Cut
.To cut the ground from under one (or from under his feet). To leave an adversary no ground to stand on, by disproving all his arguments.
He has cut his eye-teeth. He is wide awake, he is a knowing one. The eye-teeth are the canine teeth, just under the eyes, and the phrase means he can bite as well as bark. Of course, the play is on the word “eye,” and those who have cut their eye-teeth are wide awake.
Cut your wisdom teeth. Wisdom teeth are those at the extreme end of the jaws, which do not make their appearance till persons have come to years of discretion. When persons say or do silly things, the remark is made to them that “they have not yet cut their wisdom teeth,” or reached the years of discretion.
Cut the knot. Break through an obstacle. The reference is to the Gordian knot (q.v.) shown to Alexander, with the assurance that whoever loosed it would be made ruler of all Asia; whereupon the Macedonian cut it in two with his sword, and claimed to have fulfilled the prophecy.
I must cut my stick—i.e. leave. The Irish usually cut a shillelah before they start on an expedition. Punch gives the following witty derivation:—“Pilgrims on leaving the Holy Land used to cut a palm-stick, to prove that they had really been to the Holy Sepulchre. So brother Francis would say to brother Paul, ‘Where is brother Benedict?ʹ ‘Oh (says Paul), he has cut his stick!ʹ—i.e. he is on his way home.”