[Ads-l] Heard on Black Jesus: _with the quickness_ "right now, immediately, A.S.A.P."

Wilson Gray hwgray at GMAIL.COM
Sat Feb 24 01:05:02 UTC 2018


"Please, Pops, I pray to you, give me a sign, _with the quickness_!"

New to me, but Green's kind of has i    t:

1991 [U.S.] De La Soul 'Millie Pulled a Pistol on Santa' [lyrics] Millie
_bucked_ him and, with the quickness, it was over

I say "kind of," because the cite is for _buck_ v.2:

7. (US black/teen) to shoot a weapon

and not for _with the quickness_ "just like that, suddenly," in context,
apparently not recognizing _with the quickness_ as slang. As Horace put it:

_Idem indignor quandoque bonus dormitat Homerus_
"I am annoyed, when even great Homer nods [off]."

The UD has the phrase from 2006:

with the quickness
To do something in a quick or fast manner

and from 2009

With the quickness
To ... do something fast

Etymological WAG:

Googling shows that phrases such as "with the quickness of light(e)ning,
with the quickness of a courier, with the quickness of his reason, with the
Quickness with which a glorified Body is wheresoever it pleases, with the
quickness of mind, with the quickness of thought" occur over and over
again, through 2014. The phrase, "with the quickness of this Contraction,"
goes back to 1702.

So, perhaps, _with the quickness_ originated as a clip of phrases of this
type.
-- 
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org



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