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善は急げ zen wa isoge If It's Worth Doing, It's Worth Doing Promptly

善は急げ (zen wa isoge), hurry the good, says that a good thing is to be done at once, before the chance is lost. It is in print in 毛吹草 of 1638, with a second half, put off the bad. This study follows who says it, from Saikaku's bill collectors to a novel of 1914, and the Chinese lines set beside it.

Japanese Scroll of If It's Worth Doing, It's Worth Doing Promptly (zen wa isoge) — Calligraphy by Eri Takase
If It's Worth Doing, It's Worth Doing Promptly善は急げzen wa isoge

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Abstract

善は急げ, hurry the good, is a Japanese proverb of command: a good thing is to be done at once, before the chance is lost. It is in a warlord's letter of the late sixteenth century, as a study of 1996 quotes it, and first printed in 毛吹草, a haikai handbook of 1638, where it has a second half, put off the bad; the dictionaries' sense has not moved since. What the witnesses add is who says it: from Saikaku's bill collectors of 1692 and Chikamatsu's plays to the uncle in a novel of 1914, the speaker is almost always someone who wants a deal or a match closed. The Chinese lines set beside it in 1910, a general who followed good advice like flowing water and the hexagram of wind and thunder, are parallels, and no witness makes them its source; the proverb has been in English print since at least 1902, and the American proverb books since 1987 render it do quickly what is good.

Overview

The sense. The dictionaries' sense, do a good thing at once, has not moved since 1638 [1]. What the witnesses show and the dictionaries do not record is who says it and why. In the stories and plays read here, from Saikaku's bill collectors of 1692 and Chikamatsu's matchmakers, through a lovesick shop son of 1777 and the betrothals of the 1840s, to Sōseki's uncle in 1914, the speaker is almost always someone who wants a deal or a match closed and uses the proverb to shut off delay [2][3][4][5][6][7][8]. That is the proverb's social life: a moral maxim borrowed as leverage. The second half, put off the bad, is in the first collection, in the 1718 joke-book, in 藤井's headword and in the 1913 novel, and dropped by the 1656 book, by Sōseki and by the modern headwords; the half alone is also the older, in the two letters of the sixteenth century, and both forms have been current since the seventeenth century [1][9][10][11][12][8][13].

The words. 善, zen, is the good: virtue, and here a good deed, a good thing to do. は is the topic particle, written with the kana for ha and said wa; a dictionary that writes zen ha isoge is writing the spelling, which is a fact about romanization and not an opinion about the proverb. 急げ, isoge, is 急ぐ, to hurry, in the imperative: the proverb is a command, hurry! The second half, 悪は延べよ, aku wa nobeyo, is the same command reversed: 延べる is to put off, and the pair says do good at once, delay wrong [1]. The earliest witnesses write the particle をば, the emphatic object marker, as for the good, hurry it: 善をばいそげ in one sixteenth-century letter and in the book of 1656, 善をハいそげ, the same particle without the voicing mark, in the other letter [13][12]; everything from 1692 on writes は, and the popular books spell it in kana, ぜんはいそげ, which is how the sound is settled [2][9][5].

The proverb in English. In the Internet Archive's full text, the first European print is German, a list of Japanese proverbs in the journal of the German society in Tokyo in 1880: Was gut ist, thue gleich! [14]. The first English is Lafcadio Hearn's in 1902, where a matchmaker presses a bridegroom with it [15], and the first English rendering is in a German grammar's English edition of 1905, What is good, do quickly! [16]. Inouye's dictionary of 1909 gives Do quickly what is good under 善 [17], and Saitō's idiom dictionary of 1915 makes the proverb the Japanese for three English ones at once, make hay while the sun shines, strike the iron while it is hot and there is no time like the present [18]. The postwar Japanese-English dictionaries keep those equations and add their own: Okada in 1958 [19], Corwin in 1968 [20], Kenkyūsha in 1974 and 1983 [21][22]. The American books differ at first and then settle: Buchanan in 1965 gives Hasten to do good [23]; Galef in 1987 gives Do quickly what is good, Inouye's line of 1909 to the word, which the Fujiya Hotel's We Japanese had printed by 1936 beside Strike the iron while it is hot [24], and the later books copy it [25]; Trimnell in 2004 and Galef's 2012 reissue give it again [26][27]. The proverb is not in Galef's Even a Stone Buddha Can Talk (Tuttle, 2000) or in Guy Zona's Even Withered Trees Give Prosperity to the Mountain (1996) [28][29].

The historical record

The late sixteenth century. Two letters, as a study of 1996 quotes them. 大塚光信, in his notes on the language of the Muromachi lecture-notes and the Christian texts, heads an entry 善は急げ, 周知の諺、善いことは急いでせよ, a well-known saying: do a good thing quickly, and quotes two letters. One is a copy the editors of the Tochigi prefectural history attribute, with a query, to 小山秀綱 (d. 1602 or 1603), lord of Oyama in Shimotsuke until 1590: 天気はれ候を被見合候者、如先書之東西之あつかひ、みなちがい候べく候間、善をばいそげにて候, if you wait for the weather to clear, the settlement between east and west, as in my last letter, will all go wrong; so it is "hurry the good". The other is an undated letter of the monk 鎭誉, printed in the Okazaki city history: 善をハいそげと候間、早々寄准状被認候て可然候, since they say "hurry the good", you had best write the deed of donation at once (寄准状 is the text layer's reading; the word is 寄進状) [13][30]. The study is open only in the National Diet Library's reading rooms, and these are its words as the library's full-text search shows them; the two histories it cites were not read. It is the oldest use found here, and both writers cite it as a saying already known.

1638, printed 1645. 毛吹草, 松江重頼's handbook for haikai poets, whose second book, after the words of the seasons and of love, lists common sayings [31]. ぜんはいそげ、あくはのべよ, hurry the good, put off the bad: both halves, in kana. This is the 精選版日本国語大辞典's first citation, and the first printed witness [1], and the 1943 typeset of the book reads the same, the saying set between うり物にははなをかざれ and くはうゐんやのごとし [32]. The older list of sayings from the time of 北條氏直 (d. 1591), which 藤井 printed in 1929, does not carry it [33].

1656. 世話尽, a later proverb collection. 善をばいそげ, the first half alone, with the emphatic particle, in the last column of the left page after there are horses that run a thousand leagues, but only one man who can judge a horse [12].

1692 to 1724. Saikaku and Chikamatsu. 井原西鶴's 世間胸算用, twenty stories of the last day of the year, in its first printing of 1692: 善はいそげと大晦日の掛乞手ばしこくまはらせける, hurry the good, and he sent his bill collectors round sharp on the last night of the year [2]. 近松門左衛門's plays for the puppet stage put it in the mouth of whoever is closing a purchase or a match. In 淀鯉出世滝徳 of 1708 a young man is buying a courtesan out of the quarter: 明日は天社きしゆく日。萬事揃ふた大吉日 … 何に不足ない上は善は急げ明日の朝。目出度ふ曲輪を出します筈, tomorrow is the luckiest day in the almanac … and since nothing is lacking, hurry the good: tomorrow morning, happily, she leaves the quarter [3]. In 関八州繋馬 of 1724, a messenger comes to the gate at night with a betrothal: 詠歌の姫を御簾中になされんとの納入、善は急げと夜中ながら, the betrothal gifts, to make Princess Eika his consort; hurry the good, so though it is the middle of the night [4]. The dates of the three works are the reference works' [34][35][36].

1718. やふにまくは, a joke-book. 善は急げ悪は延よ。早牛もよど遅牛も段まて。いそがはまはれ。七度尋て人うたがへ商は牛の涎。短気は損気, a run of proverbs of haste and delay: hurry the good and put off the bad; the fast ox reaches Yodo and so does the slow one; if you hurry, go round; ask seven times before you doubt a man; trade is an ox's drool; a short temper is a short purse [9].

1777 to 1841. The popular fiction of Edo. Read in the National Diet Library's text layers, not at the leaf. In a 洒落本 of 1777 the son of a Kamigata shop, fallen for a girl, asks his go-between to court her for him, and when told it will be done when the chance comes: ぜんはいそげじゃァじきにやってこましたい, hurry the good, they say; I want it done right now [5]. 十返舎一九 in 1813, a man offered a woman he had wanted: こんなうまい事があるものか。ぜんはいそげとすぐに, could anything be so sweet? Hurry the good, and at once [37]. A couple offered a house and a trade in 1825: 善は急けといへる諺もひきうつあれば。明日にも片瀬村へ引移るべし, there is the proverb, hurry the good, so we will move to Katase tomorrow [38]; a lovers' meeting in 1831 [39]; a betrothal in 1839, ぜんはいそげじやそんならばよい日をゑらんで…ゆひなふを, hurry the good: then pick a lucky day and send the betrothal gifts [6]; and a marriage settled in 1841, ぜんはいそげなりとて … 吉日をえらみめでたくふうふ, hurry the good, they said, … chose a lucky day, and they were happily married [7].

1910. 藤井乙男, 諺語大辞典. 【善ハイソゲ惡ハノベヨ】〔毛吹草〕――。〔日本諸士百家記〕六、名残はつきず候へども、善は急げと候はゞ、とくとくして御出候べし。〔左傳〕成公八年、君子曰、從善如流。註、如流喩速。〔讀書錄〕五、遷善如風之速、改過如雷之迅。 The headword carries both halves; a letter in a book of samurai tales, the 本朝諸士百家記 of 1708–1709 in the library's catalogue [40], we have much still to say, but since good is to be hurried, come at once; and two Chinese lines, from the 左傳 on a general who followed good advice like flowing water, with the traditional note that like water means quickly, and from a Ming scholar's reading-notes, move to the good as fast as wind, correct faults as quick as thunder [10]. No European parallel is printed for this one.

1913. 水戸黄門漫遊記, a popular retelling of the Mito Kōmon stories. Twice, and both times to hurry a wedding: 思ひ立たが吉日、善は急げ惡は延せと云ふ事がある、今晩の內に三々九度の盃を爲せませう, the day you think of it is the lucky day, hurry the good and put off the bad, as they say; let us have the wedding cups tonight; and 善は急げ惡は延ろとやら、今晩の內にも三三九度の盃だけでもさせたいと思ひます [11].

1914. 夏目漱石, こゝろ, part three. The narrator's uncle, pressing a marriage the narrator does not want: けれども善は急げという諺もあるから、できるなら今のうちに祝言の盃だけは済ませておきたいともいいました, but there is the proverb, hurry the good, he said, so if possible he wanted at least the wedding cups exchanged now [8].

The dictionaries today. デジタル大辞泉: よいことはためらわずすぐに行え. 精選版日本国語大辞典: よいことをするのに躊躇するな、善事はただちに実行せよの意。善事は急ぐ。⇔悪は延べよ. ことわざを知る辞典: よいことはためらわず、ただちに実行せよ, with the note that 悪は延べよ often follows, the kin proverb 思い立ったが吉日, and the English There is no time like the present [1].

What is not a source. 藤井's two Chinese lines lead back, step by step, to a canon address: the Ming scholar's as fast as wind, as quick as thunder comes from Zhu Xi 朱熹, 遷善如風之速，改過如雷之猛 [41], and behind Zhu Xi is the 易 itself, on the hexagram 益 whose two trigrams are wind and thunder: 風雷，益；君子以見善則遷，有過則改, wind and thunder: Increase. The gentleman, seeing good, moves to it; having faults, corrects them [42]. So the thought that good must be done at speed has a Confucian pedigree with the same image. Whether the Japanese proverb descends from it or only rhymes with it, no witness says; 毛吹草 gives no source, and the Japanese form is a vernacular command with a second half the Chinese does not have. These are parallels, and that is how 藤井 offered them. 思い立ったが吉日, the day you think of it is the lucky day, is the Japanese kin proverb, and the two travel together in the 1913 novel [1][11].

The proverb in English

1880. Rudolf Lange, Japanische Sprichwörter, in the Mittheilungen der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Natur- und Völkerkunde Ostasiens, Heft 20, page 417, in German. 30.—Zen wa isoge. « Was gut ist, thue gleich! », what is good, do at once! [14]. The first European print found, in a list of proverbs current among ordinary people, twenty-two years before the first English.

1902. Lafcadio Hearn, Kottō, "A Woman's Diary", page 90. A Japanese woman's diary of her marriage, in Hearn's English. At the first meeting of the couple, the matchmaker Okada says to the bridegroom: Now that you have nobody to consult with at home, would it not be well for you to snatch your luck where you find it, as the proverb says,—'Zen wa isogé'? [15]. The first English print found, left in Japanese, and the use the Japanese witnesses show: a match to be closed.

1905. Hermann Plaut, Japanese Conversation-Grammar, lesson 17, page 127. zen wa isoge! What is good, do quickly! (Proverb) [16]. The first English rendering found, in the English edition of a German grammar.

1909. 井上十吉, Inouye's Japanese-English Dictionary, page 1857, under 善. Do quickly what is good [17]. The rendering the American books would settle on, four years after Plaut's.

1915. 斎藤秀三郎, Saitō's Idiomological English-Japanese Dictionary. The proverb appears on the Japanese side of three English ones: Make hay while the sun shines, 機會を逸するな（善は急げ）; Strike the iron while it is hot, 善は急げ, and again 好機を逸するな（善は急げ）and 赤い中に銭を鍛へよ（善は急げ）; There is no time like the present, 善は急げ [18]. The three English equivalents the later books give are all here, sixty years before Buchanan.

By 1936. We Japanese, the Fujiya Hotel's book of Japanese customs, in its proverb list. ZEN WA ISOGE. Do quickly what is good. "Strike the iron while it is hot." [24]. Inouye's rendering and Saitō's equivalent, side by side, the pairing Galef would print in 1987.

1958. Rokuo Okada, Japanese Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases, page 183. Zen wa isoge. Be quick about it, if it is a good thing. The advice is that we must not be slow to seize the opportunity when it presents itself, with Strike while the iron is hot, Make hay while the sun shines and Never do tomorrow what you can do today; and under 思い立ったが吉日 on page 129, Compare this proverb with: Zen wa isoge (Do without loss of time what you think is a good thing) [19].

1965. Daniel Crump Buchanan, Japanese Proverbs and Sayings, page 146. Zen wa isoge: "Hasten to do good." Don't wait to do good, but do it quickly. English parallel: Make hay while the sun shines [23].

1968. Charles Corwin, A Dictionary of Japanese and English Idiomatic Equivalents, page 18, under isogu. Zen wa isoge, marked a proverb: There's no time like the present [20].

1974. 研究社, Kenkyūsha's New Japanese-English Dictionary, fourth edition, page 2047, under 善. 善は急げ. Don't hesitate in doing (carrying out) a good thing. Make no delay in doing what is good. Strike while the iron is hot. Make hay while the sun shines. What is worth doing is worth doing promptly. Delays are dangerous [21]. Under 思い立つ on page 1299 the kin proverb 思い立ったが吉日 gets the same English set [21].

1983. 研究社, Kenkyūsha's New Collegiate Japanese-English Dictionary, third edition, page 683, under 善. 善は急げ. Good deeds should be done quickly (without hesitating). Strike while the iron is hot [22].

1987. David Galef, Even Monkeys Fall from Trees, number 61, page 136. Zen wa isoge. Do quickly what is good, and in the list of English equivalents, Strike while the iron is hot [25]. Inouye's rendering of 1909 to the word, with the equivalent We Japanese had set beside it by 1936; every later paperback copies it.

2004. Edward Trimnell, Tigers, Devils, and Fools, page 164. Do quickly what is good, Galef's line to the word, then: When the opportunity to do good presents itself, you should immediately do what you know to be right. If you hesitate, then the opportunity may be lost [26].

2012. David Galef, Japanese Proverbs: Wit and Wisdom, number 61, page 79. The 1987 entry reissued, with the Western equivalent set in the book's own square brackets: Do quickly what is good. Strike while the iron is hot. Timing matters, especially in the performance of admirable deeds. "Make hay while the sun shines" is another Western equivalent, in a sense the opposite of 56: Isogaba maware: "When in haste, take the roundabout route." [27]

Today. The house title, If It's Worth Doing, It's Worth Doing Promptly, lends the cadence of an English proverb to a Japanese one, and Kenkyūsha's dictionary of 1974 had already set What is worth doing is worth doing promptly beside the proverb [21]; the page's second gloss, If it is a good thing, hurry and do it, is the literal one. Every English equivalent on offer, strike while the iron is hot, make hay while the sun shines, there is no time like the present, is about acting now; none carries 善, the goodness of the thing, which is what makes the Japanese a moral maxim and not a counsel of speed. What a rendering must keep: the good as the object, and the imperative.

A reading

The proverb has a second half, put off the bad. It is in a warlord's letter of the sixteenth century, first printed in a haikai handbook of 1638, and has been used ever since to hurry a bargain or a match, from Saikaku's bill collectors and Chikamatsu's stage to Sōseki's uncle in 1914; and the thought has a canon behind it, the hexagram of wind and thunder, where the gentleman seeing good moves to it. Every piece of that is at an address.

References

  1. 「善は急げ」, デジタル大辞泉 · 精選版 日本国語大辞典 · ことわざを知る辞典, at kotobank. https://kotobank.jp/word/善は急げ
  2. 井原西鶴『世間胸算用』, 1692, 巻二 年の内の餅ばなは詠め, National Diet Library pid 2534240, scan 52 (read at the leaf). https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2534240/1/52
  3. 近松門左衛門『淀鯉出世滝徳』, in 『長町女腹切・淀鯉出世滝徳』, 1892, National Diet Library pid 992835, scan 31 (the text layer). https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/992835/1/31
  4. 近松門左衛門『関八州繋馬』, 1890, National Diet Library pid 876605, scan 11 (the text layer). https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/876605/1/11
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  8. 夏目漱石『こゝろ』, 1914, at Aozora Bunko. https://www.aozora.gr.jp/cards/000148/files/773_14560.html
  9. 『やふにまくは』, 1718, National Diet Library pid 2568482, scan 9. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2568482/1/9
  10. 藤井乙男『諺語大辞典』, 1910, 【善ハイソゲ惡ハノベヨ】, National Diet Library pid 862766, scan 301. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/862766/1/301
  11. 『水戸黄門漫遊記』, 1913, National Diet Library pid 912427, scans 24 and 29. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/912427/1/24
  12. 皆虚『世話尽』, 1656, National Diet Library pid 2554768, scan 34. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/2554768/1/34
  13. 大塚光信『抄物きりしたん資料私注』, 1996, s.v. 善は急げ, National Diet Library pid 14069294 (open only in the library; the entry read in the snippets of the library's full-text search, which needs no login). https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/14069294
  14. Rudolf Lange, "Japanische Sprichwörter", Mittheilungen der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Natur- und Völkerkunde Ostasiens, Heft 20, Tokyo, May 1880, pp. 415–421, at p. 417, no. 30. Internet Archive bub_gb_FCxPAAAAYAAJ. https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_FCxPAAAAYAAJ/page/n616
  15. Lafcadio Hearn, Kottō: Being Japanese Curios, with Sundry Cobwebs, Macmillan, New York, 1902, "A Woman's Diary", p. 90. Internet Archive kottojapanese00hearrich. https://archive.org/details/kottojapanese00hearrich/page/90
  16. Hermann Plaut, Japanese Conversation-Grammar, Julius Groos, Heidelberg, 1905, lesson 17, § 108, p. 127. Internet Archive japaneseconvers02plaugoog. https://archive.org/details/japaneseconvers02plaugoog/page/n143
  17. 井上十吉, Inouye's Japanese-English Dictionary, Sanseidō, Tokyo, 1909, p. 1857, s.v. Zen 善 (the shelved copy).
  18. 斎藤秀三郎, Saitō's Idiomological English-Japanese Dictionary, SEG Publishing Department, Tokyo, 1915, s.vv. hay, iron, strike, time (the shelved copy, its pages 562, 669, 1318, 1391, 1395 and 1413).
  19. Rokuo Okada, Japanese Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases, Japan Travel Bureau, Tokyo, 1958, pp. 183 and 129.
  20. Charles A. Corwin ed., A Dictionary of Japanese and English Idiomatic Equivalents, Kodansha International, Tokyo, 1968, p. 18, s.v. isogu.
  21. Masuda ed., Kenkyūsha's New Japanese-English Dictionary, 4th ed., Kenkyūsha, Tokyo, 1974, p. 2047, s.v. zen 善, and p. 1299, s.v. 思い立つ.
  22. Ichikawa ed., Kenkyūsha's New Collegiate Japanese-English Dictionary, 3rd ed., Kenkyūsha, Tokyo, 1983, p. 683, s.v. 善.
  23. Daniel Crump Buchanan, Japanese Proverbs and Sayings, University of Oklahoma Press, 1965, p. 146.
  24. Shōzō Yamaguchi and Frederic de Garis, We Japanese, Fujiya Hotel, Miyanoshita, the copy the Internet Archive dates 1936, in its list of proverbs (a lending copy; the line read in its full-text search, not at the page). https://archive.org/details/bwb_P8-BMA-146
  25. David Galef, Even Monkeys Fall from Trees, Tuttle, 1987, no. 61, p. 136.
  26. Edward Trimnell, Tigers, Devils, and Fools, Beechmont Crest, 2004, p. 164.
  27. David Galef, Japanese Proverbs: Wit and Wisdom, Tuttle, 2012, no. 61, p. 79.
  28. David Galef, Even a Stone Buddha Can Talk, Tuttle, 2000.
  29. Guy Zona, Even Withered Trees Give Prosperity to the Mountain, 1996.
  30. 「小山秀綱」, デジタル版 日本人名大辞典+Plus, at kotobank. https://kotobank.jp/word/小山秀綱
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  32. 松江重頼『毛吹草』, 1943 typeset, National Diet Library pid 1128297 (open only to a library login; the line read in the snippet of the library's full-text search, which needs none). https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1128297
  33. 藤井乙男『諺の研究』, 1929, 北條氏直時分諺留, National Diet Library pid 1452761, scans 121–126. https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/1452761/1/121
  34. 「世間胸算用」, デジタル大辞泉 · 精選版 日本国語大辞典, at kotobank. https://kotobank.jp/word/世間胸算用
  35. 「淀屋辰五郎」, 精選版 日本国語大辞典 · 改訂新版 世界大百科事典 · 日本大百科全書(ニッポニカ), at kotobank (淀鯉出世滝徳, 宝永五年 1708). https://kotobank.jp/word/淀屋辰五郎
  36. 「近松門左衛門」, 日本大百科全書(ニッポニカ) · 改訂新版 世界大百科事典, at kotobank (関八州繋馬, 享保九年 1724). https://kotobank.jp/word/近松門左衛門
  37. 十返舎一九『磯ぜせりの癖』, 1813, National Diet Library pid 9893317, scan 14 (the text layer). https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/9893317/1/14
  38. 鼻山人『風俗粋好伝』, 1825, National Diet Library pid 8942993, scan 11 (the text layer). https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/8942993/1/11
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  42. 『易』益卦, at the Chinese Text Project. https://ctext.org/book-of-changes/yi1/zh

Authors

Tim Jackowski (Systems Architect, Takase Studios, LLC) · 典 Ten (Anthropic Claude Fable 5.1, Takase Studios, LLC)

AI written · Ten wrote the history. Tim Jackowski commissioned it and answers for it.

Checked · grok-4.6 (xAI), 2026-09-05, citations · gpt-6-astra (OpenAI), 2026-09-05, citations

Cite as: Tim Jackowski and Ten, "Philology of 善は急げ (zen wa isoge)," Takase Studios, 2026, https://takase.com/library/philology/zen-wa-isoge.