cast pearls before swine, to

To offer something of value to those who cannot or will not appreciate it. The saying comes from Jesus’ teachings as recorded in the Gospel of St. Matthew (7:6): “Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet.” It was a well-known saying by Shakespeare’s time (“Pearl enough for a swine,” Love’s Labour’s Lost, 4.2) and a cliché long before Dickens wrote, “Oh, I do a thankless thing, and cast pearls before swine!” (Dombey and Son, 1848).

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cast/throw the first stone, to

To be quick to attack someone or some- thing. The term comes from Jesus’ defense of an adulteress against vindictive Pharisees and scribes, who quoted the law of Moses and said she must be stoned. Jesus told them, “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her” (Gospel of St. John, 8:7). The implication that the attacker is equally vulnerable was continued in the modern-day cliché, and spelled out even more in the old proverb, PEOPLE WHO LIVE IN GLASS HOUSES SHOULD NOT THROW STONES.

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cast one’s bread upon the waters, to

To invest one’s time, money, or effort without expecting an immediate return or reward. The term comes from the Book of Ecclesiastes (11:1)—“Cast thy bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days”—urging the congregation to give gener- ously, for one day they would indeed be rewarded. A more modern example is, “Cast your bread upon the waters and it will come back to you—but- tered” (Elbert Hubbard, Book of Epigrams, 1911).

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cast of thousands

A great many individuals, a large crowd. This term originated in Hollywood, in advertisements for epic-scale films such as Ben- Hur (1926), which had an enormous cast. Legendary producer Samuel Gold- wyn, during the filming of The Last Supper, allegedly had this exchange: “‘Why only twelve [disciples]?’—‘That’s the original number.’—‘Well, go out and get thousands.’”

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cast in stone

See IN STONE.

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cast aspersions,

To make a derogatory or highly critical remark, either fairly or, more often, unfairly. An older meaning of the verb “to asperse” is to sprinkle or scatter, and “aspersion” itself once meant a shower or spray. The full phrase is newer, but we find the same meaning in Sheri- dan’s play, The Rivals (1775), in which Mrs. Malaprop complains bitterly of “an attack upon my language! . . . an aspersion upon my parts of speech” (3:3).

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beaten track, (off)

A well-worn path, (not) the usual route or method. The origin seems obvious, since a much-used route would indeed be flattened by the tramp of many feet. The phrase began to be used figura- tively, in the sense of trite or unoriginal, in the seventeenth century or before, and off the beaten track, in the meaning of new or unusual, is just about as old. Samuel Johnson spelled it out in 1751 when he wrote, “The imitator treads a beaten walk.”

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beat around/about

the bush, to Indirection in word or deed; to shillyshally, to approach something in a roundabout way. This expression for overcautiousness dates from the early sixteenth century, when Robert Why- tynton (Vulgaria, 1520) warned, “a longe betynge aboute the busshe and losse of time.” Some authorities think it came from beating the bushes for game, and indeed there are numerous sayings concerning the delays caused by too much beating and not enough bird-catching, dating back even fur- ther. (See also BEAT THE BUSHES FOR.) Although the days of beaters seem remote, the phrase survives as a common cliché.

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beat a (hasty/quick)

retreat, to To withdraw, back down, or reverse course, usually without delay. The term comes from the military practice of sounding drums to recall troops behind the lines, or to some other position. In earlier days wind instruments, most often trumpets, were used for this purpose. Among the references to this practice is “Thai had blawen the ratret,” in John Barbour’s The Bruce (1375). Much later the expression was used figuratively to mean the same as the simple verb to retreat, and then, in the mid-nineteenth century, it became a cliché. A newer version is to beat a strategic retreat, basically a euphemism for a forced withdrawal. It came into use during World War I, as the German high command’s explanation of retiring from the Somme in 1917. In the civilian vocabulary, it came to mean yielding a point or backing down from a position in an argument.

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be at a loss

See AT A  LOSS.

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beat a dead horse

See DEAD  HORSE.

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bear with me

Be patient, make allowances, put up with me. Today used mainly as a request to hear out a long-winded story or wait for a delayed result or event, this request appeared in John Heywood’s proverb collection of 1546. It may already have been considered somewhat archaic by Ben- jamin Franklin when he wrote, in An Added Chapter to the Book of Genesis (1763), “And couldst not thou . . . bear with him one night?”

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bear the brunt, to

To put up with the worst of any hardship, violence, or other misfortune. The term dates from the early fifteenth century, when brunt signified the main force of an enemy’s assault, which was borne by the front ranks of an army aligned in the field of battle. It was used by John Lydgate in his Chronicle of Troy (1430) and later began to be used figuratively, as by Robert Browning in “Prospice” (1864): “. . . fare like my peers, The heroes of old, Bear the brunt ... of pain, darkness and cold.”

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beard the lion, to

To confront a dangerous opponent; to take a risk head- on. The first Book of Samuel (17:35) tells of David, the good shepherd, who pursued a lion that had stolen a lamb and, “when he arose against me, I caught him by his beard, and smote him, and slew him.” The expression often is put, “to beard the lion in his den,” which in effect adds the story of the prophet Daniel, whose enemies had him thrown into a den of lions for the night (Daniel 6:16–24). Daniel survived, saying that God had sent an angel to shut the lions’ mouths. In any event, the term became a Latin proverb, quoted by Horace and Martial and in the Middle Ages by Erasmus, in which a timid hare disdainfully plucked a dead lion’s beard. It began to be used figuratively by the time of Shakespeare, and was a cliché by the mid-nineteenth century.

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bean, not worth a

See HILL  OF  BEANS.

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be all things to all men

See ALL THINGS TO ALL  MEN.

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be-all and end-all, the

The ultimate purpose, the most important con- cern. An early and famous use of this term is in Shakespeare’s Macbeth (1.6), in which the ambitious Macbeth soliloquizes about assassinating Duncan so as to become king: “. . . that but this blow [the murder] might be the be-all and the end-all here.” Eric Partridge held it was a cliché by the nineteenth century, but it is heard less often today.

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battle royal

A fierce battle or free-for-all. In the seventeenth century the term signified a cockfight in which more than two birds were engaged. They would fight until there was only one survivor. By the eighteenth century the expression was a metaphor for any general fight, including a battle of wits.

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ass in a sling, to have/

get one’s To be in deep trouble. The ass referred to is not the animal but the vulgar term for buttocks. The expres- sion probably originated in the American South in the nineteenth century, and it is thought to refer to a kick in the buttocks so strong that the victim requires the kind of sling used to support an injured arm. The saying was common by about 1930.

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as one man

Unanimously, together. The term appears in the King James Version of the Book of Judges (20:8): “And all the people arose as one man.” More recently John R. Green used it in A Short History of the English Peo- ple (1876): “Spain rose as one man against the stranger.”

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as old as Adam

Extremely ancient, well known long ago. The Adam ref- erence, of course, is to the first book of the Bible, in which Adam is the first human being created by God. The OED traces the expression only to 1867. Similar clichés include OLD AS THE HILLS and FROM TIME IMMEMORIAL. See also KNOW (SOMEONE) FROM ADAM.

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as luck would have it

As it happened, how things turned out. The phrase, with either “good” luck or “ill” luck, goes back as far as Shakespeare, who used it (as good luck) in The Merry Wives of Windsor (3.5), as did Thomas Shelton (as ill luck) in a translation of Don Quixote of the same period.

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asleep at the switch

Daydreaming or forgetting to do one’s job; a lapse in alertness. The term comes from American railroading, when trainmen were required to switch a train from one track to another. If they failed to do so at the right time, trains could collide

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ask me no questions,

I’ll tell you no lies If you want the truth, better not ask directly. Listed in the Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs, this saying recurs throughout 150 years of English literature, from Oliver Goldsmith’s She Stoops to Conquer (1773), in which the lies are “fibs,” to George Bernard Shaw’s Man and Superman (1903).

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ask a silly

stupid question (and you’ll get a silly/stupid answer) A response to an unsatisfying answer or to one that is a put-down. Eric Par- tridge believed this nineteenth-century retort evolved from the proverb ASK ME NO QUESTIONS, I’LL TELL YOU NO LIES, but the two clichés are not identical.

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as I live and breathe

I am certain, I am confident. This redundant phrase—one can’t be alive and not breathe—is usually stated with a sense of mild surprise. It began life as simply as I live in the mid-1600s and contin- ues to be used as an intensifier—for example, “As I live and breathe, he’s gone and bought another new car”—but is heard less often today.

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as all getout

To the utmost, as much as possible. This homespun cliché dates  from  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century,  when  it  was  usually stated as getout. Mark Twain wrote, “We got to dig in like all git-out” (Huck- leberry Finn, 1884). It remains current.

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armed to the teeth

Overequipped, overprepared to do battle. The phrase was popularized through a speech by English statesman Richard Cobden in 1849, in which he held that too much of Britain’s wealth was devoted to arma- ments. However, to the teeth has meant completely equipped since the four- teenth century. Libeaus Disconus (c. 1350) had it, “All yarmed to the teth.”

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armchair general

A  self-proclaimed  military  expert  with  little  or  no practical  experience,  who  imposes  his  or  her  views  on  others.  See  also BACKSEAT  DRIVER; MONDAY-MORNING  QUARTERBACK.

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apron strings,

tied to (someone’s) Under someone’s influence. Like being UNDER SOMEONE’S THUMB, the term denotes being completely ruled by another, in this case usually a male being ruled by a woman (the tradi- tional wearer of aprons). It probably was already a cliché by the time Thomas Babington Macaulay wrote (1849) of William of Orange, “He could not submit to be tied to the apron strings of even the best of wives.” Indeed, two hundred years earlier England had a law called apron-string tenure, whereby a husband could hold title to property passed on by his wife’s fam- ily only while his wife was alive.

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April showers bring May flowers

Adversity  is  followed  by  good  for- tune. An old proverb, it was taken more literally in days gone by, and in fact

it appeared in a British book of Weather Lore published in 1893.

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après moi le déluge

After I’m dead nothing will matter. This cliché, lit- erally meaning “after me, the flood,” was allegedly said in slightly different form in 1757 by Madame de Pompadour to Louis XV after Frederick the Great defeated the French and Austrians at Rossbach. (She put it après nous le déluge, “after us the flood.”) The flood alludes to the biblical flood in which all but those on Noah’s ark perished. The phrase is still always stated in French.

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eleventh hour, at the

Just in time; at the last possible moment. This expression occurs in the biblical parable of the laborers (Matthew 20:1–16), in which those workers hired at the eleventh hour of a twelve-hour day received as much pay as those who began work in the first hour. Eric Par- tridge claimed that the current cliché does not allude to this story but offered no alternative source. The American poet Forceythe Willson (1837–67) wrote, “And I heard a Bugle sounding, as from some celestial Tower; and the same mysterious voice said: ‘It is the Eleventh Hour!’” (“The Old Sergeant”). The armistice ending World War I came into force at 11 A.M. on November 11, 1918, at the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month.

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elevator doesn’t go to the top floor, the

Describing someone who is simple-minded, not very intelligent. The top floor in this slangy insult denotes the brain. One synonym is a few/two/three bricks shy of a load, indi- cating a person is short of intelligence. Another is not playing with a full deck, which refers to the card game of poker. Yet another is having only one oar in the water (or not having both oars in the water). All these slangy expressions date from the second half of the twentieth century. For example, “But now this new opportunity had presented itself, and . . . how could he really lose? Okay, she probably wasn’t playing with a full deck, but he didn’t figure her for any more gun wielding” (David Baldacci, Hour Game, 2004).

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elbow room

Enough space. This metaphor for having enough space to extend one’s elbows has been used since the sixteenth century. “Now my soul hath elbow-room,” wrote Shakespeare (King John, 5.7).

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elbow grease, to use

To apply physical effort. It has been said that this expression,  dating  from  the  seventeenth  century,  originally  referred  to  a joke  played  on  a  new  apprentice, who  was  sent  out  to  a  shop  to  purchase

“elbow  grease.” Originally  meaning  simply  to  use  one’s  arm  vigorously  in scrubbing  or  polishing, it  soon  was  transferred  to  other  kinds  of  effort  as well.  “Forethought  is  the  elbow-grease  which  a  novelist—or  poet,  or dramatist—requires,” said Anthony Trollope (Thackeray, 1874).

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eighth wonder

A marvel; an astonishing or surprising thing or event. This expression, often used sarcastically, implies that something is (or is scarcely) worthy of being classed with the so-called seven wonders of the ancient world: the Pyramids of Egypt, Hanging Gardens of Babylon, Tomb of Mauso- lus, Temple of Diana at Ephesus, Colossus of Rhodes, statue of Jupiter by Phidias, and the Pharos of Alexandria. The English novelist Maria Edgeworth wrote in a letter in 1831, “A spoiled child of 30 whose mother and father . . . think him the 8th wonder of the world.” See also NINE-DAY WONDER

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apples and oranges, like comparing

Comparing two unlike objects or issues. This term, dating from the second half of the 1900s, has largely replaced the difference between chalk and cheese, at least in America. The latter expression of disparateness is much older, dating from the 1500s. Why apples and oranges and not some other object is unclear, especially given their simi- larity in that both are fruits. Nevertheless, it has caught on and is on the way to being a cliché.

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ego trip

A display of self-importance, a vehicle for self-satisfaction: for example, “These annual art shows of hers are simply an ego trip; she has no talent whatsoever.” This pejorative term dates from the second half of the 1900s. It brands someone as an egotist, which Ambrose Bierce defined as “A person of low taste, more interested in himself than in me” (The Devil’s Dictionary, 1911).

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hand to mouth, exist/live from

Living with a minimum of sustenance or support. This term, which dates from about 1500, implies that one has so little to live on that whatever comes to hand is consumed. “I subsist, as the poor are vulgarly said to do, from hand to mouth,” wrote the poet William Cowper (1790).

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get into the swing of (things), to To

To become active; to take lively part in. This expression appears to be a nineteenth-century change on being IN FULL SWING (already very active in something), dating from the sixteenth century. An early use cited by the OED is by Thomas Huxley in 1864: “I shall soon get into swing.”

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far cry, a

A long way, literally or figuratively. This expression is believed to have its source in measuring one’s distance from an enemy in terms of shouting. Sir Walter Scott indicated (The Legend of Montrose, 1819) that it was a proverbial expression of the Campbell clan, which meant that their ancient hereditary domains lay beyond the reach of invaders. However, the term was already being used figuratively by then.

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death’s door, at/near

Moribund, dangerously ill. Presumably this metaphor originated in the idea that death was a state of being one could enter, that is, an afterlife. It was used by Miles Coverdale (an early transla- tor of the Bible) in A Spyrytuall Pearle (1550), “To bring unto death’s door,” and was repeated by Shakespeare and eventually, in more secular context, by later writers. Eric Partridge deemed it a cliché by about 1850.

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cast a pall upon, to

To spread gloom. A pall was a cloth or cloak thrown over a coffin. By the eighteenth century the term had been transferred to spiritual darkness (“By this dark Pall thrown o’er the silent world,” Edward Young, Night Thoughts, 1742).

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battle of the bulge

A jocular description of fighting middle-aged spread, named for an actual battle between the Allies and German forces during World War II. The last great German drive of the war, it began in December 1944, when Nazi troops “bulged” through the Allied lines deep into Belgium. It took a month for the Allies to drive back the German forces. The current cliché was born in the second half of the 1900s, when diet-conscious Americans deplored the seemingly inevitable advance of pounds that comes in advancing years. A NewYork Times review of the one-woman play by Eve Ensler, The Good Body, had it: “... Ms. Ensler ... [was] soliciting the experiences of women caught up in similar battles of the bulge” (Nov. 16, 2004).

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apple-pie order

Very neat. One writer speculates that the term originated in the practice of New England housewives meticulously arranging apple slices on a pie crust. However, more likely it was a British corruption of the French nappes pliées, neat as “folded linen,” from the early seventeenth century. By the time Dickens used it in Our Mutual Friend (1865) it was already a cliché.

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a poor thing but mine own

It may not be much, but it belongs to me. The  phrase  misquotes Touchstone’s  description  of Audrey  in  Shakespeare’s

As You Like It (5.4): “An ill-favour’d thing, sir, but mine own.” It has been a cliché since the mid-nineteenth century.

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hand that rocks the cradle, the

A mother is a powerful influence, a thought derived from this phrase’s completion: “is the hand that rules the world.” It comes from a poem by William Ross Wallace, “The Hand that Rules the World” (1865), and has been quoted ever since. A British schoolmistress’s change on it makes for a humorous mixed metaphor: “The hand that rocks the cradle kicked the bucket.” A more sinister interpreta- tion is given in the 1992 motion picture The Hand That Rocks the Cradle, about a demented nanny seeking revenge for the death of her husband.

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