Examples of aphorism in a sentence
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Confronted by a broadminded, witty, and tolerant cosmopolitan, for whom the infinite varieties of human custom offered a source of inexhaustible fascination, Thucydides presented himself as a humorless nationalist, an intellectual given to political aphorisms and abstract generalizations. —Peter Green, New York Review of Books, 15 May 2008
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It doesn’t take long to learn that a lie always unravels and that it always ends up making you feel royally cruddy. “Do the kind of work during the day that allows you to sleep at night” was anaphorism my grandfather was fond of. —Amy Krouse Rosenthal, Newsweek, 6 Mar. 2006
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The Sun twice went into journalism legend. Its city editor John Bogart is generally credited with the aphorism “When a dog bites a man, that’s not news. But when a man bites a dog, that’s news.” And the paper delivered America’s most treasured editorial in 1897, when a young girl, whose playmates had told her there was no Santa Claus, wrote and asked the Sun to tell her the truth. —Peter Andrews, American Heritage, October 1994
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Truman is remembered as much today for his aphorisms as his policies: “The buck stops here,” “If you can’t stand the heat stay out of the kitchen,” and the like. Such slogans are endearing in a time of plastic politicians who make a career of ducking responsibilities… —Ronald Steel, New Republic, 10 Aug. 1992
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When decorating, remember the familiar aphorism, “less is more.”
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<what does the aphorism “Hindsight is 20/20” mean?>
Did You Know?
Aphorism was originally used in the world of medicine. Credit Hippocrates, the Greek physician regarded as the father of modern medicine, with influencing our use of the word. He usedaphorismos (a Greek ancestor of aphorism meaning “definition” or “aphorism”) in titling a book outlining his principles on the diagnosis and treatment of disease. That volume offered many examples that helped to define aphorism, beginning with the statement that starts the book’s introduction: “Life is short, Art long, Occasion sudden and dangerous, Experience deceitful, and Judgment difficult.” English speakers originally used the term mainly in the realm of the physical sciences, but eventually broadened its use to cover principles in other fields.
Origin and Etymology ofaphorism
Middle French aphorisme, from Late Latinaphorismus, from Greek aphorismosdefinition, aphorism, from aphorizein to define, from apo- + horizein to bound — more at horizon
First Known Use: 1528
How my heart sings 