Verbeelding van het spreekwoord 'Bezint eer ge begint' (Illustration of the Proverb 'Think Before You Act')

This engraving illustrates a Dutch proverb through an elaborate visual allegory: a bearded elder and a suspended fool are lowered into a grotesque vessel controlled by a woman at a window. Text blocks surround the scene, explaining the moral consequences of rashness and folly. The print exemplifies the Northern European tradition of moralizing prints that embed lessons in dense, inventive imagery. Such engravings—combining grotesque exaggeration, narrative complexity, and didactic captions—established conventions later refined by Hogarth and Gillray. These works merged social commentary, humor, and instruction, creating a visual language of satire that would evolve into the sequential narrative forms of comic strips and graphic storytelling.