- English translation
When you're at someone else's mercy, you play by their rules.
- Literal wording
Being overpowered imposes its own rules.
- Meaning and lesson
The saying holds that a person who has lost control of their situation is no longer free to act on preference. It concerns the one overpowered, not the victor. Weakness, defeat, or dependence imposes its own terms, and someone in that position may end up doing things they would never choose if they had any real alternative.
It can serve as a plea for understanding. Someone may invoke it to account for a compromise they resent, or to defend another person whose conduct seems unworthy, arguing that the pressure they faced, rather than their character, shaped what they did. It explains compelled action; it does not claim that might makes right.
- When it is used
Use it when someone has been pushed by circumstances or a stronger party into an act they dislike, either to explain their own reluctant choice or to soften judgment of another person's surrender to pressure.
Cite or copy proverb
How this record reached us: Editorially sourced.
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