PREVENTION is better than cure
Cf.
c
1240
BRACTON
De Legibus
V
. x.
melius & utilius [est] in tempore occurrere
,
quam post causam vulneratam quaerere remedium
, it is better and more useful to meet a problem in time than to seek a remedy after the damage is done.
1618
Happiness of Church
146
Preuention is so much better then healing, because it saues the labour of being sicke.
1732
Gnomologia
no. 3962
Prevention is much preferable to Cure.
1826
Letter
19 Apr. (1940) II. 257
Prevention is better than cure …With perseverance we shall save numbers of little Devils from becoming big ones.
1954
Journal of Edwin Carp
148
‘Why do you wear those old galoshes when the sun's shining?’..‘Prevention's better than Cure.’
1981
From Eternity to Here
vi.
Coates .. addressed a meeting of private detectives and tried to convince us that prevention was better than cure.
foresight and hindsight
;
prudence