Origin of The Phrase
The exact origin of the phrase is uncertain. The earliest citation comes from J. Durham’s Heaven upon Earth, 1685, ii. 217: "Many profest Christians are like to foolish builders, who build by guess, and by rule of thumb." The phrase also exists in other languages, for example Swedish tumregel, Norwegian and Danish tommelfingerregel, sometimes in the variant "rule of fist", for example Finnish nyrkkisääntö, German Faustregel or Dutch vuistregel, as well as in Turkish parmak hesabı (rule of finger) and in Persian "قاعده سرانگشتی," which is translated as finger's tip rule. This suggests that it has some antiquity, and does not originate in specifically English-language culture.
Read more about this topic: Rule Of Thumb
Famous quotes containing the words origin of the, origin of, origin and/or phrase:
“The essence of morality is a questioning about morality; and the decisive move of human life is to use ceaselessly all light to look for the origin of the opposition between good and evil.”
—Georges Bataille (18971962)
“The origin of storms is not in clouds,
our lightning strikes when the earth rises,
spillways free authentic power:
dead John Browns body walking from a tunnel
to break the armored and concluded mind.”
—Muriel Rukeyser (19131980)
“Good resolutions are useless attempts to interfere with scientific laws. Their origin is pure vanity. Their result is absolutely nil. They give us, now and then, some of those luxurious sterile emotions that have a certain charm for the weak.... They are simply cheques that men draw on a bank where they have no account.”
—Oscar Wilde (18541900)
“Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion. General recognition of this fact is shown in the proverbial phrase It is the busiest man who has time to spare.”
—C. Northcote Parkinson (19091993)