| 释义 |
▪ I. intellect, n.|ˈɪntɪlɛkt|
[ad. L. intellectus (u stem) a perceiving, discerning, discernment, understanding, meaning, sense, signification, f. ppl. stem of intellegĕre: see intelligent. Cf. It. intelletto (Boccaccio), F. intellect (13th c., Brunetto Latino); but the word was little used in F. or Eng. before the 16th c.]
1. That faculty, or sum of faculties, of the mind or soul by which one knows and reasons (excluding sensation, and sometimes imagination; distinguished from feeling and will); power of thought; understanding. Rarely in reference to the lower animals.
c1386Chaucer Knt.'s T. 1945 Oonly the intellect with outen moore That dwelled in his herte syk and soore Gan faillen when the herte felte deeth [Boccaccio Teseide x. cxi, Sol nello intelletto e nel cuore]. ― Sec. Nun's T. 339 Right as a man hath sapiences three Memorie, Engyn, and Intellect also. 1398Trevisa Barth. De P.R. iii. iii. (Add. MS. 27944), As þe yee is in þe body, so is þe intellect vndirstondinge in þe soule. 1588Shakes. L.L.L. v. i. 64 It reioyceth my intellect, true wit. 1593― Rich. II, v. i. 28 Hath Bullingbrooke Depos'd thine Intellect? 1667Milton P.L. vi. 351 All Heart they live, all Head, all Eye, all Eare, All Intellect, all Sense. a1677Hale Prim. Orig. Man. i. i. 28 The proper Acts of the Intellect are Intellection, Deliberation, and Determination or Decision. 1696Phillips, Intellect, that Faculty of the Soul which is usually called the Understanding. 1773Ld. Monboddo Language (1774) I. i. iv. 45 The faculty by which it [the mind] operates singly, and without participation of the body, I call intellect. 1862Darwin Fertil. Orchids i. 46 To test the intellect of moths I tried the following little experiment. 1870D. P. Blaine Encycl. Rur. Sports (ed. 3) §851 The elephant..has given instances of what may be termed intellect that the horse does not possess. 1888Ruskin Præterita III. iii. 93 The..elasticity and acuteness of the American intellect.
2. transf.
†a. An intellect embodied; a being possessing understanding; an ‘intelligence’, a spirit. Obs.
b. Intellect embodied; a person of a great intellect; also, intellectual persons collectively.
1602Marston Antonio's Rev. iii. i. Wks. 1856 I. 105 Thou royal spirit of Andrugio, where ere thou hoverst (Ayrie intellect). c1645Milton Sonn. Detract. cert. Treat., The subject new: it walked the town awhile, Numbering good intellects; now seldom pored on. 1665Boyle Occas. Refl. iv. vi. (1848) 207 How little will humane Intellects, without Revelation, discover of that manifold Wisdome of God. 1732Berkeley Alciphr. iv. §19 It is more improper to say of God, He is an intellect or intelligent Being, than to say of a reasonable soul that it is an angel. 1831Carlyle Sart. Res. i. iii, He stood-up in full coffee-house..where all the Virtuosity, and nearly all the Intellect of the place assembled of an evening. 1838De Quincey Shaks. Wks. 1863 xv. 69 This transcendent poet, the most august amongst created intellects. 1856Masson Ess., Shaks. & Goethe 22 To say that he [Shakespeare] was the greatest intellect that ever lived, is to bring the shades of Aristotle and Plato, and Bacon and Newton..grumbling about us.
3. pl. Intellectual powers; mental faculties; ‘wits’, ‘senses’. Very common in 17–18th c. Now arch. or vulgar.
1698Vanbrugh 1st Pt. æsop i. Wks. (Rtldg.) 370/1, I know he's modest, but I likewise know His intellects are categorical. 1751Johnson Rambler No. 95 ⁋18 My judgment embarrassed, and my intellects distorted. 1751Smollett Per. Pic. (1779) IV. xcv. 157 A man of sound intellects. 1799E. Home in Phil. Trans. 166 He was weak in his intellects. 1814F. Burney Wanderer I. 390 Her faculties are all disordered: her very intellects, I fear, are shaken. 1832H. Martineau Demerara i. 12 Mark had never been very bright in his intellects during his best days. 1837–9Hallam Hist. Lit. (1847) III. vii. §48. 159 To ask, why this Don Quixote..should have been more likely to lose his intellects by reading romances than Cervantes himself.
†4. Understanding; comprehension. Obs. rare.
c1470Harding Chron. Proem. iii, And some in Frenche they made, for intellecte Of men that could no Latyn vnderstande.
†5. That which one is to understand by something; the sense, meaning, signification, purport (of a word or passage). Obs. rare.
1520Whitinton Vulg. (1527) 6 Which verbe dothe accorde with the intellecte or significacyon & not with the voyce. 1588Shakes. L.L.L. iv. ii. 137, I will looke againe on the intellect of the Letter, for the nomination of the partie writing [mispr. written] to the person written vnto.
▪ II. † ˈintellect, v. Obs. rare.
[f. prec. n.]
trans. a. To give to understand; to inform. b. To understand (in a particular way); to interpret.
1599R. Linche Fount. Anc. Fict. B b ij, Which intellecteth vs..that Iudges and such like officers..ought continually striue by all endeuours to suppresse wrongs. Ibid. E, These Stations are many times thus intellected: by the Spring is meant Venus; the Summer signifies Ceres. |