Proverbs, East and West Compiled by Kim Yong Chol

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Proverbs, East and West: An Anthology of Chinese, Korean and Japanese Sayings with Western Equivalents

Compiled by Kim Yong-chol

Illustrated by Lee Hyun-joo

 

 

 

The proverb was once called "the fruit of the longest pxperience in the fewest words," and Cervantes phased it as "a short sentence founded on long experience." Certainly it is one of the oldest and shortest forms of folklore. Perhaps this is why more and more people in our time are turning to the proverb as an important tool of communication and learning.

 

Proverbs, East and West is a personal selection of proverbial sayings deriving from the peoples of China, Korea, and Japan. A total of 1,359 Asian proverbs in English translation have been chosen for this volume.

 

This book places each group of Asian proverbs with a comparable group of Western proverbs so that the reader may view the Asian proverbs against their Western equivalents. As many as 867 Western proverbs have been chosen for this book.

 

For the reader's sheer enjoyment and contemplation, the proverbs are arranged in topical categories, ranging from Anger to Wisdom. Drawing deep interests are many instances of the unity of perception in both Asian and Western proverbs.

 

 

 

Contents

 

Preface

Acknolwledgments

 

 

Chapter one    The Virtues

THROUGH ALL ages many nations and cultures have celebrated themselves on the positive traits of human character. These traits, they thought, made a man generous, sympathetic, courageous, fair-minded, wise, or simply admirable in character and conduct. This section, treating of various aspects of those inner qualities, illustrates the three Asian nations' widened but keen interest in good morals and proper ways of living. The Western nations and cultures, whose proverbs and maxims are represented here, are equally keen in their attention to the art of enlightened living.

1. Virtue
2. Kindness
3. Love
4. Honesty
5. Courage
6. Patience
7. Knowledge
8. Wisdom

 

 

Chapter Two    The Vices

THE SINFUL, immoral nature of man," ― so declared many of the world's theologians and moral philosophers. The very same negative qualities in men ― qualities contrary to good morals and proper ways of living ― have been observed over and over by diverse groups of people in many nations and cultures. The list of the vices in this section is far from complete; it focuses on those traits that have attracted considerable attention in China, Korea, and Japan through many generations. Curiously enough, these three Asian nations showed in their proverbs less concern than their Western counterparts whith such traits as lust, gluttony, hypocrisy, and sloth.

1. Anger
2. Envy and Jealousy
3. Greed
4. Selfishness
5. Pride
6. Criticism and Slander

 

 

Chapter Three    The Ineffectual

A MAN'S life is, and large, a series of attempts to accomplish what one has in mind. In this sense, life may be summed up as a series of successes and failures. Failure is just as common as success in any man's life. As illustrated in this section, a great deal of failings come from man's lack of good sense and judgment. Because these failings are terribly out of place, they do provide a funny side to life. Closely related to this comic vision of man is a view that man is by nature liable to err.

1. Foolishness
2. Incongruity
3. Imperfection

 

 

Chapter Four    Senses and Sensibilities

AS ITS title implies, this section is concerned with man's capacity for feeling and perceiving. Here, the power of the human mind responds at one level to such bodily stimuli as the eyes, ears, and nerves; at another level the power of feeling involves awareness of something emotional, or even elemental, in life. In either case, however, we note that men of the past never failed to ponder and pursue the enduring value of humble desires in the human heart. Worthy of special attention are those proverbs listed under "Silence: its value." "Feminine beauty: its shallowness," "Feminine beauty: its ill-fatedness and danger," "Happiness: its nature and sources," and "Happiness: its secrets."

1. Speech
2. Beauty
3. Heart and Mind
4. Happiness

 

 

Chapter Five    The Temporal

NO LIVING man can escape time. At his birth, a man finds himself in the sphere of time; he continues to live there until he dies. While he lives, he continues to struggle under the stress of time. It is no wonder that a man should be so deeply concerned with timely events and opportune actions in his life. He hopes that events happen just at a time more useful to himself and that an action will be accomplished at the most advantageous moment. And his fear is that anything short of timeliness or opportuneness may mean to him a source of frustration, failure, and misery. Many proverbs in this section demonstrate people's abiding concern with the element of timeliness in everyday life.

1. Time
2. Opportunity
3. Delay
4. Haste

 

 

Chapter Six    Practical Concerns

IN HIS struggle for existence, man had deep-rooted desires to have and keep sufficient necessaries of life, such as food, clothing, and shelter. In primitive times when money was not yet in use, such desires were for the things themselves. With the invention of money, however, most of the desires have been directed exclusively to money. Money has become the most important element in all practical concerns of life. In this section we see men taking various views of wealth, a condition in which men have more than enough money for his normal needs and desires, and of poverty, a condition in which men have not enough money for the necessities of life. Also included in this section are other practical concerns of life: health, trade and business and possession or people's worldly values.

1. Wealth
2. Poverty
3. Health
4. Trade and Business
5. Possession

 

Chapter Seven    Relationships

NO MAN is an island. To live is to have some sort of relations ― in a family, in a merriate, in a social group, whatever. In pre-industrial societies, the worth of an individual was determined more often in terms of the man's status in the family or society. Many of the proverbs listed below may be properly seen from that perspective. This is not to suggest that our way of judging the worth of an individula is now totally different from the way they judged people in pre-industrial societies. Even today family and social relationships remain important factors in a person's life ― though with different emphases in different cultures. This section deals with the concerns and customs of those who are joined together by common ancestry and other unifying bonds such as marriage, friendship, and fellowship.

1. Family
2. Merriage
3. Friendship

 

 

Chapter Eight    The Natural

A GOOD deal of human knowledge has derived from man's observation of what goes on in the physical world. In other words, men have learned a great deal from nature in developing their ways of living. This was particularly true when man's dependence on natural facts and forces was greater in pre-industrial societies. This section shows how the peoples of the East and the West have developed their ways and values of decent living in terms of the laws of nature that they thought were at work in the real world.

1. Weather and Seasons
2. Cause and Effect
3. Comparison and Contrast
4. Appearance and Reality
5. Living and Dying

 

 

Chapter Nine    The Supernatural

SCIENCE AS we know it today is an outgrowth of man's search for knowledge based on facts and laws in orderly systems of the universe. This is a relatively modern phenomenon. Prior to this, the peoples of the East and the West had been accustomed to seeing certain agencies, influences, and phenomena above or beyond what is natural. This section illustrates some of the most important concepts and ｅxpressions that characterized the supernatural habits of mind in the earlier centuries of human history. Some of the old proverbs given here are far from true when viewed from a scientific standpoint, but they will serve as useful means of understanding some of the ways and values of pre-industrial societies.

1. Heaven and Fate
2. Devils and Hell
3. Superstitions

 

 

Index

• Key Words and Concepts
• Western Proverbs

 

 

 

 

 

 

The People's Voice the Voice of God we call; And what are proverbs but the People's Voice? ― James Howell

 

The genius, wit, and spirit of a nation are discovered in its proverbs. ― Francis Bacon

 

Maxims are the condensed good sense of nations.  ― Sir James Mackintosh

 

The proverbs of a nation furnish the index to its spirit.  ― J. G. Holland

 

Judges a country by the quality of its proverbs.  ― German proverb

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Kim Yong-Chol, teacher, translator, and editor in the fields of English literature and Korean studies, was born in Korea in 1931. He took up his study of English literature at Seoul National University (B.A. and M.A.), and continued his study of English literature in the U.S. at the University of Hawaii (M.A.) and the University of California, San Diego (Ph.D.).

Mr. Kim has written numerous scholarly articles on British and American literature. In addition to this, he has translated into Korean a number of English novels and critical works, and has also edited an anthology of English literature for Korean college students.

In the 1970's Mr. Kim's interests broadened to include Korean studies. He began with scholarly articles in English on Korean literature and culture, and he has continued with a number of translations of Korean short stories into English. Mr. Kim also co-authored (with Mr. Chang Namgui) Functional Korean, a textbook of Korean conversation and communication.

Mr. Kim is currently Professor of English at Sung Kyun Kwan University in Seoul.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The riper the grain is, the lower it hangs its head.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ISBN : 0-930878-09-4