| 单词 | afraid |
| 释义 | afraid 1. < running because they were afraid > < afraid of the dark > < afraid he wouldn't live > < the author was afraid that he would lose his prestige > < to say bluntly what everyone else is afraid to say — T.S.Eliot > — usually used predicatively 2. < they said they were afraid they couldn't accept the invitation > < we have witnessed, I am afraid, only the first phase of a basic conflict — J.B.Conant > — often used to express a polite depreciation of one's own opinion or importance < he told her he was afraid she was quite wrong > 3. < he seemed afraid, if he were kind, he might be ridiculed — E.A.Peeples > 4. < he's afraid of even a little work > < afraid to let his emotions seize upon his speech — V.L.Parrington > < not afraid of being declamatory in his fervor — Leslie Rees > Synonyms: < your letter is a great relief to my mind for I still was anxious — O.W.Holmes †1935 > < anxious for her own safety against dangers threatening from the Mediterranean — A.S.Esmer > < Cicero, anxious for his own safety, knowing now that he had made enemies of half the Senate, watching how the balance of factions would go — J.A.Froude > fearful, though often the same as anxious, usually suggests a somewhat stronger and more generalized apprehensiveness stemming often rather from a natural timidity than particular objective causes and implying reactions of fear but fear usually strongly mingled with shyness, uncertainty, and a more general tendency to foreboding and worry < I was fearful lest we should strike the timbered edge of the plain — Francis Birtles > < they have been fearful of the unorthodox — S.E.Harris > < the average individual is somewhat fearful of high speeds — H.G.Armstrong > < it is timorous and fearful of challenge — H.L.Mencken > < now that he had these and a dozen other distinctions, he was fearful and insecure — Walter O'Meara > afraid, frightened, and scared are often interchangeable in meaning in common use; afraid, however, is the most general of the three and usually implies a deep-seated though not necessarily outwardly apparent reaction of fear manifest in a strong sense of personal insecurity or danger or in a strong and usually uncontrollable desire to avoid or evade the cause of the reaction < afraid, in her extreme perturbation, of the loneliness of the deserted rooms, and of half-imagined faces peeping from behind every open door in them — Charles Dickens > < I was too afraid of her to shudder, too afraid of her to put my fingers to my ears — Joseph Conrad > < ten thousand regular soldiers of his wonderful army that everybody in the world was afraid of — Dorothy C. Fisher > frightened implies a fear that usually gives rise to an inner disorder and temporary loss of self-command bordering on and often involving paralysis of muscle and will < the men were frightened by the sudden and unexpected attack on the fort but they defended it valiantly > < frightened at the prospect of failure > < a child frightened by stories of the boogeyman > < frightened so that he broke out in a cold sweat and could hardly stand > scared is the same as frightened in intensity but suggests a more all-inclusive usually childlike reaction as that of running away, trembling, or acting in ways that for adults would be foolish and irrational < run like scared rabbits all the way down the hill to the Charles Street elevated station — Joseph Dever > < many of the houses here were still occupied by scared inhabitants, too frightened even for flight — H.G.Wells > terrified and aghast, in this sense, suggest total paralysis of action and will. terrified implies the total reign of terror over the person resulting in stupefaction or in a total incapacity to act or think in any rational way < a child terrified into screaming by the idea of going to the dentist > < terrified by the very sound of a plane after several months of steady bombings > < the mind, indeed, in its first blank outlook on life is terrified by the demoniac force of nature and the swarming misery of man — G.D.Brown > aghast, a somewhat older use in this sense, puts strong emphasis on an immobility resulting from a terror or more usually a horror or horrified disbelief especially over the fate of someone or something other than oneself < were aghast that in their own midst there were men capable of such barbarism — Ruth Gruber > < many who are aghast at the type of world which we are now entering, in which a war could cause obliteration — Vannevar Bush > < I stood aghast, unable to move, while the gravediggers uncovered a skeleton, cleaned the bones, laid them alongside the grave — J.A.Lomax > < an intelligent woman, remembering her own childhood, must stand aghast at the utter disregard of the children's ordinary human rights — G.B.Shaw > |
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