“Crossing the river by feeling the stones”

摸着石头过河 (mō zhe shítou guòhé) <br class="br">Meaning: proceed gradually, by experimentation. <br class="br">Traditional saying, first used in Chinese Communist context by Chen Yun, 1980 December 16, then popularized by Deng 1984 October. Frequently misattributed to Deng. <br class="br">Misattributed or apocryphal <br class="br">Source: Henry He, Dictionary of the Political Thought of the People&#x27;s Republic of China, Routledge, 2016, ISBN 978-1-31550044-7, p. 287 https://books.google.com/books?id=XSi3DAAAQBAJ&amp;lpg=PA287&amp;dq=%22cross%20the%20river%20by%20feeling%20the%20stones%22&amp;pg=PA287#v=onepage <br class="br">Source: Evan Osnos, Boom Doctor https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/10/11/boom-doctor, New Yorker, October 11, 2010:<br>The strategy, as Chen Yun put it, was “crossing the river by feeling for the stones.” (Deng, inevitably, received credit for the expression.) <br class="br">Source: Chinese land reform: A world to turn upside down https://www.economist.com/briefing/2013/10/31/a-world-to-turn-upside-down, The Economist, 2013 October 31<br>Liu Hongzhi, who oversees the scheme, quotes a famous phrase often attributed to Deng, though in fact coined by a colleague: “We are crossing the river by feeling the stones.”