A staff is quickly found to beat a dog. (Strauss, 1998 p. 103)
Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.
Meaning · English
It is easy to find an excuse to punish someone
Literally: a staff to beat a dog
Examples
The manager was looking for a reason to fire him, and a staff is quickly found to beat a dog
AI-drafted example auto-approved by rule (illustrative, not a corpus attestation)
Sources & notes
Listed on English Wikiquote “English proverbs” (CC BY-SA 4.0, retrieved 2026-07-31). Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-31; pending editor spot-check.
Common questions
What does “A staff is quickly found to beat a dog. (Strauss, 1998 p. 103)” mean?
It is easy to find an excuse to punish someone Literally: a staff to beat a dog
Is “A staff is quickly found to beat a dog. (Strauss, 1998 p. 103)” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.