A Dictionary of Proverbs (Oxford Paperback Reference)

Of similar vintage is LEARNING is better than house and land.

1752 S. FOOTE Taste I. i. It has always been my Maxum..to give my Children

Learning enough; for, as the old Saying is, When house and Land are gone and spent, then

Learning is most excellent. 1896 S. BARING-GOULD Broom-Squire xxvi. I have..got

Simon to write for me, on the fly-leaf. ..When land is gone, and money is spent, Then

learning is most excellent. learning; property

A HOUSE divided cannot stand

With allusion to MATTHEW xii. 25 (AV) Every city or house divided against itself shall
not stand.

a 1050 DEFENSOR Liber Scintillarum (EETS) 133 Drihten segth .. ælc ceaster

oththe hus todæled ongean hit sylf, hit na stynt. c 1704 in T. Chalkley Journal in Works

(1751) 42 My Mother would often say, A House divided could not stand. 1858 A.

LINCOLN Speech 16 June in Works (1953) II. 461 ‘A house divided against itself cannot

stand.’ I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free.

2001 Times 12 Dec. 17 A house divided against itself cannot stand. And if Britain is to

provide a secure home for all its peoples, there must be a shared sense of what values the

nation holds in common. quarrelsomeness; unity and division

house see also BETTER one house spoiled than two; an ENGLISHMAN’S house is his
castle; FOOLS build houses and wise men live in them; those who live in GLASS houses
shouldn’t throw stones; LEARNING is better than house and land; never mention ROPE in the
house of a man who has been hanged; SWEEP the house with broom in May, you sweep the
head of the house away.

human see to ERR is human (to forgive divine).

hundred see the BUYER has need of a hundred eyes, the seller of but one.

HUNGER drives the wolf out of the wood

Cf. early 14th-cent. Fr. la fains enchace le loufdou bois, hunger chases the wolf from the
wood.