| 释义 |
▪ I. difficult, a.|ˈdɪfɪkəlt|
Also 5 dyficulte, 5–6 difficulte. Comp. difficulter, sup. difficultest (now rare).
[An English formation, of which the ending -cult is not etymologically regular: cf. L. difficil-is, F. difficile. It has been regarded as deduced from the n. difficult-y; and it may have arisen under the joint influence of difficul (see prec.) and difficulty. It appeared earlier than the adoption of difficile from French, which it has also outlived.]
1. Not easy; requiring effort or labour; occasioning or attended with trouble; troublesome, hard.
a. of actions, etc.: Hard to do, perform, carry out, or practise. Often with inf. subject.
1586T. B. La Primand. Fr. Acad. i. (1594) 42 Good beginnings in all great matters are alwaies the difficultest part of them. 1598Hakluyt Voy. I. 212 (R.) Things difficulte [they] haue made facile. 1600J. Pory tr. Leo's Africa ii. 149 Necromancers..their arte is exceeding difficult. 1608D. T. Ess. Pol. & Mor. 19 b, How difficult a thing it is, to love, and to be wise, and both at once. 1666Boyle Orig. Formes & Qual., The greatest and difficultest Changes. 1676–7Marvell Corr. cclxxv. (1872–5) II. 504 It is much difficulter for you to have obtained an injunction, than to retain it. 1751Johnson Rambler No. 172 ⁋14 Virtue is sufficiently difficult with any circumstances. 1799Kirwan Geol. Ess. 10 [Their] difficult solubility in water. 1860Motley Netherl. (1868) I. i. 1 It is difficult to imagine a more universal disaster. 1876Mozley Univ. Serm. ix. (1877) 195 Generosity to an equal is more difficult than generosity to an inferior.
b. of the object of an action. Const. inf. (now usually act., less freq. pass.), or with of or in before a noun expressing the action; also with the action contextually implied (= hard to pass, reach, produce, construct, or otherwise deal with.)
c1400Lanfranc's Cirurg. 99 To consowde olde woundes whiche þat ben difficult [MS. B. deffykel] to be consowded. Ibid. 105 Þe cheke be constreyned and difficulte of mevynge. 1509Hawes Past. Pleas. x. iv, If apparaunce Of the cause..Be hard and difficulte in the utteraunce. 1651Hobbes Leviath. iii. xxxvii. 233 The thing..is strange, and the naturall cause difficult to imagine. 1734tr. Rollins's Anc. Hist. (1827) VII. xvii. vii. 203 A river very difficult, as well in regard to its banks as to the marshes on the sides of it. 1749Fielding Tom Jones vii. vi, The real sentiments of ladies were very difficult to be understood. 1793Smeaton Edystone L. Ded. 4 A plain and simple building, that has nevertheless been acknowledged to be, in itself, curious, difficult, and useful. 1814Wordsw. Excursion v. 492 Knowledge..is difficult to gain. 1850McCosh Div. Govt. i. ii. (1874) 29 This is a difficult question to answer. 1860Tyndall Glac. i. viii 58 In some places I found the crevasses difficult. 1870Yeats Nat. Hist. Comm. 89 Markets are so difficult of access.
c. Hard to understand; perplexing, puzzling, obscure.
1556Aurelio & Isab. (1608) G vj, If youre difficulte speakinge overcome me. 1612Brinsley Lud. Lit. 46 The difficultest things in their Authours. 1661Boyle Style of Script. (1668) 53 Leaving out all such difficulter matters. 1858Buckle Civiliz. (1869) II. v. 217 Butler, one of the most difficult of our poets. 1885Bible (R.V.) Jer. xxxiii. 3 Great things, and difficult, which thou knowest not.
2. Of persons.
a. Hard to please or satisfy; not easy to get on with; unaccommodating, exacting, fastidious. In mod. use after F. difficile). Cf. difficile a. 3.
1589Puttenham Eng. Poesie i. xii. (Arb.) 44 To make him ambitious of honour, iealous and difficult in his worships. 1663Heath Flagellum or O. Cromwell (ed. 2) 7 Being in his own nature of a difficult disposition..and one that would have due distances observed towards him. 1734tr. Rollin's Anc. Hist. (1827) III. 32 Children were early accustomed not to be nice or difficult in their eating. 1773Goldsm. Stoops to Conq. i. i, I'll..look out for some less difficult admirer. 1855Thackeray Newcomes II. 87 My temper is difficult. 1889Lowell Walton Lit. Ess. (1891) 81 He [Cotton] also wrote verses which the difficult Wordsworth could praise. 1904Westm. Gaz. 20 Jan. 3/2 Lady Verona refers to her husband as ‘rather difficult’. 1929Times 2 Feb. 10/1 A letter from a ‘difficult’ customer. 1960J. Fingleton Four Chukkas 2 A touring team is infinitely better off without the ‘difficult’ player.
b. Hard to induce or persuade; unwilling, reluctant, obstinate, stubborn.
a1502in Arnolde Chron. (1811) 81 That such persones which were difficulte [printed difficultie] ageynst the sayd ordre be callid afore my Lorde Mayr and Aldirmen to be reformed bi their wise exortacions. c1645Howell Lett. i. vi. 8, I attended him also with the Note of your Extraordinaries, wherein I find him something difficult and dilatory yet. 1691Ray Creation i. (1701) 56 In particular I am difficult to believe, that [etc.]. 1749Fielding Tom Jones xiv. ii. Lady Bellaston will be as difficult to believe any thing against one who [etc.]. 1891L. Keith The Halletts I. xiii. 248 Sir Robert had been rather a difficult husband—that is to say, he had occasionally taken his own way.
▪ II. † difficult, n. Obs. rare.
[f. difficult a.]
Difficulty.
1709tr. Sir J. Spelman's Alfred Gt. 95 What Difficult ælfred had to recover the Land. Ibid. 118 bis, 120.
▪ III. ˈdifficult, v. Now local.
[a. obs. F. difficulter to make difficult, f. med.L. difficultāre, f. difficultās difficulty: see difficultate, difficilitate.]
†1. trans. To render difficult, impede (an action, etc.). The opposite of to facilitate. Obs.
a1608[see difficulting below]. 1678Temple Let. to Ld. Treasurer Wks. 1731 II. 506 Those which intended to difficult or delay the Ratification with France. a1698Ibid. II. 484 (L.), Having desisted from their pretensions, which had difficulted the peace. 1818Todd s.v. Difficultate, The late lord chancellor Thurlow was fond of using the verb difficult; as, he difficulted the matter; but he was pronounced unjustifiable in this usage.
2. To put in a difficulty, bring into difficulties, perplex, embarrass (a person). Usually pass. (Sc. and U.S.)
1686[see difficulting below]. 1713Wodrow Corr. (1843) I. 464, I would be difficulted to read the King of France ‘the most Christian king’ to my people. 1718Ibid. II. 410 How far the alterations..may straiten and difficult some ministers who have formerly sworn the oath. 1782J. Brown Address to Students (1858) 62 If you be difficulted how to act. 1813J. Ballantyne in Lockhart Ballantyne-humbug Handled (1839) 29 This business has always been..difficulted by all its capital..being lent the printing-office. 1845Bush Resurrection 51 (Bartlett) We are not difficulted at all on the score of the relation which the new plant bears to the old. 1861W. E. Aytoun N. Sinclair I. 155 The poor lads might be difficulted to find meal for their porridge.
Hence ˈdifficulting vbl. n. and ppl. a.
a1608Sir F. Vere Comm. 119 Lest..[this] might give the enemy an alarm, to the difficulting of the enterprise. 1686Renwick Serm. xviii. (1776) 212 There is not a case that can put Him to a non-plus or difficulting extremity. |