The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs (501 page)

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Authors: John Andrew Simpson,

BOOK: The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs
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SIX hours' sleep for a man, seven for a woman, and eight for a fool
1623
Spared Hours of Soldier
310
The Student sleepes six Howres, the Traueller seuen; the Workeman eight, and all Laizie Bodies sleepe nine houres and more.
1864
Gentle Life
259
John Wesley .. considered that five hours' sleep was enough for him or any man .. The old English proverb, so often in the mouth of George III, was ‘six hours for a man, seven for a woman, and eight for a fool.’
1908
Spectator
19 Dec. 1047
Is there not a proverb that a man requires six hours' sleep, a woman seven, a child eight and only a fool more? If this be true, thousands of great men were, and are, fools.
health
If the SKY falls we shall catch larks
‘In ridicule of those who talk of doing many things, if certain other things, not likely, were to happen’: Fielding,
Proverbs of all Nations
(1824) 22.
c
1445
Peter Idley's Instructions to his Son
(1935)
I
. 178
We shall kacche many larkis whan heuene doith falle.
1546
Dialogue of Proverbs
I
. iv. B1
V
When the sky falth we shal haue larks.
1670
English Proverbs
143
If the sky falls we shall catch larks.
1721
Scottish Proverbs
343
What if the Lift [sky] fall, you may gather Laverocks [larks].
1914
Misalliance
p. xxx.
I cannot be put off by the news that our system would be perfect if it were worked by angels .. just as I do not admit that if the sky fell we should all catch larks.
1950
in
Month
Oct. 234
If .. the total content of time were spread out before me .. I could do what the Historicist says he is doing …Yes; and if the sky fell we should all catch larks.
possibility and impossibility

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