One Corpse too Many ix. Only

those who had hidden here were likely ever to find. The full leafage covered all.

concealment

hides see a CLEVER hawk hides its claws.

high see GOD is high above, and the tsar is far away; the MOUNTAINS are high, and the
emperor is far away.

The HIGHER the monkey climbs the more he shows his tail

The further an unsuitable person is promoted, the more obvious his inadequacies become.
In various more or less polite forms.

c 1395 WYCLIF Bible (1850) Proverbs iii. 35 (gloss) The filthe of her foli aperith

more, as the filthe of the hynd partis of an ape aperith more, whanne he stieth [climbs] on