This quote was in the original version of the Jacula Prudentum section. I have moved the quote to this discussion page, because I do not find it in the Complete Works edition of Jacula Prudentum. Of course, it is possible that Herbert quoted this saying somewhere at some time. BTW, the following note points to the antiquity of this saying :
From Public Opinion [magazine], Volume XXXIII (1902), page 312 ; published by The Public Opinion Company, 13 Astor Place, New York, N. Y. : in a column titled Classical Origin of Proverbs, we read the following – “In the New Liberal Review Mr. Churton Collins has one of those learned literary tit-bits articles which he does better than anyone else. It is concerned with popular proverbs and their origin. Mr. Collins shows that a very large percentage of our pithiest sayings are the wit and wisdom of ancient Greece and Rome. ‘His bark is worse than his bite’ is as old as Quintus Curtius, who himself cites it as a proverb.”
See also The cyclopedia of practical quotations, English and Latin, compiled by Jehiel Keeler Hoyt & Anna Lydia Ward, Funk & Wagnalle (1889), p. 514 :
Canis timidus vehementius latrat quam mordet, A cowardly cur barks more fiercely than it bites. ~~ Quintus Curtius Rufus
