behoof

behoove (one) to (do something)

To be a beneficial action for one to take. It behooves him to give his boss two weeks' notice so that he maintains a good professional relationship with her. It would behoove you to call your mother before she hears about your pregnancy from someone else.
See also: behoove

it behooves (one) to (do something)

It is proper or necessary for one to do something; it is one's obligation or duty to do something. (The spelling "behove" is more common in British English.) Primarily heard in US. It behooves him to give his boss two weeks' notice so that he maintains a good professional relationship with her. It behooves you to call your mother before she hears about your pregnancy from someone else.
See also: behoof
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

it behooves one to do something

Cliché it is necessary for one to do something; it is incumbent (up)on someone to do something. It behooves me to report the crime. It behooves you to pay for the window that you broke.
See also: behoof, one
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs.
See also:
  • behoove
  • behoove (one) to (do something)
  • behoove one to do
  • it behooves (one) to (do something)
  • it behooves one to do
  • a good turn
  • be good news
  • be licking (one's) lips
  • be licking your lips
  • be in a good cause
References in classic literature
But what I have intended, what I have resolved upon (and this is the confidence I seek to place in you) is, on my return to England, in my own person, in my own journal, to bear, for the behoof of my countrymen, such testimony to the gigantic changes in this country as I have hinted at to-night.
American Notes for General Circulation
From the judicial investigations which followed on this occasion, and which are given at length in the Wardour Manuscript, it appears that Maurice de Bracy escaped beyond seas, and went into the service of Philip of France; while Philip de Malvoisin, and his brother Albert, the Preceptor of Templestowe, were executed, although Waldemar Fitzurse, the soul of the conspiracy, escaped with banishment; and Prince John, for whose behoof it was undertaken, was not even censured by his good-natured brother.
Ivanhoe
A stage or two further on, the lamps were lighted, and a great to-do occasioned by the taking up, at a roadside inn, of a very fastidious lady with an infinite variety of cloaks and small parcels, who loudly lamented, for the behoof of the outsides, the non-arrival of her own carriage which was to have taken her on, and made the guard solemnly promise to stop every green chariot he saw coming; which, as it was a dark night and he was sitting with his face the other way, that officer undertook, with many fervent asseverations, to do.
The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby
East, and another boy of an equally tormenting and ingenious turn of mind, now lived exactly opposite, and had expended huge pains and time in the preparation of instruments of annoyance for the behoof of Martin and his live colony.
Tom Browns Schooldays
Too long, too long thy passing is delayed." But when he heard the summons of the god, He prayed that Theseus might be brought, and when The Prince came nearer: "O my friend," he cried, "Pledge ye my daughters, giving thy right hand-- And, daughters, give him yours--and promise me Thou never wilt forsake them, but do all That time and friendship prompt in their behoof." And he of his nobility repressed His tears and swore to be their constant friend.
Oedipus At Colonus
She said all this, and everything else, as coldly as a woman of snow; quite forgetting the sisters except at odd times, and apparently addressing some abstraction of Society; for whose behoof, too, she occasionally arranged her dress, or the composition of her figure upon the ottoman.
Little Dorrit