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Robert Christy, comp. Proverbs, Maxims and Phrases of All Ages. 1887.

Youth, Age

A worm is in the bud of youth and at the root of age.Cowper.

A young man negligent, an old man necessitous.

Action from youth, advice from middle age, prayers from the aged.Hesiod.

Age but tastes, youth devours.Dryden.

Better eat gray bread in your youth than in your age.Scotch.

Better poor, young and wise, than rich, old and a fool.German.

Better under the beard of the old than the whip of the young.Polish.

Consult with the old and fence with the young.German.

Crabbed age and youth cannot live together.Shakespeare.

Heavy work in youth is quiet rest in old age.German.

He that corrects not youth controls not age.French.

If the young knew, if the old man could, there is nothing but would be done.Italian.

If you lie upon roses when young, you’ll lie upon thorns when old.

If youth knew what age would crave,
It would both get and save.

Intemperate youth ends in an age imperfect and unsound.Denham.

In the lexicon of youth which fate reserves for a bright manhood there is no such word as fail.Bulwer.

It is hard to put old heads on young shoulders.

It is less painful to learn in youth than to be ignorant in age.

No one so old that he may not live a year, none so young but he may die to-day.German.

Of young men die many, of old escape not any.

Old age is a tyrant which forbids the pleasures of youth on pain of death.Rochefoucauld.

Old boys have playthings as well as young ones, the difference is only in the price.Franklin.

Old head and young hand.

Old men for counsel, young men for war.

Old men go to death, but death comes to young men.

Old men when they scorn young, make much of death.

Old young and old long.

Reckless youth makes rueful age.Scotch.

The aged in council, the young in action.Danish.

The blunders of youth are preferable to the triumphs of manhood or the success of old age.Benjamin Disraeli.

The old effect more by counsel than the young by action.German.

The old for want of ability and the young for want of knowledge let things be lost.Spanish.

The old forget, the young don’t know.German.

The old have death before their face, the young behind their backs.German.

The old man at home and the young abroad lie after the same fashion.Spanish.

The old ones sing, the young ones pipe.

The old see better behind than the young before.German.

The warnings of age are the weapons of youth.

The young are slaves to novelty, the old to custom.

The young man’s wrath is like straw of fire,
But like red hot steel is the old man’s ire.Byron.

The young may die, the old must die.German, Dutch.

They who would be young when they are old, must be old when they are young.

We expiate in old age the follies of our youth.Latin.

What youth learns age does not forget.Danish.

When old age is evil youth can learn no good.

Where the old are foolish the child learns folly.German.

Who follow not virtue in youth cannot fly sin in old age.Italian.

Who would be young in age, must in youth be sage.German.

Young folk, silly folk, old folk, cold folk.Dutch.

Young men soon give and soon forget affronts, old age is slow at both.Byron.

Young men’s knocks, old men feel.

Young people must be taught, old ones be honored.Danish.

Young men are made wise, old men become so.

Young men should be learners when old men are actors.

Young men think old men are fools, and old men know young men to be so.

Youth is a garland of roses, age is a crown of thorns.Hebrew.

Youth is a blunder, manhood a struggle, old age a regret.Benjamin Disraeli.