tốt số hơn khôn
A good fate beats a good head — the lucky outrun the clever.
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tốt thì khoe xấu thì che
Show the fine, veil the flawed — instinct's own advertising department.
tốt tuổi nằm duổi mà ăn
Born lucky, dine reclining — a good fate does the working while its owner stretches out.
tốt tóc nhọc cột nhà
Good hair tires the house-post — long-haired beauty beating her tresses dry against the pillar.
tổ chảng
Huge, whopping — emphatically oversized.
tội gà vạ vịt
The hen's offense, the duck's fine — punished for a fowl you never touched; blame that lands on the bystander.
tội lây vạ tràn
Guilt spreads, penalty floods — the old collective punishments, drowning the innocent adjacent.
tội nghi di khinh, công nghi di trọng
Doubted guilt weighs light, doubted merit weighs heavy — justice errs toward mercy and reward.
tội qui vu trưởng
Guilt files upward to the senior — the prow errs and the helm is caned; command owns the error.
tội đại ác cực
Crime great and evil extreme — guilt at its terminal grade.
tới công chuyện
“Now it’s on” — trouble (or serious business) has officially arrived; also “going all out”.
tứ cố vô thân
utterly alone; isolated without family, friends, or support
tứ hải giai huynh đệ
all men are brothers
tứ đại đồng đường
Four generations under one roof — great-grandparents to great-grandchildren in a single household.
tức cảnh sinh tình
art of improvisation, through depicting one's scenery or situation at a fleeting moment
tức nước vỡ bờ
the straw that broke the camel's back
từ cổ chí kim
since time immemorial
từ ngày Tự Đức lên ngôi,
Since Tự Đức took the throne... — the protest verses dated by reign, where complaint learned to keep a calendar.
từ sông ra biển
from the river to the sea (a phrase supporting Palestinian self-determination)
từng lớp
(phrase) Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see từng, lớp.
tử bất giáo phụ chi quá
A child untaught is the father's fault — the old ledger of parental duty.
tử dai kỳ tử
Every child heirs alike — the estate divided per head, whichever bed they were born from.
tử giả biệt luận
Of the dead, no verdicts — the grave closes the case.
tử giả bất khả phục sinh, đoạn giả bất khả phục thục
The dead do not live again, the severed does not rejoin — two finalities to weigh before the blade falls.
tử hải dai huinh đệ
Within the four seas, all are brothers — one root under every stranger.
tử sanh hữu mạng
Death and life are fated; wealth and honor sit with heaven — the couplet that files mortality under destiny.
tử vô táng địa
Dead with no ground to lie in — ruin's last line: not even a burial plot.
tử vị phụ ẩn
The child shields the father — blood's code of concealment, older than the courts.
tửu bất túy nhơn nhơn tự túy
Wine makes no one drunk; drinkers do — the bottle's oldest alibi, refused.
tửu nhập tâm như hổ nhập lâm
Wine in the heart is a tiger in the forest — drink houses a predator where judgment lived.
tự biên tự diễn
to compose and perform all by oneself
tự chiêu kỳ họa
Summoning one's own calamity — disaster by personal invitation.
tự cứu bất hạ,
Can't save yourself, yet rescuing others — the drowning lifeguard problem.
tự dĩ vi thị
Taking oneself for the standard — self-certainty immune to correction.
tự làm tự chịu
to reap what one sows
tự sửa sang nhà cửa
to do DIY home improvements
tự thuỷ trí chung
Bearing the offense, building the merit — guilt worked off in service.
tự thân vận động
to do things by oneself; to stand on one's own two feet
tự thực kỳ lực
Eat by your own strength — hands that work feed the jaw that chews.
tự tung tự tác
to do as one pleases, to be impetuous
tự viên kì thuyết
Rounding out one's own story — patching the theory until it agrees with itself.
'Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all
Experiencing loss is better than never having the experience at all
Ta walk the Round
Lawyers used frequently to give interviews to their clients in the Round Church in the Temple; and "walking the Round" meant loitering about the church, in the hope of being hired for a witness.
tab
An ear.
tabby
An old maid; either from Tabitha, a formal antiquated name; or else from a tabby cat, old maids being often compared to cats. To drive Tab; to go out on a party of pleasure with a wife and family.
table money
A charge additional to that of the meal made at restaurants, etc., towards the cost of attendance; or a small fee charged to players at Bridge clubs; also, in the Army, Navy, and Diplomatic Service, an allowance made to assist in meeting the ex- pense of official entertaining.
Table of Pythagoras
The common multipli- cation table, carried up to ten. The table is parcelled off into a hundred little squares or cells. The name first appears in a corrupt text of Boethius, who was really referring to the abacus (<?.v.).
table scrap
Something of little value or leftover
table talk
casual conversation, especially at mealtimes
tables and chairs
Basic or essential items
Tables of Cebes
Cebes was a Theban philosopher, a disciple of Socrates, and one of the interlocutors of Plato's Phtzdo. His Tables or Tableau supposes him to be placed before a tableau or panorama representing the life of man, which the philosopher describes with great accuracy of judgment and splendour of sentiment. It is sometimes appended to the works of Epictetus.
tabooed
Forbidden. This word, now very common, is derived from a custom of the South-Sea islanders, first noticed in Cook’s Voyages.
tace
Silence, hold your tongue. TACE is Latin for a candle; a jocular admonition to be silent on any subject.
tack
A taste foreign to what was intended; a barrel may get a TACK upon it, either permanently mouldy, sour, or otherwise.
tacked
Tied down. When a man has another vanquished, or for certain reasons bound to his service, he is said to have "got him TACKED."
tackle
Clothing.
tackle
A mistress; also good clothes. The cull has tipt his tackle rum gigging; the fellow has given his mistress good clothes. A man's tackle: the genitals.
tackle
Clothes.—Sea. Also to encounter a person in argument.
taco
The vulva.
taco bumper
A lesbian.