broken reed

Idioms  

1. A weak or unreliable support, as in I'd counted on her to help, but she turned out to be a broken reed. The idea behind this idiom, first recorded about 1593, was already present in a mid-15th-century translation of a Latin tract, “Trust not nor lean not upon a windy reed.”

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Example Sentences

The committee also lifted its voice for excise taxes, arguing that in relying almost entirely on income and corporation taxes, the U.S. is relying on a broken reed.

From Time Magazine Archive

Rebel Miguel Mariano Gomez is even more of a broken reed.

From Time Magazine Archive

The Young Marshal was a broken reed, but on that reed the Nationalists leaned heavily because of Peiping.

From Time Magazine Archive

The loop at the end had a single broken reed still attached.

From "A Girl Named Disaster" by Nancy Farmer

As a result of this moral estimate, he felt that his resources without God were as slender as a broken reed buffeted by storm winds.

From Islam Her Moral And Spiritual Value A Rational And Pyschological Study by Leonard, Arthur Glyn