Italian Proverbs Who builds upon the people, builds upon sand. Illness tells us what we are. See Naples and die. Bed is the poor man's opera. - quoted in Aldous Huxley, Heaven and Hell The People want to be deceived. - Roman Epigraph To be a good shepherd is to shear the flock, not skin it! - favourite proverbial saying, by Tiberius, quoted in Suetoninus Lives of the Caesars