chinese proverbs, can you help?

There are many types of Chinese proverbs. Which one are you looking for?

俗语 - common sayings (俗 means customs or traditions) that were passed down from people to people and from generations to generations. They are highly popular and most Chinese know quite a few of them. They comprise of the following:

歇后语 - they have a distinctive feature in which 2 clauses are connected by a hyphen. Both clauses are always related, where the first clause is like a riddle and the second clause the "answer" to the riddle (it's usually an idiom).

谚语 - Summarised philosophies. Works like English proverbs.

成语 and 惯用语 - strictly speaking, even though they are considered as 俗语, they are not sentences. 成语 are 4-character idioms, while 惯用语 are their 3-character counterparts.

Hmm... since you ask for one, I will give you one based on my internet nickname "解 Ling 还须 Xi Ling 人" :P It's actually modified from a proverb, hehe. The original is as follows:

心病还须心药医, 解铃还须系铃人

xin bing hai xu xin yao yi, jie ling hai xu ji (xi) ling ren

I have a doubt regarding the pronounciation of the word 系. Actually when I first learnt of it I remember it as "xì", until my teacher corrected us and told us it's "jì" (the second way of pronouncing this word). Anyway, just stick with the correct version :)

It means whoever causes the trouble should be the one settling it, so it's a negative proverb (贬义句). The proverb comes from this classical Chinese work 《林间集》 by a person called 惠洪 (Hui Hong) from the Song Dynasty and the original prose is as follows:

法灯泰钦禅师少解悟，然未为人知，独法眼禅师深奇之。

一日法眼问大众曰：“虎项下金铃，何人解得？”

众无以对。泰钦适至，法眼举前语问之，泰钦曰：“大众何不道：‘系者解得。’”

由是人人刮目相看。

I'm not good with translating classical Chinese texts, so this is a rough interpretation of it:

There was once a monk called Reverend Fa Deng (meaning holy light) from the Southern Tang Dynasty who was so straightforward with his words that all the other monks disliked him. However, he was held in high regard by Reverend Fa Yan (meaning holy vision), who established the "Fa Yan" Buddhist sect. Once, Reverend Fa Yan asked all the monks, "Who can take down the golden bells on the neck of a tiger?" All the other monks were speechless. Only Reverend Fa Deng came up with the correct answer, "Whoever manages to put the bells on the tiger's neck has the ability to take them down." All the other monks were very impressed with his intelligent answer.

Hope this helps!

Man who cooks carrots & pees in same pot not very sanitary. Ostrich who bury head in sand get burnt in end.

mostly they are origin from some story or words said by some historical person.