Recently also often with onlooker(s).
It fareth between thee and me as it doth between a player at the chess and a looker on, for he that looketh on seeth many draughts that the player considereth nothing at all.
[1529 J. Palsgrave in Acolastus (EETS) p. xxxviii.]
To take aduise of friends is euer honorable: For lookers on many times see more then gamesters.
[1597 Bacon Essays ‘Of Followers’ 7V]
As the English say, The stander by sees more than he who plays.
[1666 G. Torriano Italian Proverbs iii]
Remembering the old adage, that ‘lookers-on see most of the game,’ I determined‥to accompany him.
[1850 F. E. Smedley Frank Fairlegh vii.]
They say that the onlooker sees most of the game. It's not a very happy game that's being played here at the moment.
[1983 M. Gilbert Black Seraphim vi.]
So it fell out that Mrs Maisie Carruthers, still too frail to attend the funeral, but not too immobile to get to the window of her room at the Manor, became the onlooker who saw most of the game.
[1998 ‘C. Aird’ Stiff News (2000) iii. 29]
Mrs. Morris, it was clear, did not suspect that her warm regard for the works manager was no secret from her assistant—an assistant who by training was an acute observer. Was not another adage that the looker-on saw most of the game?
[1999 ‘H. Crane’ Miss Seeton's Finest Hour xix. 164]
Related to: observation
Bibliography of major proverb collections and works cited from modern editions is available here.
