Friendship.

Meaning: A generous person looks for ways to act generously. Devising suggests that kindness can involve deliberate planning, rather than only an impulsive gift.

Meaning: Preferences can differ in ways that another person finds surprising. The comic cow-kissing example makes that variety conspicuous, without claiming every preferred action is harmless or that preference settles a shared disagreement.

Meaning: The saying values a modest home and land that are well used, alongside a wife described as willing. Its praise of sufficiency includes a gendered expectation that needs critical attention.

Meaning: Do not abandon a friend when they need reasonable help in a difficult situation. Dependability includes showing up when support is inconvenient, rather than only when company is enjoyable.

Meaning: Considerate conduct can affect the opportunities and relationships available to a person. The saying values how people treat others, while recognising that good manners do not guarantee success or replace competence and fair conditions.

Meaning: A demanding task can become easier when several people share the work. Help is most useful when everyone understands their contribution and the effort is sensibly divided.

Meaning: A supportive partnership can make difficulties easier to carry and pleasures richer to share. Halving and doubling give mutual support a memorable numerical image.

Meaning: Generous provision matters, but considerate treatment can matter still more. The meal and manners contrast asks how people are welcomed and respected, rather than judging hospitality only by what is served.

Meaning: A meal can be an occasion for pleasant company and good humour. Meat here stands for the meal, rather than only a particular food.

Meaning: The expression wishes for a pleasant meeting, a friendly parting and another welcome encounter. It values the continuity of good company as a hope or greeting, rather than a prediction about how every relationship will develop.

Meaning: People or concerns that are no longer regularly encountered may receive less attention. Distance can make remembering and maintaining a connection require deliberate effort rather than routine contact.

Meaning: More people can make a gathering livelier, while fewer people can mean more of the available food or comforts for each. Company and shared resources create different advantages.

Meaning: Affection can make a loved person’s presence especially welcome. Sweet breath gives closeness and comfort a sensory image.

Meaning: Music is pictured as creating harmony or a peaceful atmosphere. The saying idealises an experience rather than guaranteeing that no harm can occur around it.

Meaning: Care for your neighbour while keeping sensible boundaries. Goodwill and cooperation do not require giving up every distinction between your own space, needs and responsibilities and theirs.

Meaning: The saying praises a neighbour-quart as a good quart. A qualified reading connects the enjoyment of a measured portion with the neighbour associated with it.

Meaning: A difficulty affecting a neighbour may also require attention to your own situation. The nearby-fire image encourages awareness of connected risks, without making self-protection an excuse to ignore someone else’s need for help.

Meaning: A worthwhile offer deserves consideration instead of automatic dismissal. The word good carries the judgement the saying depends on, so an attractive proposal still needs to fit someone’s circumstances and respect their freedom to decline.

Meaning: The saying praises familiar friends and things valued through time or experience. Its list associates age with enjoyment, without establishing that older people, objects or methods are always better than newer ones.

Meaning: Long-established friendships may be especially valued because trust and shared experience have had time to develop. Appreciate that history without assuming that every old relationship is better than a new one.

Meaning: A long-standing hurt or dispute may be harder to resolve than a recent one. The old sore gives persistent trouble a bodily image.

Meaning: Value a trustworthy person rather than taking their presence for granted. The claim of scarcity intensifies the invitation to appreciate good conduct.

Meaning: Some things require participation from more than one side. One person’s effort cannot by itself create a mutual relationship or complete a genuinely shared action.

Meaning: A person can provoke a harmful response from something or someone previously familiar and trusted. The dog image directs attention to one’s own contribution to conflict.