Famous Proverbs

1] Practice makes perfect

2] The soldier who retreated fifty paces laughed at the one who had fallen back a hundred paces

3] He that demands misses not, unless his demands be foolish

4] The least boy always carries the greatest fiddle

5] Change brings life

6] He preaches well (or best) that lives well (or best).

7] Those who sell dog-meat often display a lamb’s head

8] Custom makes all things easy

9] Weapons breed peace

10] Sometimes clemency is cruelty, and cruelty clemency

11] I saw few die of hunger; of eating, a hundred thousand.

12] The child says nothing but what it hears by the fire

13] Words have wings, and cannot be recalled

14] Old cattle breed not

15] It’s hard to get one’s own sword back when it’s in someone else’s scabbard

16] Soft fire makes sweet malt

17] Never hit a man when he’s down

18] There are spots even in the sun

19] A good wife is a good prize

20] Better to have one eye than be blind altogether

21] Love is lawless.

22] There’s always room at the top

23] A man can die but once

24] A word is enough to the wise

25] What you don’t know can’t hurt you

26] Exchange (or Fair exchange) is no robbery

27] Seek and you shall find

28] No land without stones, or meat without bones

29] An obedient wife commands her husband

30] Talk of an angel and you’ll hear the fluttering of his wings

31] Laugh and the world laughs with you; weep and you weep alone

32] Set a wolf to keep the sheep

33] If you want a thing well done, do it yourself

34] Nothing ventured, nothing gained

35] Give a servant a rod, and he’ll beat his master

36] Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth

37] Many doctors, death accomplished

38] He that has a good memory, gives few alms

39] One man eats the jackfruit, another gets his hands sticky

40] A word is enough to the wise

41] You must lose a fly to catch a trout

42] Win a good reputation, and sleep at your ease

43] Great alms-giving lessens no man’s living

44] A fool says what he knows, and a wise man knows what he says.

45] He that lives ill, fear follows him

46] The fine pullet shows its excellence from the egg.

47] Let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth

48] Thieves and rogues have the best luck, if they do but escape hanging

49] Prosperity makes friends, adversity tries them

50] Who errs and mends, to god himself commends

51] Lovers are madmen

52] Wisdom is better than strength

53] He is a fool that makes a hammer of his fist

54] If the thorn falls, the leaf is pierced; if the leaf falls the leaf is pierced

55] Genius is an infinite capacity for taking pains.

56] When someone gives up a peach, return him a plum

57] It is the first step that is troublesome

58] Forewarned, forearmed; to be prepared is half the victory

59] First think, and then speak

60] III luck is good for something

61] If things were to be done twice, all would be wise.

62] Pitchers have ears

63] You cannot make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear

64] Friendship is a plant which must be often watered

65] What is the mother of industry

66] You cannot serve God and Mammon

67] Tell a lie and stick to it.

68] If you have known one, you have known them all

69] He that lives ill, fear follows him

70] The fairest silk is soonest stained

71] Needs must when the devil drives

72] Anything will fit a naked man.

73] One thief will not rob another

74] The good die young.

75] He that will not endure to itch must endure to smart

76] Kinsman helps kinsman, and woe to him that has none

77] They that value not praise, will never do anything worthy of praise

78] All must be as God will

79] You know what you can do till you try.

80] The calmest husbands make the stormiest wives

81] He is an ill husband who is not missed

82] So many countries, so many customs

83] Forgiveness is perfect when the sin is not remembered

84] When a man grows angry, his reason rides out.

85] What is brought by the wind will be carried away by the wind

86] None are so fond of secrets as those who don’t mean to keep them

87] Scatter with one hand, gather with two

88] Brute strength without reason falls of its own weight

89] Dead men tell no tales

90] Credit lost is like a Venice glass broken

91] Don’t have too many irons in the fire

92] Delay is the antidote of anger

93] True gold is not transformed by fire

94] The young will sow their wild oats

95] Thatch your roof before the rain begins

96] Water far away will not extinguish a fire that is nearby; relatives far from you are not as good as neighbours close to you.

97] Ill luck is good for something

98] Use makes mastery

99] A hundred pounds of sorrow pays not one ounce of debt

100] He who says what he likes shall hear what he does not like