Motivational Quotes

Proverbs

How many of us have been attracted to reason; first learned to think, to draw conclusions, to extract a moral from the follies of life, by some dazzling aphorism.

- Bulwer-Lytton, Edward G.

Best Quotes about Proverbs

A proverb is not a proverb to you until life has illustrated it.

Keats, John

No people require maxims so much as the American. The reason is obvious: the country is so vast, the people always going somewhere, from Oregon apple valley to boreal New England, that we do not know whether to be temperate orchards or sterile climate.

Dahlberg, Edward

How many of us have been attracted to reason; first learned to think, to draw conclusions, to extract a moral from the follies of life, by some dazzling aphorism.

Bulwer-Lytton, Edward G.

Don't make use of another's mouth unless it has been lent to you.

Belgian Proverb

Never give a child a sword.

Latin Proverb

To know the road ahead, ask those coming back.

Chinese Proverb

Whoever gossips to you will gossip about you.

Spanish Proverb

Don't fall before you're pushed.

English Proverb

Trumpet in a herd of elephants; crow in the company of cocks; bleat in a flock of goats.

Malayan Proverb

10.

A handful of patience is worth more than a bushel of brains.

Dutch Proverb

11.

A smiling face is half the meal.

Latvian Proverb

12.

If you wish your merit to be known, acknowledge that of other people.

Oriental Proverb

13.

Proverbs are short sentences drawn from long experience.

Cervantes, Miguel De

14.

Never rely on the glory of the morning nor the smiles of your mother-in-law.

Japanese Proverb

15.

Praise youth and it will prosper.

Irish Proverb

16.

You've got to do your own growing, no matter how tall your grandfather was.

Irish Proverb

17.

If you believe everything you read, better not read.

Japanese Proverb

18.

A collections of anecdotes and maxims is the greatest of treasures for the man of the world, for he knows how to intersperse conversation with the former in fit places, and to recollect the latter on proper occasions.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

19.

Examine what is said, not him who speaks.

Arab Proverb

20.

Precepts or maxims are of great weight; and a few useful ones on hand do more to produce a happy life than the volumes we can't find.

Seneca

21.

When you have only two pennies left in the world, buy a loaf of bread with one, and a lily with the other.

Chinese Proverb

22.

Drink nothing without seeing it; sign nothing without reading it.

Spanish Proverb

23.

Don't you go believing in sayings, Picotee: they are all made by men, for their own advantages. Women who use public proverbs as a guide through events are those who have not ingenuity enough to make private ones as each event occurs.

Hardy, Thomas

24.

When you have given nothing, ask for nothing.

Albanian Proverb

25.

One kind word can warm three winter months.

Japanese proverb

26.

Do not remove a fly from your friend's forehead with a hatchet.

Chinese Proverb

27.

If the wind will not serve, take to the oars.

Latin Proverb

28.

It is not enough to aim; you must hit.

Italian Proverb

29.

The genius, wit, and the spirit of a nation are discovered by their proverbs.

Bacon, Francis

30.

The best armor is to keep out of range.

Italian Proverb

31.

If you scatter thorns, don't go barefoot.

Italian Proverb

32.

He who asks is a fool for five minutes, but he who does not ask remains a fool forever.

Chinese Proverb

33.

The big thieves hang the little ones.

Czech Proverb

34.

For proverbs are the pith, the proprieties, the proofs, the purities, the elegancies, as the commonest so the commendablest phrases of a language. To use them is a grace, to understand them a good.

Florio, John

35.

I believe there's no proverb but what is true; they are all so many sentences and maxims drawn from experience, the universal mother of sciences.

Cervantes, Miguel De

36.

It is the part of a good shepherd to shear his flock, not to skin it.

Latin Proverb

37.

Who begins too much accomplishes little.

German Proverb

38.

If you refuse to be made straight when you are green, you will not be made straight when you are dry.

African Proverb

39.

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.

Chinese Proverb

40.

Keep your broken arm inside your sleeve.

Chinese Proverb

41.

Seize opportunity by the beard, for it is bald behind.

Bulgarian Proverb

42.

A proverb is the child of experience.

Proverb, English

43.

Don't think there are no crocodiles because the water is calm.

Malayan Proverb

44.

If you bow at all, bow low.

Chinese Proverb

45.

If you want to be respected, you must respect yourself.

Spanish Proverb

46.

What you don't see with your eyes, don't invent with your mouth.

Jewish Proverb

47.

A proverb is good sense brought to a point.

Morley, John

48.

Keep five yards from a carriage, ten yards from a horse, and a hundred yards from an elephant; but the distance one should keep from a wicked man cannot be measured.

Indian Proverb

49.

Buy on the rumor; sell on the news.

Wall Street Proverb

50.

He that can't endure the bad, will not live to see the good.

Jewish Proverb