bed of Procrustes

As Nassim Taleb suggests in his book “The Bed of Procrustes,” “Don’t talk about ‘progress’ in terms of longevity, safety or comfort before comparing zoo animals to those in the wilderness.”

So that were we to try to force the practical life of men, collective as well as individual, into strict and exclusive conformity with the latest data of science, we should condemn society as well as individuals to suffer martyrdom on a bed of Procrustes, which would soon end by dislocating and stifling them, life ever remaining an infinitely greater thing than science.

Thus, however weary a man might be, he never liked to lie in the bed of Procrustes.

To improve his parliamentary technique, he traveled everywhere with a phonograph on which he played records of the speeches of Britain's Victorian Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone, was soon throwing such high-caliber cliches at the Opposition as "Sword of Damocles" and "Bed of Procrustes."

Like the bed of Procrustes, fashions are compelled to suit every one.