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Reader question: Please explain “cardinal rule” as in this headline: “The cardinal rule of skin care: Do no harm.” My comments: By this “cardinal rule”, they’re effectively saying, I think, that buying expensive skin care products to cure one’s skin problems is not as good as learning not to do things that are harmful to you skin in the first place. In other words, if your skin doesn’t have a disease, illness or injury, you don’t have to go through the trouble of curing it. If you chew on your nails all the time, for example, you’ll have great trouble for the manicurist to find perfectly fitting nails for you, and you’ll perhaps pay a lot more for them than people who have normal, uninjured nails. For another example, if you have severe sunburn, wearing sunscreen before going to the beach today may not be as helpful as if you have healthy skin. Anyways, this “cardinal rule” is consistent with the advice of any good doctor who knows that the best treatment of an illness, especially a chronicle one, is prevention. Oh, cardinal. Cardinal means chief, principal, top, central, crucial, etc. The cardinal from the church, as you already know is a high-ranking priest. Cardinal has its roots in the Latin “cardo”, meaning hinge. The hinge is the thing on which the door, for instance, revolves. A cardinal rule, therefore, is a rule on which all other rules hinge, i.e. a most important rule. | 
