Meaning & use
pearls before swine
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Meaning
phraseidiom
Something valuable offered to people who cannot appreciate it and will not value it.
Grammar: Often appears in the form 'cast pearls before swine', or as a comment: that was pearls before swine.
Patterns
- cast pearls before swine
- be pearls before swine
Teaching poetry to the bored class felt like pearls before swine.
She served her best wine to guests who only wanted beer, which was pearls before swine.
He called his brilliant speech pearls before swine since nobody was listening.
Common combinations
- cast pearls before swine
- I felt I was casting pearls before swine at that meeting.
- like pearls before swine
- Her advice was like pearls before swine to him.
- nothing but pearls before swine
- Playing jazz at that party was nothing but pearls before swine.
Synonyms and how they differ
- wasted effort
- Wasted effort is a neutral phrase, while pearls before swine adds the idea that the audience is too dull to value it.
- water off a duck's back
- This idiom describes advice that has no effect, but it does not suggest that the advice was valuable.
Word family
Practice
A chef cooks a fine meal for guests who only want fast food. Which phrase fits best?
Choose one answer.
Pearls before swine describes something valuable given to people who will not appreciate it. The other idioms mean something different, such as a fuss over nothing or something easy.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “pearls before swine”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.