devil take the hindmost

devil take the hindmost

1. An imprecation that everyone should look after their own interests, leaving those who cannot cope to whatever fate befalls them.
   • 1611, Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher, Philaster

     What if a toy take 'em i' th' heels now, and they run all away, and cry, "the devil take the hindmost?"

   • 1742, James Oglethorpe, "Letter to the Honorable Trustees", in The Colonial Records of the State of Georgia, Volume 23, Lucian Lamar Knight, Kenneth Coleman, Milton Ready (editors), 1914

     Land Alianable which would bring in the Stock Jobbing Temper, the Devill take the Hindmost.

   • 1787, in Robert Burns, "To a Haggis" (Deil tak the hindmost)
   • 1843, Thomas Carlyle, Past and Present, book 3, ch. VI, Two Centuries

     And [we] coldly see the all-conquering valiant Sons of Toil sit enchanted, by the million, in their Poor-Law Bastille, as if this were Nature’s Law; — mumbling to ourselves some vague janglement of Laissez-faire, Supply-and-demand, Cash-payment the one nexus of man to man: Free-trade, Competition, and Devil take the hindmost, our latest Gospel yet preached!

   • 1915, W.S. Maugham, "Of Human Bondage", chapter CVIII:

     "Oh, don't talk to me about your socialists, I've got no patience with them," she cried. "It only means that another lot of lazy loafers will make a good thing out of the working classes. My motto is, leave me alone; I don't want anyone interfering with me; I'll make the best of a bad job, and the devil take the hindmost."

   • 2010, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Love Never Dies, Song nr. 22

     "Choose your hand, try your best. He who wins, wins it all. Devil take the hindmost."

• every man for himself