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By the wayside

Posted by Chris on August 03, 2007

In Reply to: By the wayside posted by Deborah M. Coelho on August 03, 2007

: Please tell me if you have ever used the expression "let it go by the wayside"? I just happened to have been emailing my friend in Vermont and I said lets make definite plans to get together or we may "let it go by the wayside". Common sense tells me what it means but I don't know where it came from and am dying to know!

Almost certainly from the parable of the sower, which appears in several gospels including Luke 8:5 "A sower went out to sow his seed and as he sowed some fell by the wayside; and the fowls of the air devoured it"

So, as you'll have guessed, it usually means to accept that some things will be fruitless and to conentrate on those things that are productive.

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