let sleeping dogs lie

短语

莫惹是非

发音

AU

词形变化

lets sleeping dogs lie 三单 lets sleeping dogs lie letting sleeping dogs lie letting sleeping dogs lie 现在分词

别名

let a sleeping dog lie let the sleeping dogs lie

释义与例句

v.
  1. 1.

    To leave things as they are; especially, to avoid restarting or rekindling an old argument; to leave disagreements in the past.

    莫惹是非

    让惹是非

    习语

    Near-synonyms: let it be, leave it be, let things be, leave things be, let it alone, leave it alone, let things alone, leave things alone; let bygones be bygones, let nature take its course

    Eventually, they decided it would be best to let sleeping dogs lie and not discuss the matter any further.

    A: I noticed a minor typo in the proofs just now, but I think they're already doing the make-ready on the press. B: Time to let sleeping dogs lie then.

词源

Attestations exist from the 1820s and 1830s. Earlier ones may be discoverable with better corpus searches. The metaphor is self-evident and is typical of folk wisdom. To choose to pass by a sleeping dog without stirring it is comparable to letting a hornets' nest or beehive be, not poking a bear, and so on.

来源：wiktionary