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Dutch Proverbs (401-500)

Every flood has its ebb.

Fortune and glass break soon.

Sloth is the beginning of vice.

Every shot does not bring down a bird.

No one knows where another's shoe pinches.

My shirt is nearer than my cloak.

What is long spoken of happens at last.

What lay hidden under the snow comes to light at last.

He that spares something today
will have something tomorrow.

A still sow eats up all the draff.

Better squinting than blind.

When the stomach is full the heart is glad.

A good fire makes a quick cook.

By labor fire is got out of a stone.

It is hard to swim against the stream.

It is too late to lock the stable door when the steed is stolen.

It is easy to find a stick to beat a dig.

Ill tidings come soon enough.

Hasty speed doesn't often succeed.

Step by step one goes far.

We hang little thieves and let great ones escape.

A thief makes opportunity.

Little thieves have iron chains, and great thieves gold ones.

There are more thieves than are hanged.

He that will have fire must bear with smoke.

It is good to warm oneself by another's fire.

Once a thief always a thief.

Much wisdom is smothered in a poor man's head.

Every day a thread makes a skein in the year.

All threateners don't fight.

He would be wise who knew all things beforehand.

Who undertakes many things at once
seldom does anything well.

An old wolf is used to being shouted at.

Thistles and thorns prick sore, but evil tongues prick more.

Time gained, much gained.

Time is God's and ours.

Fortune does not stand waiting at any one's door.

Our time runs on like a stream;
first fall the leaves and then the tree.

Time brings roses.

Time past never returns.

Truth is lost with too much debating.

Time goes, death comes.

Time destroys all things.

A wolf hankers after sheep even at his last grasp.

Time and place make the thief.

Tall trees catch much wind.

Trees often transplanted seldom prosper.

An ennobled peasant does not know his own father.

What the old ones sing, the young ones whistle.

When the tree falls everyone runs to gather boughs.

Good tree, good fruit.

Great wealth, great care.

Who watches not catches not.

The worst wheel makes most noise.

Virtue consists in action.

A usurer, a miller, a banker, and a publican
are the four evangelists of Lucifer.

Wasting is a bad habit, sparing a sure income.

They who fight with golden weapons
are pretty sure to prove their right.

Good wine praises itself.

What is lost in the fire must be sought in the ashes.

Who wants fire, let him look for it in the ashes.

When it is God's will to plague a man,
a mouse can bite him to death.

Neither reprove nor flatter your wife
where any one hears or sees it.

It is a bad well into which one must put water.

The worse the wheel, the more it creaks.

Who spits against the wind, fouls his beard.

Stay a while, a lose a mile.

Who has a bad wife, his hell begins on earth.

The wicked shun the light as
the devil does the cross.

When the wine is in the man, the wit is in the can.

Better one eyewitness than ten hearsay witnesses.

When fools go to market, peddlers make money.

Fortune is round; it makes one a king, another a dunghill.

When the wine goes in, the wit goes out.

Fine words don't fill the belly.

Poor folk's wisdom goes for little.

Wisdom in the man, patience in the wife,
brings peace to the house and a happy life.

All women are good Lutherans-they would
rather preach than hear mass.

That is good wisdom which is wisdom in the end.

Talk of the wolf and his tail appears.

He that lives with wolves must howl with them.

Woods have ears and fields have eyes.

Little wood, much fruit.

Big fish spring out of the kettle.

A word is enough to the wise.

An honest man's word is his bond.

Half a word to the wise is enough.

The young may die, the old must.

What is wrong today won't be right tomorrow.

It is good spinning from another's yarn.

The rich have many friends.

An old rat won't go into the trap.

No greater promisers than they who have nothing to give.

There's no making a silk purse of a sow's ear.

Were fools silent they would pass for wise.

The best fodder is the master's eye.

Proverbs are the daughters of daily experience.

When prosperity smiles, beware of its guiles.

When two quarrel both are in the wrong.

It is pleasant to look on the rain when one stands dry.

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