I am not apt, upon a wound,595
Or trivial basting, to despond;
Yet I'd be loath my days to curta'l;
For if I thought my wounds not mortal,
Or that we'd time enough as yet
To make an honourable retreat,600
'Twere the best course; but if they find
We fly, and leave our arms behind
For them to seize on, the dishonour,
And danger too, is such, I'll sooner
Stand to it boldly, and take quarter,605
To let them see I am no starter.
In all the trade of war no feat
Is nobler than a brave retreat:
For those that run away, and fly,
Take place at least o' th' enemy.[1]610
This said, the Squire, with active speed,
Dismounted from his bony[2] steed
To seize the arms, which by mischance
Fell from the bold Knight in a trance.
These being found out, and restor'd615
To Hudibras, their natural lord,
As a man may say,[3] with might and main,
He hasted to get up again.[4]
- ↑ These two lines were not in the first editions of 1663, but added in 1674. This same notion is repeated in part iii. canto iii. 241—244. But the celebrated lines of similar import, commonly supposed to be in Hudibras,
"For he that fights and runs away
May live to fight another day,"
are found in the Musarum Deliciæ (by Sir Jno. Mennis and James Smith) 12mo, Lond. 1656, and the type of them occurs in a much earlier collection, viz. The Apophthegmes of Erasmus, by Nico. Udall, 12mo, Lond. 1542, where they are thus given:
That same man that renneth awaie
Maie again fight, an other daie. - ↑ In some editions it is bonny, but I prefer bony, which is the reading of 1678.—Nash.
- ↑ A sneer at the expletives then used in common conversation, such as: and he said, and she said, and so sir, d'ye see, &c. See Spectator, 371.
- ↑ Var.The active Squire, with might and main,
Prepar'd in haste to mount again.
