From Song-dynasty scholar Wang Mou's 《
野客丛书·
俗语有所自》:
似此等语，
不可枚举 — 'expressions like these cannot be counted one by one.' The idiom kept
枚举 (to enumerate one by one,
枚 = measure word for small items) and evolved
不可 into the more literary
不胜 ('cannot bear to').
