Origins

Many proverbs have been in use for many years:

every man is his own worst enemy

. . . The proverb was first recorded in Thomas Browne’s Religio Medici (1643).

every man is the architect of his own fortune

. . . The proverb is attributed to the Roman politician Appius Claudius Caecus, who held the post of censor from 312 b.c. to 308 b.c.

Sometimes, proverbs are quotations:

the leopard can’t change its spots

. . . The proverb is of biblical origin: “Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots?” (Jeremiah 13:23).