The genius, wit, and spirit of a nation are discovered in its proverbs.

The earliest located appearance is in Samuel Palmer’s 1710 book on proverbs, where the idea is introduced as an observation made by unspecified “Great Men,” not attributed to a named author. A later proverb collection by James Kelly (1721) prints the line on its title page and credits “Ld. Bacon,” after which magazines and later editors repeat the Bacon attribution.

The saying claims that a country’s common proverbs reveal key traits of its culture—how people think, what they value, and their typical humor or temperament—because proverbs condense shared experience into memorable language.

It has been observ’d by Great Men, that the Genius, Wit, and Spirit of a Nation, is discover’d by their Proverbs, which shew the Wisdom, Invention and Disposition of the Country either to Virtue or Vice.

The genius, wit, and spirit of a nation are discovered by their proverbs.

The genius, wit, and spirit of a nation are discovered in its proverbs.