| 释义 |
spendthrift, n. (and a.)|ˈspɛndθrɪft|
Also 7 spend-thrift.
[f. spend v.1 + thrift n.1 Cf. the earlier dingthrift.]
1. One who spends money profusely or wastefully; one who wastes his patrimony by foolish or lavish expenditure; an improvident or extravagantly wasteful person (freq. connoting moral worthlessness).
1601Holland Pliny I. 246 What would he have cost our prodigal spendthrifts, if hee had been taken upon our coasts neere Rome? 1670Dryden Conq. Granada i. i, Thus, as some fawning Usurer does feed With present Sums th'unwary Spendthrift's Need. 1750Johnson Rambler No. 53 ⁋9 Little satisfaction will be given to the Spendthrift by the encomiums which he purchases. 1776Adam Smith W.N. iv. i. (1904) II. 11 This complaint..of the scarcity of money, is not always confined to improvident spendthrifts. 1852Thackeray Esmond i. xiv, If I fall,..there will only be a spendthrift the less to keep in the world. 1864Bowen Logic ix. 278 An instance of the former is what may be called the Spendthrift's Fallacy.
transf.1860Emerson Cond. Life, Fate Wks. (Bohn) II. 324 Nature is no spendthrift, but takes the shortest way to her ends.
2. transf. One who employs or uses something lavishly or profusely; a prodigal consumer, user up, or waster, of something.
1610Shakes. Temp. ii. i. 23 Fie, what a spend-thrift is he of his tongue. 1654Whitlock Zootomia 302 But the Debaucht burner out of his dayes..is an undoubted Spend-thrift of time. 1742Young Nt. Th. ii. 273 Thus, with indulgence most severe, she treats Us spendthrifts of inestimable time. 1825J. Neal Bro. Jonathan III. 297, I have been a prodigal of my best affections; a foolish prodigal—a spendthrift. 1890Spectator 25 Jan., How can a man be proud of his genius without dreading that he may prove a spendthrift of that genius instead of its skilful almoner?
3. attrib. passing into adj.
a. Acting as or like, having the qualities of, a spendthrift.
1607Tourneur Rev. Trag. i. i, Within the spend-thrift veynes of a drye Duke. 1647R. Stapylton Juvenal 109 Spend-thrift Fabius,..who in his youth spent his estate, and was thence surnamed the Gulfe or (as our word is) the Spend⁓thrift. a1704T. Brown Walk round Lond., Coffee-Houses Wks. 1709 III. iii. 40 The Spendthrift Officers. 1834Lytton Pompeii i. i, These rich plebeians are a harvest for us spend⁓thrift nobles.
fig.1830Galt Lawrie T. v. ii. (1849) 194 The common wee spendthrift fiddle.
b. Characterized or marked by excessive or improvident expenditure; wasteful.
1790Burke Fr. Rev. 234 Had you no way of turning the revenue to account, but through the improvident resource of a spendthrift sale? 1838Lytton Leila iv. v, The spend⁓thrift violence of the mob was restrained. 1886W. J. Tucker E. Europe vii, As the money-lender is an inevitable figure, where habits are spendthrift and bankruptcy imminent.
Hence ˈspendˌthriftism, the state or quality of being spendthrift. ˈspendˌthrifty a., prodigal or wasteful in expenditure.
1642D. Rogers Naaman 611 For their spend-thrifty, uncleane and ruffianlike courses. 1862T. C. Grattan Beaten Paths I. 30 The Irish..felt a poor pride in acting down to the degrading level of spendthriftism and bullying. |