| 释义 |
unbeˈseeming, a.
[un-1 10 and 5 d.]
1. With object: Not beseeming or befitting (a person, etc.); unbecoming or inappropriate to. (Very common in 17th c.)
1583Golding Calvin on Deut. lxv. 394 Nowe it were vnbeseeming his power that hee coulde not execute the thing that he had determined with himselfe. 1586T. B. La Primaud. Fr. Acad. i. 191 They judged the verie remembrance thereof to be unwoorthie & unbeseeming men of honor. 1631Gouge God's Arrows i. §27 You shall find them all to be very toyes, much unbeseeming Gods excellent Majesty. 1651Wittie tr. Primrose's Pop. Err. i. ii. 40 But some thinke it a thing unbeseeming the dignitie of a physician, to prepare his Medicines. 1676Hale Contempl. i. 493 An unnecessary breaking of the rest of this day, and unbeseeming the solemnity of it. 1721in Cath. Rec. Soc. Publ. VIII. 301 As being a thing Unbeseeming a Religious house. a1721Sheffield (Dk. of Buckhm.) Wks. (1753) II. 153 The truth of it is, a criminal there had put me into a passion, a little unbeseeming a Judge. 1880Swinburne Study Shaks. (1895) 60 An office..no more unbeseeming the pupil hand of the future master, than [etc.].
†b. In quasi-adverbial use. Obs.
1645Tombes Anthropol. 9 Ye doe unbeseeming your priviledge. 1655W. Gurnall Chr. in Arm. ii. xviii. §2. 190 He dare not think or speak unbeseeming the glory or goodnesse of God.
2. Unbecoming; offending against propriety or good taste. (Very common in 17th c.)
1594Hooker Eccl. Pol. i. viii. §9 All those things which men by the light of their naturall vnderstanding euidently know..to be beseeming or vnbeseeming. 1621Burton Anat. Mel. i. ii. iii. xiii, They..break many times into violent passions, oaths, imprecations and unbeseeming speeches. 1664Pepys Diary 23 Sept., Minnes took occasion, in the most childish and unbeseeming manner, to reproach us all. 1671H. M. tr. Erasm. Colloq. 433 What is more unbeseeming, than that an ignoble merchant should have store of money. 1716M. Davies Athen. Brit. I. 296 Larding their unbeseeming and inconsistent Prophecies, with..incongruous Latin. 1825Lamb Elia ii. The Wedding, The unbeseeming artifices, by which some wives push on the matrimonial projects of their daughters. a1843Southey Doctor ccxxii, Nor has it any unbeseeming levity, like this which is among Browne's poems. 1860Geo. Eliot in Cross Life (1885) II. 244 The Almighty above is as unbeseeming as painted Almighties usually are.
Hence unbeˈseemingly adv., -ˈseemingness.
1617Collins Def. Bp. Ely ii. x. 497 They dare not for horrour say that our Sauiour did vnwisely, or any way *vnbeseemingly. 1660Stanley Hist. Philos. ix. (1687) 521/2 They, under the pretence of his Doctrine, do many strange things, inveigling the young men unbeseemingly. a1677Barrow Serm. Phil. iv. 11 Wks. 1686 III. 63 All reason dictateth..that in being discontented we behave our selves very unbeseemingly and unworthily.
1623Bp. Hall Contempl., O.T. xviii. iv, Against the disguise she had pleaded the *unbeseemingnesse for her person and state. 1674N. Fairfax Bulk & Selv. 191 That would be an unbeseemingness. 1723Dk. Wharton True Briton No. 48 II. 422 He is to learn from the Unbeseemingness and Intemperances of others Passions, the better how to govern his own. |