time and tide wait for no man

For thogh we slepe or wake, or rome, or ryde, Ay fleeth the tyme; it nil no [will no] man abyde.
[c 1390 Chaucer Clerk's Tale l. 118]

The Tyde abydeth no man.
[a 1520 Everyman (1961) l. 143]

Tyde nor time tarrieth no man.
[1592 R. Greene Disputation between He Cony-catcher & She Cony-catcher X. 241]

Time and tide tary on no man.
[1639 J. Clarke Parœmiologia Anglo-Latina 233]

Let's step into the state-room, and turn in: Time and tide waits for no one.
[1767 ‘A. Barton’ Disappointment ii. i.]

Come, come, master, let us get afloat. ‥Time and tide wait for no man.
[1822 Scott Nigel III. ii.]

Time and tide wait for no man. ‘And a school bus waits for no boy.’
[2002 Washington Post 10 Mar. SC11 (Family Circus comic strip)]

Related to: opportunity; time

Bibliography of major proverb collections and works cited from modern editions is available here.

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One must not procrastinate or delay, as in Let's get on with the voting; time and tide won't wait, you know. This proverbial phrase, alluding to the fact that human events or concerns cannot stop the passage of time or the movement of the tides, first appeared about 1395 in Chaucer's Prologue to the Clerk's Tale. The alliterative beginning, time and tide, was repeated in various contexts over the years but today survives only in the proverb, which is often shortened (as above).