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broke a butterfly upon the wheel

broke a butterfly upon the wheel is the simple past of break a butterfly upon the wheel.

Meaning of break a butterfly upon the wheel

Verb

break a butterfly upon the wheel (third-person singular simple present breaks a butterfly upon the wheel, present participle breaking a butterfly upon the wheel, simple past broke a butterfly upon the wheel, past participle broken a butterfly upon the wheel)

  1. To inflict a punishment out of all proportion to the offence.
    • Let Paris tremble—“What? that Thing of ſilk,
      “Paris, that mere white Curd of Aſs’s milk?
      “Satire or Shame alas! can Paris feel?
      “Who breaks a Butterfly upon a Wheel?”
      Yet let me flap this Bug with gilded wings,
      This painted Child of Dirt that ſtinks and ſtings1734, Alexander Pope, An Epistle from Mr. Pope, to Dr. Arbuthnot
  2. To employ great exertions for insignificant ends.

Questions about broke a butterfly upon the wheel

What is broke a butterfly upon the wheel the simple past of?
Broke a butterfly upon the wheel is the simple past of break a butterfly upon the wheel.

Words near broke a butterfly upon the wheel in the dictionary

  1. Brokaws
  2. broke
  3. broke a butterfly on a wheel
  4. broke a butterfly on the wheel
  5. broke a butterfly upon a wheel
  6. broke a butterfly upon the wheel
  7. broke a fly on a wheel
  8. broke a fly on the wheel
  9. broke a fly upon a wheel
  10. broke a fly upon the wheel
  11. broke a lance

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: broke a butterfly upon the wheel (page history and authors); break a butterfly upon the wheel (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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