adage

"Avoid a man who neither drinks nor smokes," was one of Don's adages.

I am tempted here to say "A stitch in time saves nine," but adages are sometimes dangerous.

But I forbear the further threading of proverbs, lest I seem to have pilfered my friend Erasmus' adages.

The volume of 1500 had been jejune, written when he knew nothing of Greek; 800 adages put together with scanty elucidations.