The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is today.

More Chinese Proverbs

• A closed mind is like a closed book; just a block of wood
• To know another is not to know the person’s face, but to know the person’s heart.
• A little impatience will spoil great plans.
• A smile will gain you ten more years of life.
• The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is today.
• If you want to avoid being cheated, ask for prices at three different stores.
• Men trip not on mountains they trip on molehills.
• It is not the knowing that is difficult, but the doing.
• Think about your own faults during the first half of the night, and the faults of others during the second half.
• There are two kinds of perfect people: those who are dead, and those who have not been born yet.
• He who cheats the earth will be cheated by the earth.
• Listening well is as powerful as talking well, and is also as essential to true conversation.
• A clear conscience never fears midnight knocking.
• Teachers open the door. You enter by yourself.
• An inch of time is an inch of gold but you can’t buy that inch of time with an inch of gold.
• Learning is a treasure that will follow its owner everywhere.
• Solve one problem, and you keep a hundred others away.
• Talk does not cook rice.
• All things change, and we change with them.
• Patience is a bitter plant, but its fruit is sweet.
• A book holds a house of gold.
• Govern a family as you would cook a small fish – very gently.
• One beam, no matter how big, cannot support an entire house on its own.
• A man without a smiling face must not open shop.
• If you bow at all, bow low.
• Do everything at the right time, and one day will seem like three.
• A hundred no’s are less agonizing than one insincere yes.