Language: en
Meaning: (idiomatic,obsolete)From oneplace(or person, or task) toanother;from pillar to post,hither and thither.c. 1420, formerly attributed toJohn Lydgate,Hrre[sic]Folowyth the Interpretacõn of the Names of Goddis and Goddesses of this Treatyse Folowynge as Poetes Wryte, [Westminster,i.e., London: Printed byWynkyn de Worde, published 1498],OCLC561380359; republished as Oscar Lovell Triggs, editor,The Assembly of Gods: or, The Accord of Reason and Sensuality in the Fear of Death by John Lydgate. Ed. from the Mss. with Introduction, Notes, Index of Persons and Places, and Glossary, by Oscar Lovell Triggs(Early English Text Society, Extra Series; 69), London: Published for theEarly English Text SocietybyK. Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co., 1896,OCLC4125645, page 34, lines 1145–1148:Whyche dooñ he hym sent to Contrycion, / And fro thensforth to Satysfaccion. / Thusfro poost to pylourwas he made to daunce, / And at the last he went forthe to Penaunce.1562,John Heywood,Iohn Heywoodes Woorkes. A Dialogue Conteynyng the Number of the Effectuall Prouerbes in the Englishe Tounge, Compact in a Matter Concernynge Two Maner of Maryages. With One Hundred of Epigrammes: and Thrée Hundred of Epigrammes vpon Thrée Hundred Prouerbes: and a Fifth Hundred of Epigrams. Whervnto are Now Newly Added a Syxt Hundred of Epigrams by the Sayde Iohn Heywood, London: [Imprinted at London inFléetestreteby Thomas Powell],OCLC78701810; republished as John S. Farmer, editor,The Proverbs, Epigrams, and Miscellanies of John Heywood: Comprising A Dialogue of the Effectual Proverbs in the English Tongue Concerning Marriages—Five Hundred Epigrams—Three Hundred Epigrams on Three Hundred Proverbs—The Fifth Hundred Epigrams—A Sixth Hundred Epigrams—Miscellanies—Ballads—Note-book and Word-List(Early English Dramatists), London: Privately printed for subscribers by the Early English Drama Society, 18Bury Street,Bloomsbury, W.C., 1906,OCLC24204980, pages 55 and 218:{“A Dialogue Containing the Number of the Effectual Proverbs in the English Tongue. Part II. Chapter II.”,page 55} What, a post of physic, (said she)? Yea a post; / Andfrom post to pillar, wife, I have been tossed / By that surfeit. And I feel a little fit / Even now, by former attempting of it.{“Three Hundred Epigrammes, upon Three Hundred Prouerbes, Invented and Made by John Heywood”,page 218} 251. "Of Post and Pillar." /Tossedfrom post to pillar: thou art a pillar strong; / And thou hast been a pillar, some say, too long.1804March 19, “Seat of Government”, in “the author of theThirty Years' View” [i.e.,Thomas Hart Benton], editor,Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856. From Gales and Seaton's Annals of Congress; from their Register of Debates; and from the Official Reported Debates, by John C. Rives, volumesIII (October 17, 1803 – April 25, 1808), New York, N.Y.:D. Appleton & Company, 346 & 348Broadway; Columbus, Oh.: Follett, Foster & Co., published1857,→OCLC, pages45 and 47–48:[page 45] The bill for the temporary removal of the seat of Government of the United States to the city of Baltimore was taken up for its second reading.[…][pages 47–48] Does it not show, in terms of unequivocal meaning, that it was the opinion of the men best qualified to decide, that the seat of Government, once fixed under the provision of the constitution, must be permanent? It was not then imagined that the Government ought to be travelling aboutfrom post to pillar, according to the prevalence of this or that party or faction.1872,Testimony in Relation to Alleged Frauds in the New York Custom-House, Taken by the Committee on Investigation and Retrenchment(United States Senate,42d Congress, 2d Session; report no. 227), volume III, Washington, D.C.:Government Printing-Office,→OCLC,page181:Q. You applied to Secretary[George Sewall] Boutwellbecause you had ascertained you could not get redress anywhere else?—A. No; we were sent from pillar to post, andfrom post to pillar, and we got no satisfaction any way.1874May, “From Pillar to Post”, inSarah J[osepha] Hale,Louis A[ntoine] Godey, editors,Godey's Lady's Book and Magazine, volume LXXXVIII, number527, Philadelphia, Pa.: Published by Louis A. Godey, N.E. cor. Sixth andChestnut Sts.,→OCLC,page422:How often we see men who have been nearly everything in the world outside the unelastic professions—directors and secretaries, clerks in all manner of offices, and managers of all sorts of schemes—knocking about from America to England, and from Australia to Japan; without specialty, but with a good general business faculty, understanding all about tare and tret and double entry and working up a business, they are the very embodiments of the popular saying, and are flung from pillar to post andfrom post to pillar, as a juggler flings his plates or balls from one hand to the other.
Validation Count: 0
Sourced from Wiktionary