{"id":76,"date":"2014-04-22T17:28:00","date_gmt":"2014-04-22T17:28:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/?p=76"},"modified":"2014-04-22T17:28:00","modified_gmt":"2014-04-22T17:28:00","slug":"wit-idioms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wit-idioms\/","title":{"rendered":"Wit idioms"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Here is a list of idiomatic expressions using the word wit.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>At one&#8217;s wit&#8217;s end<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>When you are at your wit\u2019s end, you are at the limits of your intellectual resources.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>She didn\u2019t know what she was supposed to do. She was at her wit\u2019s end.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>When you are at your wit\u2019s end, you are so worried or upset because you don\u2019t know what to do.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I have tried everything I can to get her back in my life, but she still doesn\u2019t talk to me. I am at my wit\u2019s end.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3><strong>Brevity is the soul of wit.<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>This is a saying from Shakespeare\u2019s Hamlet. It means that jokes are funnier if they are shorter. This expression also indicates the need to express ideas using fewer words.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Stephen doesn\u2019t know that brevity is the soul of wit. He takes at least ten minutes to tell even a simple joke.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3><strong>Frighten one out of one&#8217;s wits \/ scare one out of one&#8217;s wits<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>To frighten somebody out of their wits is to frighten them so badly.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>That loud noise frightened me out of my wits.<\/li>\n<li>Don\u2019t shout at me \u2013 you are scaring me out of my wits.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The expressions \u2018frighten one out of one\u2019s mind\u2019 or \u2018scare one out of one\u2019s mind\u2019 has the same meaning.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>As soon as I entered the compound, the dogs started barking at me and scared me out of my mind.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The expression <strong>\u2018scare the wits out of someone\u2019<\/strong> has very similar meaning.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The windows blew shut and scared the wits out of me.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Get one&#8217;s wits about one \/ have one&#8217;s wits about one<\/h3>\n<p>To get your wits about you is to think clearly when you are under pressure.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I was so stressed out that I couldn\u2019t get my wits about me.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The expression <strong>\u2018keep one&#8217;s wits about (one)\u2019<\/strong> also has the same meaning.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>If the driver hadn\u2019t kept his wits about him during the accident, more lives would have been lost.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>I couldn\u2019t keep my wits about me when the manager told me that I was going to be sacked.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Live by one&#8217;s wits<\/h3>\n<p>To live by your wits is to survive just by being clever.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>He lost both parents when he was just ten and had to live by his wits.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Match wits (with someone)<\/h3>\n<p>To match wits with somebody is to prove that intellectually you are just as capable as them.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I can never match wits with my kid sister.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>An ounce of discretion is worth a pound of wit<\/h3>\n<p>This is a proverb. Before telling jokes you should think whether it is appropriate or not.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Stephen makes fun of everybody. He doesn\u2019t care whether his jokes hurt others. Someone should tell him that an ounce of discretion is worth a pound of wit.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Sharp wit<\/h3>\n<p>When you have a sharp wit you are quite good at making jokes and funny comments.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>My chemistry professor had a sharp wit. That was the only reason I attended his classes.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>A battle of wits<\/h3>\n<p>A battle of wits is a situation in which two people try to beat each other by using their intelligence.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The battle of wits between the government and the opposition is going to continue for a while.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>A half-wit<\/h3>\n<p>A half-wit is a stupid person.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Mike is a half-wit. He can\u2019t even write his own name.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Frighten\/scare the hell out of somebody<\/h3>\n<p>To frighten the hell out of somebody is to frighten them so badly.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Don\u2019t drive so fast. You are frightening the hell out of me.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Gather your wits<\/h3>\n<p>To gather your wits is to make an effort to think more clearly.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I was so confused so I sat there trying to gather my wits.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Here is a list of idiomatic expressions using the word wit. At one&#8217;s wit&#8217;s end When you are at your wit\u2019s end, you are at the limits of your intellectual resources. She didn\u2019t know&#46;&#46;&#46;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-76","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-idioms","tag-idioms-about-wit"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=76"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77,"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76\/revisions\/77"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}