There are a handful of expressions that used to contain some real wisdom, but in being shortened have become so inane that they even contradict their original wisdom.
For example, the original expression was “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness.” (Well, actually that’s Oscar Wilde’s version. Ironically, the original idea came from someone else in a somewhat different form.) Wilde’s expression made clear that the imitator marked themselves as merely mediocre, simply for imitating. This is an enormously condescending insult—Oscar Wilde’s wit, you know. But the shortened modern version, “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery,” takes away everything insulting and condescending about the original. It takes away the tension in Wilde’s construction and refashions it into a kind of sincerity that means something different. It excuses imitation as being a a good thing—missing the moral valence of the word “flattery.” Heck, on the school yard it attempts to defang imitative mockery into some sort of compliment. Shortening it misses the point—and the wit!
The topical expression this month is “The exception proves the rule.” You see, that its not actually the real expression. The full expression—a legal explanation—is “The exception proves the rule in cases not excepted.” This idea is not the vapid suggestion that if there is a rule that there must be exceptions or that the existence of something that breaks a pattern serves to underscore the existence of a rule or pattern. No, that is all nonsensical.
What the original expression means is that if the law lists some exceptions, then there must be a rule that covered everything else. That is, even if the rule is not listed explicitly, the existence of the explanation of exceptions is enough to prove the existence of the real—though implicit—rule.
Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution reads:
No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.
That last sentence, which I have italicized, is an exception. It explains how to create an exception to the general rule of prohibition. As so many have said, this sentence proves that no legislative action is needed to enforce the rules. In legal terms, the prohibition is self-enacting.