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Never give a sucker an even break
- Don't hesitate to take advantage of a fool.
Notes
Idioms and Phrases
Don't allow a person who's easily duped a fair chance, as in He's always trying to give out expired coupons for his store, firmly believing in never giving a sucker an even break . Probably a direct quotation, it has been attributed to showman P. T. Barnum (responsible for the oft-quoted “There's a sucker born every minute”); and comedian W. C. Fields (who popularized it in one of his films); and theater manager Edward Francis Albee, the most probable of the three. [ Slang ; early 1900s]Example Sentences
Fields taught 76 years ago: Never give a sucker an even break.
So the phrase "never give a sucker an even break", which is a premise that has always made bowlers carry on when perhaps a rest from injury might be more advisable, would not apply.
Never give a sucker an even break, said WC Fields, but that is what Chris Tremlett's back and hamstring niggle has done with Bresnan.
Never give a sucker an even break, 'cause it's dog eat dog all along the line.
"Never give a sucker an even break," "All horse players die broke," "How to live with women: Don't."
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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
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