| 释义 |
significancy|sɪgˈnɪfɪkənsɪ|
[See prec. and -ancy.]
1. The quality of being highly significant or expressive; expressiveness.
c1595Carew Excell. Eng. Tongue in G. G. Smith Eliz. Crit. Ess. II. 286 What soeuer tongue will gaine the race of perfection must runn on those fower wheeles, Significancye, Easynes, Copiousnes, & Sweetnes. Ibid. 288 Neither maye I omitt the significancy of our prouerbes, concise in wordes but plentifull in number. 1641J. Jackson True Evang. T. ii. 142 It is of brave significancy to expresse the..cleansing quality of Christs blood. 1697Dryden Virg. Postscr. to Rdr., Antiquated words..are never to be reviv'd, but when Sound or Significancy is wanting in the present Language. 1709Berkeley Th. Vision §125 By the clearness and significancy of what he says. 1712Swift Let. Eng. Tongue Wks. 1751 IV. 241 Dunces of Figure, who had Credit enough to give rise to some New Word,..tho' it had neither Humour nor Significancy. 1824Coleridge Aids Refl. (1848) I. 301 Though its own beauty, simplicity, and natural significancy had pleaded less strongly in its behalf. 1847C. Brontë J. Eyre xvii, ‘I will tell you in your private ear,’ replied she, wagging her turban three times with portentous significancy. 1871J. R. Macduff Mem. Patmos xii. 162 This interpretation is brought out with greater force and significancy in the verse which follows.
2. The quality of being significant, of having a meaning or import.
1631J. Burges Answ. Rejoined, Lawfuln. Kneeling 53 Significancy maketh a Ceremony to bee evill. 1672Marvell Reh. Transp. i. 247 The imposing of a significant Ceremony, is no more than to impose significancy upon a word. 1707Norris Treat. Humility vii. 273 As there is significancy in motion, so there are some passions which motion only can speak. 1754Edwards Freed. Will ii. x. (1762) 96 Again (if Language is of any Significancy at all) if Motives excite Volition, then they are the Cause of its being excited. 1816J. Gilchrist Philos. Etym. 23 As there is a relation between these two methods of significancy, the one may be employed to explain the other. 1850Blackie æschylus II. 296 The significancy of a name affords of itself no presumption against its historical reality.
b. The meaning or import (of something).
1641J. Jackson True Evang. T. i. 50 If we withall take the word Martyr in the fullest importance and significancy of the word. 1668Howe Blessedness Righteous (1825) 6 The word..hath the significancy we here give it. 1774Chesterfield's Lett. (1792) I. Advt. p. xi, They are so varied and their significancy thrown into..so many different lights, that they could not be altered. 1786–1805H. Tooke Purley (1829) I. 40 The right use, significancy, and force of all words except the names of Ideas. 1840Blackw. Mag. XLVII. 153 These symbols had lost their significancy to the mob. 1866Candlish 1st Ep. St. John xv. 167 Such is the import and significancy of the proposition that Jesus is the Christ.
†c. A significant thing. Obs.
1635–56Cowley Davideis iv. Note 28 That Oyl mixt with any other liquor, still gets uppermost, is perhaps one of the chiefest Significancies in the Ceremony of Anointing Kings and Priests.
3. Importance, consequence.
1679in Somers' Tracts I. 75 Of what little Significancy the Resolves of the Council..are to the imposing a Supreme Ruler upon the Nation. 1712Addison Spect. No. 317 ⁋2 They are neither missed in the Commonwealth, nor lamented by private Persons. Their Actions are of no Significancy to Mankind. 1753Hanway Trav. (1762) I. Ded. p. viii, This opinion of our own significancy will however be corrected by the judgment of the public. 1847S. Austin Ranke's Hist. Ref. III. 71 Zwingli..kept mainly in view the practical significancy of scripture as a whole. 1864J. H. Newman Apol. ii. (1904) 39/1 Men on either side..attached no significancy to the fact. |