Sweep before your own door.
Meaning: Address your own faults and shortcomings before criticizing or interfering in others' affairs.
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 Wisdom
- Put no faith in tale-bearers. — Gossips distort truth through retelling, making their reports unreliable guides for judgm…
- Temperance is the best physic. — Moderation in food, drink, and habits prevents disease better than medicine can cure it.
- Gather thistles, expect prickles. — Planting harmful seeds guarantees painful consequences; you reap what you sow literally a…
- Roses, mind you, have thorns. — Beauty demands caution; attractive things often conceal hidden dangers or painful consequ…
- Second thoughts are best. — Hasty decisions often falter; pausing to reconsider reveals wiser paths forward.
- Every tide has its ebb. — Periods of decline inevitably follow periods of flourishing; change is the only constant…
From our untranslatable words
- Prozvonit — To call someone's phone and hang up after one ring, so they call you back and you save th…
- Boketto — Staring off into the distance with your mind pleasantly empty, thinking of nothing at all.
- Pålegg — Anything you might put on a slice of bread — cheese, ham, jam, egg, whatever — gathered u…