bed of Procrustes

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Ben Jonson complained that it compels all ideas, irrespective of their worth, to fill a space of exactly fourteen lines, and that it therefore operates on the same principle as the bed of Procrustes.

From Halleck's New English Literature by Halleck, Reuben Post

Theology was ever the bed of Procrustes, to be adapted to which, the limbs of travellers, if too long were cut off, and if too short were lengthened.

From Good Sense by Holbach, Paul Henri Thiry, baron d'

Let the student of singing beware of the numerous impostors who claim to have a “Method,” a sort of bed of Procrustes, which the victim, whether long or short, is made to fit.

From Style in Singing by Haslam, W. E.

The bed of Procrustes, madam, was a bed to which all who lay upon it had to be conformed.

From Come Rack! Come Rope! by Benson, Robert Hugh

Think what that must be even to a man innocent of crime, and feel how far worse than the bed of Procrustes it must be to one like me.

From Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 3, July, 1851 by Various