Paint The Lily for Dummies

Hey there! So, you're curious about the phrase "paint the lily," huh? Well, I'll do my best to explain it to you in a way that's easy to understand.

Okay, imagine a beautiful flower, like a lily, all pure and perfect just the way it is. Now, what if someone came along and tried to add some paint to the flower? Would it make the flower more beautiful? Probably not, right? In fact, it might even make the flower look weird or unnatural.

Well, that's kind of what "paint the lily" means. It's a way to describe someone who is trying to make something that is already perfect even better, but in reality, they're just making it worse or overdoing it. It's like when you're playing a video game and you already have the highest score, but you still keep trying to get even more points. You're just "painting the lily" in that situation.

Now, this phrase is actually from a line in one of William Shakespeare's plays called "King John." In the play, a character says, "To gild refined gold, to paint the lily." "Gilding refined gold" means putting a thin layer of gold on top of something that's already made of gold, which is unnecessary since gold is already valuable and beautiful. And "painting the lily" means the same thing - trying to make something perfect even more perfect, even though it's already perfect just the way it is.

So, there you have it! "Paint the lily" means trying to improve or enhance something that is already perfect, but instead, it usually ends up making it worse or unnecessary. It's like trying to add more sprinkles to an ice cream sundae that's already perfectly delicious - it's just not necessary!