reversible sayings

October 31, 2008 9:48 AM

What are some good sayings or quotes along the lines of Bill Clinton and the Sphinx from Mystery Men? i.e. the power of our example not the example of our power, before you can learn what I teach i must first teach how to learn, etc....
posted by sorindome to Grab Bag (19 answers total)

"Be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful." — Warren Buffett

"If strong, feign weakness; if weak, feign strength." — Sun Tzu, The Art of War
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 9:56 AM on October 31, 2008

Best answer: It is known as chiasmus in rhetoric; googling "chiasmus examples" brings up over 30,000 hits.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 10:06 AM on October 31, 2008 [3 favorites]

When the going gets tough, the tough get going.
posted by BobbyVan at 10:06 AM on October 31, 2008

I'm glad ricochet biscuit knew the term, because my googling was going nowhere. I freakin' love The Sphinx, though! My favorite quote from him is "When you learn to balance a tack hammer on your head, you will head off your foes with a balanced attack."

Thanks for asking this question.
posted by owtytrof at 10:09 AM on October 31, 2008

Best answer: I think chiasmus is related to what you're looking for, but down a bit in that wikipedia article the examples of antimetaboleseem to match what you're looking for more specifically.
posted by carsonb at 10:15 AM on October 31, 2008 [1 favorite]

Good point, carsonb -- I may have been guilty of some terminological inexactitude.

From the wikipedia page for chiasmus:

These examples are often quoted by modern commentators to demonstrate chiasmus, although they are defined as antimetabole in the classical sense.

Quite the modern commentator am I.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 10:22 AM on October 31, 2008

Slate article providing several examples of antimetabole from the 2008 Presidential campaign.
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 10:29 AM on October 31, 2008

I may have been guilty of some terminological inexactitude.

I wouldn't worry. That's nothing compared to not being able to string together a coherent, correctly formatted sentence for an answer, sheesh.
posted by carsonb at 11:00 AM on October 31, 2008

One I hear used in racing a lot: "To finish first, one must first finish."
posted by LordSludge at 11:16 AM on October 31, 2008

"It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog." (Twain, I think, but don't have a proper citation.)
posted by GhostintheMachine at 11:31 AM on October 31, 2008

Never let a fool kiss you or a kiss fool you.
posted by the latin mouse at 11:56 AM on October 31, 2008

There's an old Rocky Horror radio ad that has Riff Raff saying, "If you don't come see this movie, I will belt you around the mouth, and mouth you around the belt."
posted by dirtdirt at 12:19 PM on October 31, 2008

How bad do you want to be good? Do you want to be good real bad?
posted by JohnnyGunn at 12:30 PM on October 31, 2008

It wasn't the cough that carried her off; it was the coffin they carried her off in.
posted by grumblebee at 1:00 PM on October 31, 2008

Virtue that transgressed is but patch’d with sin,
And sin that amends is but patch’d with virtue.
-- Shakespeare "Twelfth Night"

Since every Jack became a gentleman,
There’s many a gentle person made a Jack.
-- Shakespeare "Richard III"

I wasted time and now doth time waste me
-- Shakespeare "Richard II"

What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba
-- Shakespeare "Hamlet"
posted by grumblebee at 1:11 PM on October 31, 2008

Ascribed to Dorothy Parker, WC Fields and others: "I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy."
posted by mono blanco at 1:41 PM on October 31, 2008

I prefer Tom Waits' take, "I'd rather have a free bottle in front of me than a prefrontal lobotomy."
posted by ten pounds of inedita at 2:41 PM on October 31, 2008

If you drink a fifth on the fourth, you won't come fourth on the fifth.
posted by JohnnyGunn at 3:41 PM on October 31, 2008

Here's a whole book of them.
posted by mmoncur at 4:13 AM on November 1, 2008