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Glass by association with gold acquires an emerald lustre; by association with the good a fool becomes wise.

Labour bestowed on the worthless is vain: even by a hundred efforts a crow cannot be made to talk like a parrot.

As a river takes a brook to the sea, so does knowledge take a man to a king.

As the heavens acquire light from the moon, so does a family from a wise son.

Whosoever's name is not written with the pen in the enumeration of those who are learned, his mother is called barren; and those who have not obtained praise in charity and penance, in valour, science, and the acquisition of property, their mothers have no pleasure in them—they have only obtained the pain of giving them birth.