to live from hand to mouth
Preserved but no longer current.
Meaning · English
To live without any provision for the morrow.
Era: ca. 1898 (Victorian)
Sources & notes
Reproduced from Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (1898 edition, public domain; archive.org, retrieved 2026-07-31; OCR text, minor errors possible). Reflects the scholarship and attitudes of its era.
Common questions
What does “to live from hand to mouth” mean?
To live without any provision for the morrow.
Is “to live from hand to mouth” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.