PROVERBS

Related Subjects: Apothegms, Platitude, Quotation, Wit

1. Despise not the discourse of the wise, but acquaint thyself with their proverbs; for of them thou shaIt learn instruction.—Apocrypha: Ecclesiasticus
   

2. Wise sayings are not only for ornaments.—BACON, Apothegms
   

3. Certainly apothegms are of exellent use. . . . They serve to be interlaced in continued speech. They serve to be recited upon occasion of themselves. They serve, if you take out the kernel of them and make them your own.—BACON, Apothegms
   

4. There is some degree of li- centiousness and error in forming axioms.—BACON, N ovum, Organum
   

5. The genius, wit, and spirit of a nation are discovered in its proverbs.—BACON, Essays
   

6. Thou shalt become an astonishment, a proverb, and a byword, among all nations.—Bible, Deuteronomy 28:37
   

7. He gave good heed, and sought out, and set in order many proverbs.—Bible, Ecclesiastes 12:9
   

8. I do not say a proverb is amiss when aptly and seasonably applied; but to be forever discharging them, right or wrong, hit or miss, renders conversation insipid and vulgar.—CERVANTES, Don Quixote
   

9. There is no proverb which is not true.—CERVANTES, Don Quixote
   

10. A proverb is a short sentence based on long experience.—CERVANTES, Don Quixote
    

11. Most maxim-mongers have preferred the prettiness to the justness of a thought, and the turn to the truth.—LORD CHESTERFIELD
    

12. Never utter the truism, but live it among men.—EMERSON,
    Journals
    

13. Don't you go believing in sayings, Picotee; they are all made by men, for their own advantage.—THOMAS HARDY, Hand of Ethelberta

14. The People's Voice the voice of God we call;
    And what are proverbs but the People's Voice?—JAMES HOWELL
    

15. Pointed axioms and acute replies fly loose about the world, and are assigned successively to those whom it may be the fashion to celebrate.—SAMUEL JOHNSON, Lives of the Poets
    

16. In all pointed sentences, some degree of accuracy must be sacrificed
    to conciseness.—SAMUEL JOHNSON
    

17. A proverb is no proverb to you till life has illustrated it.—KEATS, Letters
    

18. Nothing is so useless as a general maxim.—MACAULAY, Essays
    

19. Maxims are the condensed good sense of nations.—SIR JAMES MACKINTOSH
    

20. A good maxim is never out of season.—Proverb
    

21. The proverb is something musty.—SHAKESPEARE, Hamlet
    

22. I can tell thee where that saying was born.—SHAKESPEARE, Twelfth Night
    

23. It is more trouble to make a maxim than it is to do right.—MARK TWAIN, Pudd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar