Beggars on horseback will ride to the devil.
Meaning: Sudden wealth corrupts those unaccustomed to fortune, driving them toward ruin through excess.
Origin: Recorded in A Dictionary of English Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases, an undated collection published in London by Whittaker & Co. around 1880 and credited to Thomas Preston. Its earlier history hasn't been traced.
More proverbs about Challenge
- Begging is an ill trade on a fast-day. — Alms-giving diminishes on religious fast-days when even the charitable are themselves abs…
- Fear not the loss of the bell more than the loss of the steeple. — Don't obsess over minor possessions when greater structures—relationships, principles, li…
- The bird that can sing and will not sing, must be made to sing. — Talent unused is wasted potential; those capable of contributing must be compelled to ful…
- Who so blind as he that will not see? — Willful ignorance is the most complete blindness; refusing truth is worse than lacking it.
- Whether you boil snow or pound it, you will have but water from it. — Effort cannot change the fundamental nature of something inherently worthless or insignif…
- It is easy to bowl down hill. — Gravity assists destructive momentum, making harm effortless once negative forces align.
From our tongue twisters
- Apelle figlio di Apollo fece una palla di pelle di pollo e tutti i principi della città di Capua la palpeggiarono. — A wall of 'p/ll/l/a' that seems to grow longer as you speak it faster.
- Se la serpe si avvicina alla siepe del serpente, il serpente scappa dalla siepe. — A sibilant 's/se/si/sci' minefield; both words (serpe and serpente) slither through the s…
- Chi è Ciccio Capece? Ciccio Capece è un capocaccia che caccia con la cacciaballa. — A 'c/ci/ccia' onslaught — Italian's hard and soft c in the same sentence, non-stop.