It takes less than a day to freeze three feet of ice, and it takes less than a day to penetrate a stone by dripping water. What does that mean?

It means that the ice cubes formed by water are three feet thick. This is not formed due to a cold day. The water drips onto the stone drop by drop, and finally penetrates the stone. It is not just It took a day's work.

Source: Three feet of ice does not freeze in a day. It comes from the "Zhuangliu Chapter" of Wang Chong's "Lunheng" in the Eastern Han Dynasty. The original sentence is "The old man's river ice combines, and it does not freeze in a day; the accumulation of soil forms a mountain." , Feisuxu's work. "It means that the ice in the river is not created by a day of cold, nor is the accumulation of soil into a mountain overnight.

It takes more than a day for a drop of water to penetrate a stone. It comes from "Jade Dew in the Cranes and Forests" written by Luo Dajing of the Song Dynasty. The original sentence is "A rope cuts wood, and a drop of water penetrates a stone." It means that if you use a rope to saw wood, there will be a day when the wood will be cut. It will break, and the water drops drop by drop on the stone, and one day the stone will be penetrated by the drops.

Extended information:

The story of water dripping through stone:

Zhang Guaiya was the county magistrate in Chongyang. Suddenly, he saw a petty official coming out of the treasury in a panic. Zhang Chengya stopped the clerk and found a penny hidden under his turban. Zhang Guaiya stepped forward to question and found out that it was stolen from the treasury. He took the clerk back to the lobby and ordered him to be tortured. The clerk was unconvinced: "A mere penny is nothing!" Zhang Guaiya was furious and said: "One penny a day, a thousand penny a thousand days, a rope will cut the wood, and a drop of water will penetrate the stone." Zhang Guaiya beheaded him in public. This little official.

This sentence is usually used to describe the formation of a situation, which has been accumulated and brewed for a long time. Everything that happens has its underlying and long-standing factors, which cannot happen suddenly. When used in a derogatory sense, it is often used to describe the accumulation of contradictions over time; when used in a positive sense, it is used to describe the hard-won achievements.