The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs (93 page)

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there is no such thing as BAD weather, only the wrong clothes
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A poetic sentiment that even the gloomiest outlook contains some hopeful or consoling aspect. Cf.
1634
MILTON
Comus
I. 93 Was I deceiv'd, or did a sable cloud Turn forth her silver lining on the night?
1863
Struggles of P.V. Nasby
(1872) xxiii.
Ther is a silver linin to evry cloud.
1869
Struggles & Triumphs
406
‘Every cloud’, says the proverb,‘has a silver lining.’
1939
Trouble for Lucia
xi.
She always discovered silver linings to the blackest of clouds, but now, scrutinize them as she might, she could detect in them none but the most sombre hues.
1991
Redundancy of Courage
xxii. 283
This misfortune of hers had done wonders for our up and down relationship—all clouds have a silver lining, don't they say.
optimism

 
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ne'er CAST a clout till May be out
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a DROWNING man will clutch at a straw
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CUT your coat according to your cloth
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Attributed to the Greek painter Apelles (4th cent. BC.): see quot. 1721. The ‘shoemaker’ variant is a long-standing one in British proverb lore, but is now mainly North American. A
last
is a wooden or metal model on which a shoemaker fashions shoes or boots. Cf. PLINY
Natural History
xxxv. 85
ne supra crepidam sutor iudicaret
, the cobbler should not judge beyond his shoe; ERASMUS
Adages
I. vi. 16
ne sutor ultra crepidam
.
1539
tr.
Erasmus' Adages
17
Let not the shoemaker go beyond hys shoe.
1616
Dict.
(rev.ed.) 567
Cobler keepe your last.
1639
Parœmiologia Anglo-Latina
21
Cobler keepe to your last.
1721
Scottish Proverbs
242
Let not the Cobler go beyond his last … Taken from the famous Story of Apelles, who could not bear that the Cobler should correct any part of his Picture beyond the Slipper.
1868
Tim Bunker Papers
lix.
I understood the use of a plow .. better than the use of a pen .. remembering the old saw ‘Let the cobbler stick to his last’.
1930
Murder on Bus
xxx.
Yet even then, Mapell had been mixed up with a gang of blackmailers. The shoemaker sticks to his last!
1984
San Andreas
viii.
Point taken, Mr. McKinnon. You see before you a rueful cobbler who will stick to his last from now on.
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