| 释义 |
sycophancy|ˈsɪkəfənsɪ, -fænsɪ|
[ad. L. sȳcophantia, a. Gr. σῡκοϕαντία, f. σῡκοϕάντης sycophant.]
The practice or quality of a sycophant.
1. The trade or occupation of an informer; calumnious accusation, tale-bearing. Now only in Gr. Hist.: see next, 1.
1622Bp. Hall Contempl., N.T. iii. iv, It was hard to hold that seat [sc. the publican's] without oppression, without exaction: One that best knew it, branded it with poling, and sycophancy. 1721Bailey, Sycophancy..false Dealing, false Accusation, Tale-bearing. 1808Mitford Hist. Greece xxi. §1. III. 18 That evil which, with the name of Sycophancy, so peculiarly infested Athens. 1850Grote Greece ii. lxv. (1862) V. 562 Men (says Xenophon) whom every one knew to live by making calumnious accusations (called Sycophancy).
2. Mean or servile flattery; the character of a mean or servile flatterer.
1657Trapp Comm. Esther iii. 1 Whether it was also by flattery or sycophancy..that Haman had insinuated himself into the Kings favour. 1742Richardson Pamela (1824) I. xcv. 472 The child will reject with sullenness all the little sycophancies that are made to it. 1821Syd. Smith Wks. (1867) I. 338 Abject political baseness and sycophancy. 1860Mill Repr. Govt. (1865) 67/1 The people, like the despot, is pursued with adulation and sycophancy. 1873Dixon Two Queens IV. xxii. ix. 225 Neither of these critics had the sycophancy to approve his lines. |