| 释义 |
downward, adv. (prep.) and a.|ˈdaʊnwəd|
For forms see down adv.
[Primarily an aphetic form of adownward, in OE. adúnweard; but subseq. referred directly to down: see -ward.]
A. adv.
1. Towards a lower place or position; towards what is below: with a descending motion or tendency.
a. in reference to movement through space.
c1200Trin. Coll. Hom. 105 Ech god giue..cumeð of heuene dunward. c1230Hali Meid. 19 Ha..walden fallen duneward. 1297R. Glouc. (1724) 362 As hii þat donward come. 1398Trevisa Barth. De P.R. xiii. xxiv. (1495) 456 A drope..fallyth dounwarde by his owne heuynesse. 1535Coverdale 2 Kings xx. 10 It is an easy thinge for the shadowe to go ten degrees downewarde. 1641French Distill. i. (1651) 40 This Oil taken inwardly worketh upward and downward. 1887Bowen Virg. æneid i. 607 While streams downward run to the sea.
b. in reference to direction, attitude, or aspect.
c1400Mandeville (Roxb.) xix. 87 Lukand douneward to þe erthe. c1450Douce MS. 55 ch. x, Tourne the brede doun⁓warde in the panne. 1562J. Heywood Prov. & Epigr. (1867) 113, I looke downeward to my feete. 1793Southey Triumph Woman 302 Why downward droops his musing head? 1855Browning Old Pictures in Florence x, 'Tis looking downward makes one dizzy.
c. in reference to position or situation.
a1300Cursor M. 9887 (Cott.) Þis castel dunward þan es it polist slight. c1391Chaucer Astrol. ii. §36 Thanne set I the point..downward in the same signe. c15111st Eng. Bk. Amer. (Arb.) Introd. 33/2 Fro ye myddell don⁓warde ben they lyke the halfe neder parte of an horse. 1641J. Jackson True Evang. T. ii. 115 [St. Peter] was crucified..with his head downward. 1667Milton P.L. i. 463 Dagon his Name, Sea Monster, upward Man And downward Fish. 1854J. Scoffern in Orr's Circ. Sc. Chem. 24 Metallic cones, ranged apices downward.
2. fig.
a. Towards that which is lower in order, or inferior in any way.
a1300Cursor M. 1943 (Cott.) Fra me dun-ward drogh man his thoght. c1440Jacob's Well (E.E.T.S.) 48 In þe lyne of kynrede dounward, Þi sone to þe is in þe firste degre. 1596Dalrymple tr. Leslie's Hist. Scot. iv. 260 The Peichtis in thair guddis and ryches downward began to declyne. a1732T. Boston Crook in Lot (1805) 160 God carries his people's circumstances downward..till they come to that point. 1847Emerson Repr. Men Wks. (Bohn) I. 351 Things seem to tend downward, to justify despondency.
b. Onward from an earlier to a later time.
1611Bible Transl. Pref. 3 From Christes time downe⁓ward. 1679–1714Burnet Hist. Ref. an. 1535 (R.) From the twelfth century downward. 1849Grote Greece ii. lxvi, All the old laws of Athens, from Solon downward.
3. Comb.
1821Shelley Prometh. Unb. ii. v, Downward-gazing flowers. 1865G. M. Hopkins Poems (1948) 134 A block of copse Close-rooted in the downward-hollowing fields. 1871Browning Balaust. 1370 The downward-dwelling people. 1878B. Taylor Deukalion iii. i. 97. 1922 Joyce Ulysses 377 Exterior splendour may be the surface of a downwardtending lutulent reality. Ibid. 656 Slow erosions of peninsulas and downwardtending peninsulas. 1943L. B. Lyon Evening in Stepney 14 Fuel for the downward-bending The sod-quickening fire. 1964J. C. Catford in D. Abercrombie et al. Daniel Jones 35 A downward-forward displacement of the hyoid bone..can easily be observed.
†B. prep. = down prep. 1. Obs. rare.
c1430Pilgr. Lyf Manhode i. v. (1869) 3 A corde..he hadde set dounward þe wal.
C. adj.
1. Directed towards that which is lower; descending; inclined downward.
a. lit.
1552Huloet, Downewarde, præceps. 1592Shakes. Ven. & Ad. 1106 This foul..boar, Whose downward eye still looketh for a grave. 1697Dryden Virg. Georg. iv. 517 The downward track. 1728–46Thomson Spring 188 In the western sky the downward sun Looks out. 1878Huxley Physiogr. 146 The downward current of the river.
b. fig.
a1586Sidney (J.) At the lowest of my downward thoughts. 1700Dryden Sigism. & Guisc. 344 Thy low fall..Shows downward appetite to mix with mud. 1727–46Thomson Summer 1516 A Hampden..who stemmed the torrent of a downward age To slavery prone. 1869Freeman Norm. Conq. (1876) III. xiii. 303 Steps in a downward scale.
2. Lying or situated below; lower. rare.
a1300Cursor M. 9926 (Gött.) Þat rechis to þe donwar [v.r. neþemest] light. 1697Dryden Virg. Georg. i. 341 Aurora..lights the downward Heav'n. 1824Campbell Theodric 138 The waste and wild Schreckhorn..frowning..Upon a downward world of pastoral charms.
Hence ˈdownwardly adv. = downward adv.; ˈdownwardness.
1839Bailey Festus iii. (1852) 26 That downwardness of soul. 1850Browning Easter Day xv. 33 Certain rays..Shot downwardly. 1872Mivart Elem. Anat. 60 The downwardly tapering condition of the coccygeal vertebræ.
▸ downward-mobile adj. chiefly N. Amer. = downwardly mobile adj. at downwardly adv. Compounds 2.
1948Public Opinion Q. 12 700 For 100 cases where the economic status of the public relations men could be compared with that of their fathers,..only seven were *downward mobile. 1959V. Packard Status Seekers (1960) xviii. 256 Many socially declining or downward-mobile people turn to alcohol or drugs for support. 1994Philadelphia Tribune (Nexis) 29 Apr. 1 b, Below this..is the steadily downward-mobile, African location known as Soweto.
▸ downward mobility n. movement from a higher to a lower social or professional level; loss of wealth and status; cf. upward mobility at upward adv. 1e.
1929M. Ginsberg in Econ. Jrnl. 39 562 On the evidence before us there is very little *downward mobility from I to III, and this is not in harmony with the suggestion often made that the lower classes are recruited sensibly from the failures of the upper. 1949H. A. Murray in H. Melville Pierre Introd. p. xxxviii, From wealth to penury, from leisure to toil... A sociologist might call it a tragedy of downward mobility, the exact antithesis of the basic American myth. 1993Esquire Sept. 126/2 Some men tolerate a little downward mobility just fine—just don't settle for no mobility at all. Men treading water in their careers tend to check out earliest of all. |