Lisgar Collegiate Institute - Vox Lycei Yearbook (Ottawa, Ontario Canada)

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64 VOX LYCEI Famous Phrases The writer once overheard a student explain her dislike for Shakespearean performances by saying that the plays were too full of quotations. True it is: for in many of Shakespeare! plays there are numerous quotations. And manv of us. though we may pride ourselves upon our learning, probably do not know the origin of half the common phrases we use as carelesslv as verbs in our daily conversation. No less a person than Cicero hrst made use of the expression lYhile there's life, there's hope, in a letter to Atticus. XYe are in the same boat. is not modern slang, but occurs in a letter written by Clement I, Bishop of Rome, to the church of Corinth, in the First century. This letter. we are told, is still extant. and is one of the prized documents of the early church. I.ord Chesterfield, of Samuel johnson fame. is responsible for the expres- sion I never put off till to-morrow what I can do to-day. This was his ex- planation of how he managed to do so much work. In writing later to his son. he said: XYhat is worth doing is worth doing well. It was Diogenes. the cynic, who declared that Habit is second nature . The phrase Circumstances over which I have no control. was used by XVelling- ton in a letter concerning some affairs in which his son was mixed up and with which he declined to interfere. Dickens also used the expression a few years later when he had Micawber write to David Copperfield, Circumstances beyond my individual control ...... Nothing is certain but death and taxes. wrote Benjamin Franklin. stating that the Constitution of the Cnited States was in operation and to all appearances would last. Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones was said by blames I of England when his favorite, the Duke of Buckingham. complained that a mob had broken his glass window, which was at that time a luxury. A tempest in a teapot' 'was an old Roman proverb made use of by Cicero. It is raining cats and dogs, like a great many other sayings. is a per- version of the word catadupe ta waterfalll. It is raining catadupes. or water- falls, is the exact meaning. To be in the seventh heaven means to be extremely happy. The Cabbalists maintained that there were seven heavens, each rising in happiness above the other, the seventh being the abode of God and the highest class of angels. He cannot hold a candle to him. suggests inferiority. The allusion is to boys who held candles in theatres and other places of enter- tainment. The French say Le jeu ne vaut pas la chandellef' CThe game is not worth the candlej Swift writes: Others say that Mr. Handel to Buccini can't hold a candle. XVhen members of the British House of Commons and other dehaters call out Spoke , they mean that the person who gets up to address the assembly has spoken already, and cannot speak again except in explanation of something imperfectly understood. I have put my spoke in his wheel, means I have shut him up. The allusion is to a pin or spoke used to lock wheels in machinery. When solid wheels were used, the driver was provided with a spoke or pin. which he thrust into one of the three holes made to receive it, in order to skid the cart when it went down hill. The carts used by railway navvies, and tramwagons used in some collieries still have a wheel spoked to skid it. And the writer fancies some one has a spoke ready for this article. so I shall allow the spoke to be put into my wheel but before skidding , let ine intimate that much pleasure and satisfaction may accrue from the study of the origin and development of phrases H. C. M.

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