| 释义 |
chance-medley|ˌtʃɑːnsˈmɛdlɪ, -æ-|
[a. AF. chance medlée mixed or mingled chance or casualty: see chance; medler is a var. of mesler to mix, mingle: see meddle. From the fact that medley is also a n., and chance medley a possible combination in the sense of ‘fortuitous medley’, the meaning has often been mistaken, and the expression misused.]
1. Law. Accident or casualty not purely accidental, but of a mixed character. Chiefly in manslaughter by chance-medley (for which later writers often use chance-medley itself): ‘the casual killing of a man, not altogether without the killer's fault, though without an evil intent; homicide by misadventure; homicide mixt’ (Cowel).
1494Fabyan vii. 499 Sir Thomas de Agorne..was by Chaunce medley slayne of a Bryton knyght. 1530–1Act 22 Hen. VIII, xiv, Sayntuary for that..offence of..manslaughter by chaunce medly. 1546Langley Pol. Verg. De Invent. iii. viii. 74 b, That had doen any murther unware or by chauncemedly. 1577Holinshed Chron. II. 74 William Rufus..received his deaths wound by casualtie or chancemedlie. 1581J. Bell Haddon's Answ. Osor. 390 If a man had committed manslaughter by chauncemedley. 1620J. Wilkinson Treat. Coroners & Sherifes 9 To put a difference betweene homicide by chaunce-medley and murder. 1631J. Taylor (Water P.) Turn Fort. Wheel (1848) Pref., Is hap turn'd haples, or is chance chance medly? 1670Blount Law Dict., Manslaughter..differs from Murder, because it is not done with foregoing malice; and from Chancemedley, because it has a present intent to kill. 1742Lond. Mag. 359 The Jury found it Chance Medley. 1855G. Brimley Ess. 80 Why does..Hamlet after murdering Polonius die by chancemedley?
b. fig.
1642Fuller Holy & Prof. St. iii. ii. 155 If without thine intention..by chancemedly thou hittest Scripture in ordinary discourse, yet fly to the city of refuge, and pray to God to forgive thee. a1745Swift Wks. (1841) II. 116 By mere chance-medley shot his own fortune dead with a single text.
2. Inadvertency, haphazard or random action, into which chance largely enters. (Erroneously put for ‘pure chance’, and for ‘a fortuitous medley or confusion’.)
1583Fulke Defence vii. 319 You make them in the case of chance medley, that have translated ‘sheol’ a grave. 1645Milton Tetrach. (1851) 213 This is true in the generall right of marriage, but not in the chance medley of every particular match. 1785Cowper Tirocin. 858 Whom thou wilt chuse..Is all chance-medley and unknown to me. 1849F. B. Head Stokers & P. viii. (1851) 72 The strange chance⁓medley of objects before us. 1875Jowett Plato (ed. 2) IV. 70 Left to the guidance of unreason and chance medley.
3. attrib.
1822W. Irving Braceb. Hall xxvii. 247 Having been handled rather roughly..in the chance-medley affair of May-day. 1844Disraeli Coningsby iii. ii. 93 Such lax, chance-medley maxims. 1853Sir J. Herschel Pop. Lect. Sc. iv. §22 (1873) 159 By a simple chance-medley confusion. |