dripping water hollows a stone
dripping water hollows a stone proverb: many minor influences gradually produce a significant effect.
Proverb
dripping water hollows a stone
- Many minor influences gradually produce a significant effect.
- In this case, as in all others of the kind, the report was known to all the chapter before it had been heard by the archdeacon or his wife. The dean heard it, and disregarded it; as did also the dean's wife—at first; and those who generally sided with the Grantlys in the diocesan battles...1861, Anthony Trollope, Framley Parsonage
Origin of dripping water hollows a stone
The proverb is a paraphrase of a similar proverb from the biblical Book of Job (14:19), or perhaps a translation of that proverb: אֲבָנִ֤ים ׀ שָׁ֥חֲקוּ מַ֗יִם avanim, shahaqu mayim; literally: rocks - have been graded down (by) water, which has been translated: Water wears away stones, or in the King James version, (because the word mayim for water is seemingly in the plural, ending with -yim ): "The waters wear the stones".
Questions about dripping water hollows a stone
- What does dripping water hollows a stone mean?
- Dripping water hollows a stone means many minor influences gradually produce a significant effect.
- What part of speech is dripping water hollows a stone?
- Dripping water hollows a stone is a proverb.
Words near dripping water hollows a stone in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: dripping water hollows a stone (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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