English in everyday life
Proverbs
Explore English sayings from most to least frequent in a published American English corpus. Alternate forms are collected together.
About these frequency groups
Groups use full-form occurrence counts in the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA), recorded in 2016–2017. For a proverb with several forms, we use the highest individual count, since adding overlapping forms could count the same occurrence twice.
These are historical American English corpus counts, not estimates of how often everyone uses a saying today. A zero means no full-form match was recorded. The source’s separate familiarity ratings are retained in the data but do not determine this ordering.
We grouped variants, merged reviewed duplicate entries, and preserved existing editorial wording. The source includes historical and dated sayings; inclusion is not an endorsement.
Expressions containing take, including its inflections. Clear word filter
49 entries
Most common
100 or more recorded occurrences
Common
10–99 recorded occurrences
Let nature take its course
Winner take all
You can't take it with you
It takes two to tango
It takes a village to raise a child
It takes one to know one
Stop and smell the roses
Matching variant: Take time to smell the flowers
Less common
1–9 recorded occurrences
You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink
Matching variant: You can take a horse to water, but you can't make him drink
Red sky at night, sailor's delight; red sky at morning, sailors take warning
You have to take the bad with the good
Don't take any wooden nickels
Give respect, get respect
Matching variant: Give respect, take respect
Take what the defense gives you
If you don't know where you are going, any road will take you there
It takes a thief to catch a thief
The impossible takes a little longer
You have to take the rough with the smooth
All the good ones are taken
Buy the ticket, take the ride
Don't dish it out if you can't take it
It takes all sorts to make a world
It takes two to make a deal
Never take a knife to a gunfight
Take what life gives you
The love you take is equal to the love you make
There is a tide in the affairs of men which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune
Not observed in this corpus
No full-form matches recorded; this does not mean the proverb is never used