[Ads-l] No matter how stout one beam, it cannot support a house

[Barretts Mail]

The proverb "No matter how stout one beam, it cannot support a house” is cited as being Chinese in a handful of books and many websites. See “The Routledge Book of World Proverbs” (http://bit.ly/2gzhfsl <http://bit.ly/2gzhfsl>) as one such book. “State of the Art Selling” has it as, "One beam alone, no matter how stout, cannot support a house” (http://bit.ly/2ftXRxm <http://bit.ly/2ftXRxm>).

The only Chinese equivalent I’ve been able to find is 单梁难撑房, which get a measly 15 hits on Google, nearly all of which are talking about the English equivalent.

That seems odd for a proverb.

Benjamin Barrett
Formerly of Seattle, WA
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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org