Famous Proverbs

1] Do as the friar says, not as he does

2] Love your neighbour, yet pull not down your hedge

3] New brooms sweep clean

4] He that is in poverty is still in suspicion

5] Despair gives courage to a coward

6] A gift in hand is better than two promises.

7] A good beginning makes a good ending.

8] Love is a disease, and the loved on is the only medicine

9] Who keeps company with the wolf, will learn to howl

10] Truth is stranger than fiction

11] A man is valued as he makes himself valuable

12] The absent party is always to blame.

13] A long tongue is a sign of a short hand

14] Why does one man’s yawning make another yawn?

15] What soberness conceals, drunkenness reveals

16] Don’t play with fire

17] Better to ask the way than go astray.

18] Whether the pitcher strikes the stone, or the stone the pitcher, it is bad for the pitcher

19] Better the last smile than the first laugh

20] The healthful man can give counsel to the sick

21] Choose neither women nor linen by candlelight.

22] To forget a wrong is the best revenge

23] Mount Fuji itself is not So beautiful to one who is cold and hungry

24] Spend and be free, but make no waste

25] It is easier to get a favour from fortune than to keep it

26] The difficult is done at once; the impossible takes a little longer

27] When the word is out it belongs to another

28] An ill wound is cured, not an ill name

29] Every lot is to be overcome by endurance

30] Seek and you shall find

31] A thousand cranes in the air are not worth one sparrow in the fist.

32] Good fame is better than a good face

33] The hunchback does not see his own hump, but his companion’s

34] A jack of all traders is master of none

35] Desire beautifies what is ugly

36] Blue are the far away hills

37] It is a hard-fought field where no man escapes unkilled

38] There’s no such thing as free as a free lunch

39] He that has a wife, has strife

40] Fingers were made before forks

41] First impressions are the most lasting

42] If one sheep leaps over the ditch (or dyke), all the rest will follow

43] A ragged coat may cover an honest man.

44] Death and life are in the power of the tongue

45] No pot so ugly as not to find a cover

46] If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em

47] Morning dreams come true

48] Every one thinks his own cross is heaviest

49] The dog that fetches, will carry.

50] A rich man can do nothing wrong

51] A good servant should never be in the way and never out of the way

52] Misfortune does not always come to injure

53] On an open plain, the rhododendron is a tall tree

54] Conscience does make cowards of us all

55] The end justifies the means

56] Almost’ never killed a fly.

57] Fling dirt enough, and some will stick

58] He is lifeless that is faultless

59] A good conscience is a sure card

60] It is better to travel hopefully than to arrive

61] The absent party is always to blame.

62] No good building without a good foundation.

63] The more laws, the more offenders

64] No man so good but another may be as good as he

65] It is ill waiting for dead men’s shoes

66] He that will not have peace, God gives him war

67] Coming events cast their shadows before

68] Too much hope deceives

69] The worth of a thing is best known by the want of it

70] Would you know what money is, got borrow some

71] In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king

72] No like is the same.

73] The beaten road is the safest

74] Practice is the science that gives confidence

75] Choose your neighbour before your house and your companion before the road.

76] No wrong without a remedy

77] He who has a mind to beat his dog will easily find a stick.

78] When good cheer is lacking, our friends will be packing

79] Don’t make a mountain out of molehill

80] All must be as God will

81] You cannot sell the cow and sup (or drink) the milk

82] A straw will show which way the wind blows.

83] A good example is the best sermon

84] God is always on the side of the big battalions

85] Easy come, easy go

86] The best wine comes from an old vessel

87] Suffering does not manifest itself

88] Burn not your house to rid it of the mouse.

89] Behind the smile, a dagger may be hidden

90] Don’t try to run before you walk

91] Love knows hidden paths

92] God’ s mill grids slow but sure

93] Handsome is as handsome does

94] Men leap over where the hedge is lowest

95] The game is not worth the candle

96] Riches rather enlarge than satisfy appetites

97] Don’t cross the bridge before you get to it

98] There are spots even in the sun

99] Do as say, not as I do

100] Money makes the man