A dictionary of Proverbs (Oxford Paperback Reference)

KEEP a thing seven years and you’ll always find a use for it
□1623 W. PAINTER Palace of Pleasure C5 Things of small value the old proverb say, Wise men seuen yeares will carefully vp lay. 1663 T. KILLIGREW Parson’s Wedding in Comedies & Tragedies (1664) 100 According to the Proverb; Keep a thing seven years, and then if thou hast no use on’t throw’t away. 1816 SCOTT Antiquary II. vi. They say, keep a thing seven year, an’ ye’ll aye find a use for’t. 1945 F. THOMPSON Lark Rise xx. ‘I don’t know that I’ve any use for it.’ ‘Use! Use!.. Keep a thing seven years and you’ll always find a use for it! ’ "thrift
KEEP no more cats than will catch mice
□1673 J. DARE Counsellor Manners lxii. If thou hast a regard to Thrift, keep no more Cats than will kill Mice. 1678 J. RAY English Proverbs (ed. 2) 350 I will keep no more cats then will catch mice (i.e. no more in family then will earn their living). Somerset. 1710 S. PALMER Proverbs 358 Keep no more Cats than will Catch Mice. Ecquipage and Attendance.. must be agreeable to Character, Dignity and Fortune. 1910 R. KIPLING Rewards & Fairies 73 The King keeps no cats that don’t catch mice. She must sail the seas, Master Dawe. "efficiency and inefficiency; work
KEEP your own fish-guts for your own sea-maws
□1721 J. KELLY Scottish Proverbs 118 Give your own Sea Maws [gulls] your own
Fish Guts. If you have any Superfluities give them to your poor Relations, Friends, or Countrymen, rather than to others. 1816 SCOTT Antiquary I. xv. Ye ken my gude-man likes to ride the expresses himsel—we maun gie our ain fish-guts to our ain sea-maws. 1952 ‘P. PIPER’ Death in Canongate (1954) viii. ‘Oh! it makes me a bit sick when you can be so liberal with anyone—’ ‘And not with you. That’s what you are trying to say, isn’t it?’ ‘I suppose so,’ he said, and quoted lugubriously, ‘“Keep your ain fish guts for your ain sea maws.”’ ■ charity; family