| 释义 |
▪ I. brute, a. and n.1|bruːt|
Also 7 bruit(e.
[a. F. brut, fem. brute:—L. brūtus heavy, dull, irrational (Sp. bruto, It. bruto n.). Some of the senses are probably directly from, or at least influenced by, the Latin.]
A. adj. (Now often an attrib. use of the n.)
1. Of animals: Wanting in reason or understanding; chiefly in phrases brute beasts, the brute creation, = the ‘lower animals’.
c1460–70Bk. Quintessence 11 Fro fleisch of alle brute beestis. 1494Fabyan vii. ccxxii. 246 Great moreyne fell vpon brute bestes. 1580Lupton Siquila 55 More senselesse, than the senselest or brutest beast in the world. 1611Bible Pref. 1 Bruit-beasts led with sensualitie. 1613Withers Abuses Stript i. v. in Juvenilia (1633) 42 Viler than the brutest creature. 1667Milton P.L. x. 495 The brute Serpent in whose shape Man I deceav'd. 1703Rowe Fair Penit. iii. i, Whose bounteous Hand feeds the whole Brute Creation. 1732Berkeley Alciphr. i. §13 To degrade human-kind to a level with brute beasts. 1832Downes Lett. fr. Cont. Countries I. 46 Not a being, human or brute, appeared. 1849W. Irving Mahomed x. (1853) 59 The very brute animals were charmed to silence.
2. a. Of human beings, their actions, and attributes: Brute-like, brutish; dull, senseless, stupid; unintelligent, unreasoning, uninstructed; sensual.
1535T. Bedyl in Strype Eccl. Mem. I. ii. App. lv, I suppose many of the curates to be so brute, that they would read or speake every word, as it was written. a1618Sylvester Mem. Mortalitie ii. xxxix, Man (alas!) is bruter than a Brute. 1641Milton Ch. Govt. i. (1851) 100 Their owne brute inventions. 1645― Tetrach. (1851) 159 Which should preserve it in love and reason, and difference it from a brute conjugality. 1812Southey in Q. Rev. VIII. 321 The deplorable doctrines of brute materialism. 1870Bowen Logic viii. 238 A black skin is not an invariable sign of a brute intellect.
b. Rough, rude, wanting in sensibilty.
1555Fardle Facions ii. x. 210 Their behauour was in the beginning very brute. 1645Milton Colast. Wks. (1851) 373 As to this brute Libel. a1744Pope (J.) The brute philosopher, who ne'er has proved The joy of loving or of being loved.
3. a. Of things: Not possessing or connected with reason, intelligence, or sensation; irrational, unconscious, senseless; merely material; esp. in brute matter, brute force.
1540Morysine tr. Vives' Introd. Wisd. B v b, Nature, reason, and comlynes commaunde the sayde body to be subjecte as a thynge brute, to that that dyeth never. 1611J. Guillim Heraldry iii. v. 97 By brute natures I understand all essences..that are meerely void of life. 1646Evance Noble Ord. 37 Jehu, and Nebucadnezar weare but brute instruments to worke Gods purposes. 1692Bentley Boyle Lect. viii. 259 Brute inanimate Matter. 1712Blackmore Creation i. (1736) 6 Who..believe That the brute earth unguided should embrace The only..proper place. 1736Butler Anal. i. iii. 82 A tendency to prevail over brute force. 1836–7Sir W. Hamilton Metaph. (1877) I. ii. 36 The necessary results of a brute mechanism. 1860Adler Fauriel's Prov. Poetry xx. 455 Our Sanctuaries are nothing but brute stone, and still they weep. 1866Kingsley Herew. viii. 141 The land has been changed by the brute forces of nature.
†b. Of inarticulate sound.
c. Of thunder: = brutish 4. Obs.
1642Rogers Naaman 62 The workes alone are a brute sound, and have no tongue in them. 1656Cowley Davideis iv. (1669) 144 They [the curses] with brute sound, dissolv'd into the air. Ibid. 154 (note), Brute, That signified nothing. So Thunders from whence the Ancients could collect no Prognostications, were called Brute Thunders.
4. a. Of surfaces: Rugged; unpolished. rare.
1627Drayton Agincourt (1748) 7 The shire whose surface seems most brute, Darby. 1804Southey in Ann. Rev. II. 527 The value of the brute diamond. a1861T. Winthrop John Brent (1883) i. 6 The precious metal was to the brute mineral in the proportion of perhaps a hundred pin-heads to the ton.
b. brute fact, a crude, isolated, or unexplained fact.
1874G. H. Lewes Probl. Life & Mind I. v. 296 Science looks through the brute fact, to contemplate the Abstraction which gives it connection, significance. 1879W. James in Mind IV. 329 We discriminate between brute fact and explained fact. 1926A. E. Taylor Plato xvii. 455 Science..is always forced to retain some element of brute fact, the merely given, in its account of things. 1957Economist 21 Sept. 931/1 He refuses to accommodate the brute facts of historical development within a convenient but artificial pattern.
B. n.
1. a. One of the lower animals as distinguished from man: a brute creature.
1611Heywood Gold. Age i. i. Wks. 1874 III. 15 Worse then a bruit, for bruits preserue their own. 1667Milton P.L. viii. 441 My Image not imparted to the Brute. 1712Pope Spect. No. 408 ⁋4 Man seems to be placed as the middle Link between Angels and Brutes. 1724Watts Logic (1736) 91 Life..attributed to Plants, to Brutes, and to Men. a1876J. H. Newman Hist. Sk. I. i. iv. 164 Brutes..cannot invent, cannot progress.
b. The animal nature in man. (Cf. beast 1 c.)
1784Burns Stanzas in Prosp. Death 15 Again exalt the brute and sink the man.
2. A man resembling a brute in want of intelligence, cruelty, coarseness, sensuality, etc. Now (colloq.) often merely a strong term of reprobation or aversion, and sometimes extended to things.
1670Cotton Espernon iii. xi. 538 These Bruits incapable of Reason, were exasperated at the very name of Punishment. 1719De Foe Crusoe (1840) II. xiii. 278 The great fat brute thought it below him. 1722― Relig. Courtsh. i. iii. (1840) 117, I was a brute for living in that horrid manner. 1752Chesterfield Lett. III. ccxcii. 340 That northern Brute, the King of Sweden! 1766Anstey New Bath Guide viii. 49 Their Husbands, those Brutes..swear they will never set Foot here again. 1876Geo. Eliot Dan. Der. I. xii. 224 The brute of a cigar required relighting. 1878R. Broughton Cometh up as Flower viii. 80 He would be a pretty brute. 1885Mrs. Oliphant Madam I. v. 67 Women can't try their husbands for being brutes.
C. attrib. and comb., as brute-man, brute-minded, brute-mindedness, brute-shadow, brute-worship; † brute-beastish, brute-like adj. and adv.; brute-bastille (nonce-wd.), a menagerie; brute-buried a., buried like a brute.
1845Hood Monkey Mart. v, To look around upon this *brute-bastille.
1530Palsgr. 307/1 *Brute beestysshe..bruste.
1822Hood Lycus the Cent. 247 Let me utterly be *Brute-buried.
1813Byron Giaour 52 Man..should..trample, *brute-like, o'er each flower. 1862Lytton Str. Story II. 47 His brute-like want of sympathy with his kind.
1852Tupper Proverb. Philos. 296 Hath..the *brute-man more than instinct?
1843Carlyle Past & Pr. 271 Thou findest Ignorance, Stupidity, *Brute-mindedness, etc.
1822Hood Lycus the Cent. 123 Lest a *brute shadow should grow at my feet.
1738Warburton Div. Legat. I. 284 The Original of *Brute-worship.
▪ II. brute
obs. form of bruit n. and v. |