Library / English Dictionary

CONFESS

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Admit (to a wrongdoing)

Example:

She confessed that she had taken the money

Synonyms:

concede; confess; profess

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Hypernyms (to "confess" is one way to...):

acknowledge; admit (declare to be true or admit the existence or reality or truth of)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "confess"):

fess up; make a clean breast of; own up (admit or acknowledge a wrongdoing or error)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s that CLAUSE

Derivation:

confession (a written document acknowledging an offense and signed by the guilty party)

confession (an admission of misdeeds or faults)

confessor (someone who confesses (discloses information damaging to themselves))

Sense 2

Meaning:

Confess to God in the presence of a priest, as in the Catholic faith

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Hypernyms (to "confess" is one way to...):

acknowledge; admit (declare to be true or admit the existence or reality or truth of)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Derivation:

confession ((Roman Catholic Church) the act of a penitent disclosing his sinfulness before a priest in the sacrament of penance in the hope of absolution)

confessor (a priest who hears confession and gives absolution)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Confess to a punishable or reprehensible deed, usually under pressure

Synonyms:

confess; fink; squeal

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Hypernyms (to "confess" is one way to...):

acknowledge; admit (declare to be true or admit the existence or reality or truth of)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s
Somebody ----s PP

Derivation:

confession (a written document acknowledging an offense and signed by the guilty party)

confession (an admission of misdeeds or faults)

confessor (someone who confesses (discloses information damaging to themselves))

Credits

 Context examples: 

"I do not know," I confessed.

(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)

I doubt; I fear; I think strange things, which I dare not confess to my own soul.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

We were compelled to confess that we never had.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

But really I never understood that you were at all connected with that family, and therefore I am a little surprised, I confess, at so serious an inquiry into her character.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

What would the knight have said had he confessed to his love for the Lady Maude?

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

“Did she know?—had she heard any thing about her, since their being at Randalls?—he felt much anxiety—he must confess that the nature of her complaint alarmed him considerably.”

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

My revenge is of no moment to you; yet, while I allow it to be a vice, I confess that it is the devouring and only passion of my soul.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

These particulars struck me, I confess, disagreeably; and as I followed him into the bright light of the consulting room, I kept my hand ready on my weapon.

(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

"I—have thought about them," Ruth confessed, remembering the wanton thoughts that had vexed her in the past, her face again red with maiden shame that she should be telling such things.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

But these measures, however good in themselves, were insufficient for the real extent of the evil, the whole of which Sir Walter found himself obliged to confess to her soon afterwards.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)