You should never touch your eye but with your elbow.
Meaning: Protecting your eyes requires maintaining impossible distance from contamination.
Origin: Recorded in A Dictionary of English Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases, an undated collection published in London by Whittaker & Co. around 1880 and credited to Thomas Preston. Its earlier history hasn't been traced.
More proverbs about Perseverance
- Faint heart never won a fair lady. — Romantic success requires courage; passive timidity guarantees failure in matters of love.
- Keeping from falling is better than helping up. — Prevention of harm requires less effort and causes less suffering than recovery from it.
- A famine in England begins at the horse-manger. — Poor grain management for livestock presages broader scarcity throughout the land.
- Every one puts his fault on the times. — People habitually blame circumstances and bad luck rather than acknowledging their own re…
- Have but few friends, though many acquaintances. — Quality relationships require intentional investment; shallow connections can be numerous…
- Get thy spindle and thy distaff ready, and God will send thee flax. — Prepare your tools and skills; opportunity arrives only for those already equipped to sei…
From our idioms
- no tener vuelta de hoja — To be conclusive and beyond dispute; to admit no alternative interpretation.
- a montones — In vast quantities; abundantly available and unremarkable.
- a ojo — By rough estimate or visual judgment, without precision.