Mind Moves:There is wisdom in proverbs. There is beauty in their message. There is advice behind their brevity: the short sharp syntax of sagacity with its undeniable chime of truth.
Proverbs address every aspect of life. There is recognition in their detail. There is reassurance in their universality. Individually they remind us of the perceptiveness of people about every human condition and context. Collectively they are testament to the accumulated wisdom of the ages and the indomitable wit and wisdom of the human mind.
Psychologists have traditionally been aware of the abstract, analysable, figurative and metaphoric function of proverbs and their capacity to say what cannot otherwise be expressed, or certainly not expressed so succinctly.
Family therapists have been fascinated by the degree to which families may appropriate certain maxims as models of family life: for example, "blood is thicker than water" being an implicit imperative to family members that whatever internal disagreements may abound, you stick by your own and support the clan.
But proverbs also extend to advice about neighbourliness, co-operation and community cohesion (many hands make light work), about interpersonal communications (civility costs no money), about assessments of people (don't judge a book by its cover), holding one's tongue in social situations (a silent mouth is sweet sounding) and everyday diplomatic interactions (a person's mouth often broke his own nose).
Proverbs caution us about financial management (he that goes a borrowing goes a sorrowing) and about judicious investment (don't put all your eggs in one basket). They provide a philosophical perspective on wealth itself (contentment is the greatest of riches), allied issues of social conscience (as the money bag swells the heart contracts) and social injustice (a poor man's tale cannot be heard).
But it is in the area of marriage and romantic relationships that adages guide, reassure, caution and admonish us. Sweet is the notion that there is someone for everyone, or that "every old sock finds an old shoe", cautionary is the maxim that if you "marry in haste you repent at leisure" and how wonderfully anti-ageist is the adage that "old coals are easiest kindled" affirming that passion is not the exclusive provenance of youth.
Proverbs provide a pastiche of psychological insights in accessible packaging. Many of these seemingly simple sentences have received subsequent scientific verification through psychological and sociological research. For the scope of the proverb is as wide as life.
It extends to every facet of existence. With the deceptive semblance of impromptu profundity, proverbs provide immediate action plans. They guide us through the mundane mechanics of life, remind us of our mortality and acknowledge our struggle with life's imponderables.
They are moral imperatives. Their clarity comforts, and in times of need we make nostalgic returns to those Irish cliches that provided a phrase for every life phase, a sentence for every sentiment and words of consolation for every occasion. "The genius, wit and spirit of a nation are discovered in its proverbs," wrote Francis Bacon.
Perhaps despite the clichéd nature of our most familiar phrases, which inevitably "breed their own contempt", there is still psychological relevance, sociological insight and economic guidance to be found in these words of wit and wisdom today.
The seanfhocail of our forefathers and foremothers may have provided them in pre-media and pre-therapy times with informative maxims to guide them. Psychotherapy may not have been available but the proverb was. Few situations arose for which there was not some proverbial prescription: the solution in a sentence that formed everyday commentary and internal reflection.
Do they have value today? While they may not be spoken aloud in the way they tripped from the tongue of people in the past, their function is not redundant and they continue to hold psychological significance in a new way. They are the emotional vocabulary through which life was once articulated. They contained economic injunctions, health strategies that warned of the inherent dangers of alcohol and idleness, and prescriptions for psychological happiness.
The distinguished collectors of proverbs show how we gain insight into a society through its proverbs. They say that we can learn what is "most near and dear" to the hearts of a people, how they interpret honour and dishonour and what their emotional ideologies are, by examining the proverbs they employ.
Proverbs are an integral part of our rich Irish oral tradition. They provide insight into our national psyche. While we may regard them as quaint adages of a former era, we might also ask with what superior wisdom have we replaced them? Perhaps then we might remind ourselves that unless we have surpassed them, "people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones".
For a detailed academic analysis of proverbs see Timeless Wisdom: What Irish Proverbs Tell us About Ourselvesby Aidan Moran and Michael O'Connell, University College Dublin Press.
Clinical psychologist and author Marie Murray is director of student counselling, University College Dublin.