half the battle

half the battle idiom
A successful beginning, as in You've got the shopping list done—that's half the battle. This expression is an abbreviation of an 18th-century proverb, “The first blow is half the battle.”

The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer. Copyright © 2003, 1997 by The Christine Ammer 1992 Trust. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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