Meaning & Analysis
To shape, mold, or influence a person or situation with extreme ease, as if they were made of soft, pliable wax that can be effortlessly imprinted or altered.
Insights
Malleability and Influence
The proverb primarily refers to a person who is highly malleable and easily influenced or controlled by another's will. Their opinions and actions can be shaped effortlessly.
Impressionability and Suggestibility
It describes someone who is highly impressionable and susceptible to persuasion, lacking firm convictions of their own. As Ben Jonson's quote suggests, an external idea can be 'printed upon' them.
Favorable Circumstances
The phrase can describe a situation or plan that unfolds perfectly and without resistance. When a scheme 'works like wax', it is proceeding smoothly and exactly as intended.
Manipulation and Control
The act of 'working' someone like wax often implies a power imbalance where one person uses cunning, flattery, or deceit to dominate another, highlighting a dynamic of skillful manipulation and passive vulnerability.
Historical Symbolism of Wax Seals
The proverb draws on the historical importance of wax seals for authenticating documents. To 'work someone like wax' is to metaphorically press one's own seal or will onto another person, overwriting their identity and agency.
Psychology of Influence and Bias
The phrase reveals a psychological dynamic of power and vulnerability. It speaks to the traits of a highly suggestible or naive person while also highlighting the manipulative tactics—flattery, deception, rhetoric—of the influencer. The frequent application to women in early quotes, such as by Lyly, also exposes historical gender biases.
Literary and Theatrical Resonance
The proverb's prevalence in Elizabethan and Jacobean drama (Lyly, Kyd, Jonson) reflects the era's fascination with courtly intrigue, political manipulation, and the power of language to shape and control others.
Material Culture and Metaphor
The metaphor's power is rooted in the common, everyday understanding of wax as a uniquely transformable material. This connection to material culture makes the abstract concept of manipulation feel tangible and immediate.
Rhetorical Devices
Simile
The proverb is built on a direct and powerful simile ('like WAX') that compares a person's psychological pliability to the physical properties of wax.
Material Symbolism
Wax serves as a potent symbol of formlessness, vulnerability, and the potential to be shaped. Its physical qualities are mapped directly onto a person's character.
Active Verb Choice
The active verb 'to work upon' suggests a deliberate, skillful, and sustained effort, framing the act of influence as a form of craftsmanship or artistry.
Transcription
Quotations
At my wil I wend she wolde haue wrought, like wax.
You shall see .. how I will worke this geare lyke wax.
But wee see that Golde and fayre words are..able to worke sillie women like waxe.
This workes like waxe.
The time was wherein wit would worke like waxe.
[As in c1592 Kyd].
You may worke vpon him like waxe.
That he may worke like waxe, and print vpon.
Cross References
- See OTTO, no. 373.
- W136 Soft wax will take any impression.
Related Proverbs
Original Scan
Used under CC BY-NC 3.0.