khen nết hay làm, ai khen nết hay ăn
Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.
Meaning · English
Praise is not as good as reward
Literally: praise good do, who praise good eat
Examples
Anh ấy nói khen nết hay làm, ai khen nết hay ăn khi chủ tịch công ty không thưởng cho nhân viênHe said praise is not as good as reward when the company president did not reward the employees
AI-drafted example auto-approved by rule (illustrative, not a corpus attestation)
Sources & notes
Discovered via Nam ngạn chích cẩm (Phạm Quang Sán, 1918; public domain, via vi.wikisource); retrieved 2026-08-01. Source: source ↗ Attested in Nam ngạn chích cẩm (Phạm Quang Sán, 1918). Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-08-01; pending editor spot-check.
Common questions
What does “khen nết hay làm, ai khen nết hay ăn” mean?
Praise is not as good as reward Literally: praise good do, who praise good eat
Is “khen nết hay làm, ai khen nết hay ăn” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.