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Ἡ γλῶσσα πολλοὺς εἰς ὄλεθρον ἤγαγεν.

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Ἡ γλῶσσα πολλοὺς εἰς ὄλεθρον ἤγαγεν.

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The tongue has led many people to their destruction.

This is yet another one of Menander's monostichs:

Ἡ γλῶσ|σα πολ||λοὺς εἰς | ὄλεθ||ρον ἤ|γαγεν.

Smyth's Greek grammar cites this as an example of what he calls an empiric aorist, which is essentially the same as a gnomic aorist, i.e. aorists used to express a general experience or accepted fact. Such aorists are often rendered in English with a present or perfect verb, rather than the usual past tense translation.

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Κακὸν ἀναγκαῖον τὸ πείθεσθαι γαστρί.

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Κακὸν ἀναγκαῖον τὸ πείθεσθαι γαστρί.

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To obey the stomach is a cruel constraint.

Here the stomach stands for life's most basic physical needs, like having to eat in order to stay alive. Note that the infinitive is a neuter noun; hence the neuter article, τό. The noun ἀναγκαῖον means a prison, a place to which you are confined or constrained by necessity, ἀνάγκη. From the Greek root in γαστήρ we get all the gastr- words in English like gastronomy and gastritis.

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Βουλὴ πονηρὰ χρηστὸν οὐκ ἔχει τέλος.

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Βουλὴ πονηρὰ χρηστὸν οὐκ ἔχει τέλος.

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A wicked plan does not lead to a useful outcome.

This is another one of the iambic monostichs of Menander:

Βουλὴ | πονη||ρὰ χρη|στὸν οὐκ || ἔχει τέλος.

The root of the noun βουλή is also found in the verb βούλομαι.

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Τὸ τεχνίον πᾶσα γαῖα τρέφει.

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Τὸ τεχνίον πᾶσα γαῖα τρέφει.

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Everywhere in the world fosters art.

Suetonius says that the Emperor Nero quoted this saying when boasting that he would thrive anywhere in the world because he was a talented musician, even if he were to be driven from Rome as astrologers had predicted. The word τεχνίον is a diminutive of the more commonly used word τέχνη, meaning art, skill, craft; the Greek root of these words gives us all the tech- English words like technology.

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Λῦπαι γὰρ ἀνθρώποισι τίκτουσιν νόσους. 

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Λῦπαι γὰρ ἀνθρώποισι τίκτουσιν νόσους. 

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Grieving leads to people getting sick.

Literally: griefs (plural) give birth to sicknesses (plural) for people. The words are from a fragment of Euripides, and the saying also appears in the monostichs (one-liners) of Menander; here is the iambic meter marked:

Λῦπαι | γὰρ ἀν||θρώποι|σι τίκ||τουσιν | νόσους.

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Σίδηρον πλεῖν διδάσκεις.

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Σίδηρον πλεῖν διδάσκεις.

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You're teaching iron to float.

This is another kind of fool's errand, the opposite of the previous proverb: iron is never going to float. At least, that's what the Greeks thought about iron. Later on, of course, iron did learn to float! You can read about the history of iron-hulled sailing ships at Wikipedia.

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Ἰχθὺν νήχεσθαι διδάσκεις.

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Ἰχθὺν νήχεσθαι διδάσκεις.

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You're teaching a fish to swim.

This is a proverbial fool's errand: fish know how to swim already; you don't have to teach them. Compare a similar saying: Ἀετὸν ἵπτασθαι διδάσκεις, "You're teaching an eagle to fly." From the root in the verb διδάσκω, we get English words like didactic, autodidact, etc.

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Ἅλας ἄγων καθεύδεις.

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Ἅλας ἄγων καθεύδεις.

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You are sleeping while carrying salt.

As Erasmus explains, the proverb refers to someone who is behaving carelessly while carrying out a difficult task, as salt was a valuable commodity that could be easily damaged by being spilled, coming into contact with water, etc. Specifically, Zenobius says, "A merchant, having filled his vessel with salt, fell asleep. It happened that the water in the bilge increased and dissolved the salt. Hence the proverb." The Greek word for salt, ἅλς, is cognate with English "salt," Latin sal, etc.

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Ἐξ ἑνὸς πάνθ᾽ ὁρᾷν.

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Ἐξ ἑνὸς πάνθ᾽ ὁρᾷν.

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To see all things from the one.

The saying appears in the sayings collected by Apostolius. The word πάντα, "all (things)," drops its final vowel before the following vowel, and the rough breathing causes the aspiration: πάνθ᾽ ὁρᾶν. Compare the opposite idea expressed in the U.S. motto: E pluribus unum, "Out of the many, one."

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Μὴ κίνει Καμάριναν.

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Μὴ κίνει Καμάριναν.

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Don't move Kamarina.

This refers to a marshy swamp outside the city of Kamarina in Sicily. Because the air of the swamp was unhealthy, the people wanted to drain the swamp, but the Delphic oracle told them: Μὴ κίνει Καμάριναν. The people ignored the oracle, drained the swamp, and thus exposed their city to attack by their enemies. The saying of the oracle came to be used like a proverb, and as such it is the subject of a poem in the Greek Anthology.

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Νοῦς ἐστι πάντων ἡγεμὼν τῶν χρησίμων.

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Νοῦς ἐστι πάντων ἡγεμὼν τῶν χρησίμων.

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The mind is chief among all useful things.

In other words, the mind is the most useful thing of all! This is yet another of Menander's one-liners:

Νοῦς ἐσ|τι πάν||των ἡ|γεμὼν || τῶν χρη|σίμων.

The adjective χρήσιμον, "useful," is related to the verb χράομαι, to use, to make use of. From Greek ἡγεμὼν we get the English word hegemony.

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Ἰδίας νόμιζε τῶν φίλων τὰς συμφοράς.

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Ἰδίας νόμιζε τῶν φίλων τὰς συμφοράς.

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Consider your friends' misfortunes as your own.

This is one of Menander's monostichs (one-liners):

Ἰδίας | νόμι||ζε τῶν | φίλων || τὰς συμ|φοράς.

From the Greek root ἰδί- we get the English word idiot; here's how that happened: ἴδιος, "personal, private, one's own," gave rise to the Greek word ἰδιώτης, meaning "a private citizen, layman, non-professional," i.e. someone without skilled knowledge, and hence English "idiot." For more about this etymology, see Wikipedia: Idiot. You can also see the same root in words like idiom and idiosyncrasy.

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Πενίας βαρύτερον οὐδέν ἐστι φορτίον.

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Πενίας βαρύτερον οὐδέν ἐστι φορτίον.

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No load is heavier than poverty.

The word βαρύτερον is a comparative form of the word βαρύ, "heavy," hence the genitive form πενίας: heavier than poverty. The noun φορτίον, a "load" or something you carry, is from the verb φέρω, "carry." From the Greek root in βαρύ we get words like baritone and barometer.

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Κακοῦ κόρακος κακὸν ᾠόν.

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Κακοῦ κόρακος κακὸν ᾠόν.

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Bad egg of a bad crow.

Compare the English saying, "A chip off the old block," but with negative connotations. At Wikipedia, you can read a funny anecdote about the rhetorician Corax of Syracuse, whose name Κόραξ means crow; when Corax and a student who refused to pay his tuition got involved in a lawsuit, the judge got so angry at both of them that he threw them out of court, proclaiming "Κακοῦ κόρακος κακὸν ᾠόν," with Corax being the bad crow, κακός κόραξ, and his pupil being the bad egg, κακὸν ᾠόν. In his Natural History, Aelian reports the proverb, claiming that crow-fathers were notorious for eating their offspring.

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Πρεσβύτερον σέβου.

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Πρεσβύτερον σέβου.

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Respect the elder.

This admonition is attributed to Chilon of Sparta, one of the Seven Sages of ancient Greece, and it is included among the so-called Delphic maxims; you can find out more at Wikipedia. The word πρεσβύτερος is the comparative form of πρέσβυς, "old." You can see this Greek root in the English word "presbyterian," and it is also the origin of the word "priest."

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Δίκαιος εἶναι μᾶλλον ἢ δοκεῖν θέλε.

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Δίκαιος εἶναι μᾶλλον ἢ δοκεῖν θέλε.

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Δίκαιος εἶναι μᾶλλον ἢ χρηστὸς θέλε.

Strive to be righteous rather than useful.

Δίκαιος εἶναι μᾶλλον ἢ δοκεῖν θέλε.

Strive to be righteous rather than to seem (to be righteous).

This is one of the monostichs (one-liners) of Menander, and I am presenting it in two versions here because I am convinced that the second version, with δοκεῖν, is the correct version, even though it appears in none of the extant manuscripts. The usual version with χρηστὸς does not make a lot of sense, and it also has no elegance to it. The version with δοκεῖν is a more profound statement, contrasting being with seeming to be, and it also has a nice sound quality with δίκαιος ~ δοκεῖν. You can read an argument in defense of the emendation here: Further Thoughts on Menandri Sententiae by Vayos Liapis, who argues that χρηστὸς was originally a marginal gloss which then insinuated itself into the text itself, displacing δοκεῖν. So, the version you will find in all the modern editions of Menander does say "Δίκαιος εἶναι μᾶλλον ἢ χρηστὸς θέλε" — but I'm pretty sure if we could ask Menander he would say instead: Δίκαιος εἶναι μᾶλλον ἢ δοκεῖν θέλε.

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Οἱ γὰρ κακοί κακίους ἐπαινούμενοι.

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Οἱ γὰρ κακοί κακίους ἐπαινούμενοι.

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Wicked people when praised become even more wicked.

The phrase comes from Philostratus's Life of Apollonius. A similar saying also appears in the so-called Sentences of Sextus, a Hellenistic collection of Greek aphorisms that was popular among Christian writers: κακοὶ κολακευόμενοι κακίους γίνονται, "the wicked, when flattered, become more wicked."

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Ἄλλων ἰατρός, αὐτὸς ἕλκεσιν βρύων.

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Ἄλλων ἰατρός, αὐτὸς ἕλκεσιν βρύων.

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A doctor for others, himself covered with festering sores.

This is a "physician, heal thyself!" type of saying. Specifically, it is the punchline of an Aesop's fable in which the fox mocks the frog for claiming to be a doctor when the frog cannot cure his own skin disease. In some versions the fox mocks the frog not just for his skin but also for his hobbled way of walking, as you can see in these different English versions of the fable.

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Τὸν ἕτερον πόδα ἐν τῃ σορῷ ἔχων.

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Τὸν ἕτερον πόδα ἐν τῃ σορῷ ἔχων.

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Having the other foot in the coffin.

In other words, one foot is still here among the living, but the other foot is already in the coffin; i.e. someone is as good as dead already. Compare the English saying, "having one foot in the grave." The phrase appears in Lucian, who marks it as proverbial with the word φασίν ("they say"): τὸν ἕτερον πόδα, φασίν, ἐν τῇ σορῷ ἔχων. Erasmus cites another variation on this saying, also from Lucian: τὸν ἕτερον πόδα ἐν τῷ πορθμείῳ ἔχοντα, "having the other foot already in the ferry-boat" (i.e. the ferry-boat of Charon, crossing the river Styx).

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Οὐδεὶς ἀγαθὸς εἰ μὴ εἷς ὁ θεός.

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Οὐδεὶς ἀγαθὸς εἰ μὴ εἷς ὁ θεός.

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No one is good except one, God.

The words are from the Gospel of Mark; it comes from a dialogue when someone has petitioned Jesus, addressing him as διδάσκαλε ἀγαθέ, "good teacher," and Jesus rebukes him with these words, saying that God alone is good. Notice the nice pairing of words which works the same in both Greek and English: οὐδ-εὶς, "no-one" and εἷς, "one."

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Ὁ ἄφρων πληθύνει λόγους.

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Ὁ ἄφρων πληθύνει λόγους.

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The fool multiplies his words.

This is a saying from the Biblical Book of Ecclesiastes. This is just one of many sayings in Ecclesiastes denouncing the wordiness of fools; the Greek ἄφρων is an alpha-private compound: ἄ-φρων, without-mind, "witless, foolish." The wide range of meanings of λόγος in Greek gives his kind of saying an ironic undertone: the fools has plenty of words, but not necessarily of the logical persuasion. (And yes, I know, I sometimes write too much about these proverbs, but it's from enthusiasm, not foolishness, I promise!)

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Ἀπὸ τοῦ ἡλίου μετάστηθι.

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Ἀπὸ τοῦ ἡλίου μετάστηθι.

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Move out of the sunshine.

These are the words famously spoken by the Cynic philosopher Diogenes to Alexander the Great, as reported by Plutarch in his Life of Alexander. Alexander was curious to meet Diogenes and was eager to do him a favor. He found Diogenes lying in the sunshine; all Diogenes wanted from Alexander was for him to stop blocking his sunshine. This famous anecdote has its own Wikipedia article: Diogenes and Alexander.

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Ἄνθρακες ὁ θησαυρός.

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Ἄνθρακες ὁ θησαυρός.

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The treasure (turned out to be) charcoal.

The proverb refers to a supposed treasure that turned out to be worthless, and it's a shortened version of a saying you saw in an earlier blog post: Ἄνθρακες ὁ θησαυρὸς πέφηνεν. The word θησαυρός gives us English treasure and, yes, Greek ἄνθραξ does give us the English word anthrax, because one of the meanings of the Greek word is an abscess or boil that is dark or dark-red, like charcoal.

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Ἡφαίστειος δεσμός.

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Ἡφαίστειος δεσμός.

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The Hephaestean bond.

Erasmus provides a very cool Latin version of the Greek: Vulcanium vinculum (Vulcan was the Roman name for the god Hephaestus). The saying alludes to the famous incident in the Iliad when Hephaestus forged a chain-link net to bind his wife Aphrodite in bed with her lover Ares; you can read about this story at Wikipedia: Hephaestus and Aphrodite.

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Νεκρὸν μυρίζεις.

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Νεκρὸν μυρίζεις.

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You're putting perfume on a corpse.

As Eramus explains, this saying refers to bestowing favors on someone who will never pay them back (the dead person cannot pay you back!). It can also be used when doing a favor too late (you should have done it to the live person!). From this Greek root, we get the necro- verbs in English, like necromancy.

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