clothes make the man
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You can judge a man's character based on his clothing and appearance. I'm not surprised John was fired for cause—he never dressed professionally, and the clothes make the man. You really need to get some better work clothes before starting this new job. The clothes make the man, you know
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms. © 2022 Farlex, Inc, all rights reserved.
Clothes make the man.
Prov. People will judge you according to the way you dress. Jim was always careful about how he dressed. He believed that clothes make the man.
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs. © 2002 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
clothes make the man
People say clothes make the man to mean that dressing well helps people to be successful. The lawyer was wearing a stylish blue suit. Clothes make the man, Wade thought.
Collins COBUILD Idioms Dictionary, 3rd ed. © HarperCollins Publishers 2012
clothes make the man
Outer appearances are very important. The thought appears in ancient Babylonian writings, and Erasmus’s collection of adages (1523) refers to the fact that the statement “Clothes are the man” appeared in Homer and numerous ancient Latin sources. In sixteenth-century England it was usually put as “apparel” rather than “clothes”; Shakespeare’s Polonius pontificates, “The apparel oft proclaims the man” (Hamlet, 1.3). It was a cliché by the nineteenth century.
The Dictionary of Clichés by Christine Ammer Copyright © 2013 by Christine Ammer