I am having troubles figuring out what the use of the 「に」 in 「に越したことはない」 is.

I searched for almost an hour on internet, but didn't find anything that could
possibly answer my question.

Because we put it directly after the 連体形 of a verb, it must be an old use of に
that remains common today, but I can't find exactly what its meaning is.

I thought it was the に that we use when we say something like 「私には妹がいる。」to
mean "There is a sister to me."

So, I suppose 「食べるに越したことはない。」 would mean "there is no thing that is beyond to
[eat]."

But I'm not sure at all whether my guess is right or not.

Somebody help me please, thanks.
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particle-に 連体形
に越したことはない Wondering about the に
I think this grammar is a remnant of classical Japanese, where nominalizer こと
was unnecessary and the attributive form (連体形) by itself functioned as a noun.
You can find this usage today mainly in proverbs:

  * 逃げるが勝ち = 逃げる **こと** が勝ち
  * 聞くは一時の恥、知らぬは一生の恥 = 聞く **こと** は一時の恥、知らない **こと** は一生の恥
  * 袖振り合うも他生の縁 = 袖(が)振り合う **こと** も他生の縁(だ)

As you can see, the following particle can be anything. So 食べるに越したことはない is 食べる
**こと** に越したことはない, and means "There is nothing that is better than eating", or
less literally, "Nothing is as good as eating".

* * *

Here `X + に + 越す` obviously means "to be better than X", "to surpass X".
However, in modern Japanese, 越す is not used in this way, because it's a
transitive verb. デジタル大辞泉 treats `Xに越したことはない` as a [special idiomatic
usage](http://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/jn/79181/meaning/m0u/).

> ５ （「…にこしたことはない」のように打消しの表現を伴って）…するのがいちばんよい。「早いに―・したことはない」

Unfortunately, an online dictionary of old Japanese (学研古語辞典) [doesn't explain
`Xに越す` at all](http://kobun.weblio.jp/content/%E8%B6%8A%E3%81%99). So I don't
know how common `Xに越す` was in archaic Japanese. That being said, the particle
に is still commonly used for marking something that is compared with the
subject. There are expressions such as "～に匹敵する", "～に並ぶ", "～に及ぶ", "～に似る", and
so on, all of which are very common today. So I guess に in `Xに越す` can be
understood along the lines of these expressions.
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answer