| 释义 |
▪ I. boggle, v.|ˈbɒg(ə)l|
Also 6 buggell, 7 bogle.
[app. f. boggle, var. of bogle a spectre, (such as horses are reputed to see). In later times there has been a tendency to associate the word with bungle, which appears in sense 4, and in the derivatives.]
1. intr. To start with fright, to shy as a startled horse; to take alarm, be startled, scared at.
1598Chapman Iliad x. 420 They [steeds] should not with affright Boggle, nor snore. 1601Shakes. All's Well v. iii. 232 You boggle shrewdly, euery feather starts you. 1638Suckling Brennoralt iv. i. 35 Thou..boglest at every thing, foole. 1655W. Gurnall Chr. in Arm. xiv. 221/1 Balaam..spurs on his conscience (that boggl'd more than the Asse he rode on). 1678R. Lestrange Seneca's Mor. (1702) 426 We Boggle at our own Shadows, and Fright one another. 1769Wesley in Wks. (1872) III. 373 The shaft-horse then boggled and turned short toward the edge of the precipice. 1865M. E. Braddon Doctor's Wife x. 93 Boggling a little when she turned the corners.
2. To raise scruples, hesitate, demur, stickle (at, occas. about, over, etc., or to do a thing).
a1638Mede Wks. i. xxxvii. (1672) 202 A Sound and Loyal heart is not that which boggles and scruples at small sins. 1667Pepys Diary (1877) V. 241, I find the Parliament still bogling about the raising of this money. 1681J. Chetham Angler's Vade-m. xxxix. §13 (1689) 287 They would not bogle to give 1000 sesterces. 1692R. Lestrange Josephus' Ant. v. x. (1733) 125 He never shrunk or boggled for the matter. a1734North Exam. ii. iv. ⁋115 He boggled at first against testifying at all. 1798M. Wollstonecraft Posth. Wks. IV. lxviii. 8 Since you boggle about a mere form. 1868Browning Ring & Bk. ix. 1378 Nor do thou Boggle, oh parent, to return the grace. 1876Green Short Hist. vi. §6. 336 One, who was known to have boggled hard at the oath.
3. ‘To play fast or loose’ J.; to palter, quibble, equivocate.
a1613Overbury A Wife (1638) 219 He doth boggle very often. a1649Drummond of Hawthornden Skiamachia Wks. (1711) 199 Are ye not afraid to boggle thus with God Almighty? a1674Clarendon Hist. Reb. (1704) III. xi. 206 He boggled so much in his answer, that they would be of opinion that, etc. 1816Hazlitt Modern Apost., They have never sneaked nor shuffled, botched or boggled in their politics.
4. To fumble, bungle, make a clumsy attempt.
[1536Latimer Serm. & Rem. (1845) 373 If I have one there to help me, I shall do the more good; if not I shall buggell myself as well as I can.] 1853C. Auchester II. 9 He boggled at the lock for a minute or two, but at last admitted himself. 1880L. Stephen Pope vii. 169 He uses only one epithet, but it is the right one, and never boggles and patches.
†5. trans. To cause to hesitate, to scare. rare.
1663Flagellum or O. Cromwell (1672) 155 This bogled at first three quarters of them.
▸ trans. To confound, bewilder; to amaze, astound. Now chiefly in to boggle the mind: to be bewildering, astounding, or mentally overwhelming; cf. the mind boggles at mind n.1 19k.
1835W. G. Simms Partisan I. viii. 95 He contrived to boggle them continually in perpetual intricacies, each more difficult than the other. 1892R. L. Stevenson & L. Osbourne Wrecker ii. 45 The ocean might dry up, the rocks melt in the sun..and there was nothing in these incidents to boggle the philosopher. 1934V. Woolf Let. 15 Feb. (1979) V. 277 What Angelica will live to see boggles me. 1958N.Y. Times 8 Apr. 28 A few years ago the idea of a man-made star no bigger than a grapefruit tracking through space would have boggled the mind. 1983Black Perspective in Music 11 12 The multitude of magnificent vegetation draping the mountains took on a hue of colors that boggled the mind. 1992I. Rankin Strip Jack (1993) v. 108 The headline writers were boggled, trying to decide which order to put things in. 2000Daily Tel. (Nexis) 11 Apr. 36/5 The sums staked on the next generation of mobile phones continue to boggle the mind.
▪ II. boggle, n.|ˈbɒg(ə)l|
[f. prec. vb.]
1. The act of boggling as a horse. † to take boggle: to shy with fright, to take alarm.
1660G. Fleming Stemma Sacr. 30 They had taken boggle at some State overtures. 1824Craven Dial. 22 His skaddle tit, glentin its ee up at me, took boggle, maad a girt flounder, an ran back.
2. Demur, scruple, objection, difficulty, fuss; chiefly in to make boggle. Obs. or arch.
1667Pepys Diary (1879) IV. 459 The Dutch do make a further bogle with us about two or three things. 1768Tucker Lt. Nat. I. 140 The plain man makes no boggle at the ideas of creation, annihilation, or vacuity.
3. A bungle. boggle-de-botch, boggledy botch (colloq.): a complete bungle, a ‘mess’. See botch v. and n.
1834M. Edgeworth Helen xxvi, A fine boggle-de-botch I have made of it. 1841Gresley C. Lever 21 What a boggle he did make of it to be sure. 1862Sat. Rev. XIII. 121 Jones of the 43rd, who got into that boggle in Armenia.
▪ III. boggle
dialectal variant of bogle, goblin. |