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MERCIFUL
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
(used conventionally of royalty and high nobility) gracious
Example:
our merciful king
Classified under:
Similar:
gracious (characterized by charm, good taste, and generosity of spirit)
Derivation:
mercifulness (a disposition to be kind and forgiving)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Showing or giving mercy
Example:
a merciful god
Classified under:
Also:
clement ((used of persons or behavior) inclined to show mercy)
compassionate (showing or having compassion)
soft (compassionate and kind; conciliatory)
humane (marked or motivated by concern with the alleviation of suffering)
kind (having or showing a tender and considerate and helpful nature; used especially of persons and their behavior)
Antonym:
merciless (having or showing no mercy)
Derivation:
mercifulness (leniency and compassion shown toward offenders by a person or agency charged with administering justice)
mercifulness (the feeling that motivates compassion)
Context examples:
But God is merciful and just, and knows your pain and your devotion to that dear Madam Mina.
(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)
But there have been times since, in my manhood, many times there have been, when I have thought, Is it possible, among the possibilities of hidden things, that in the sudden rashness of the child and her wild look so far off, there was any merciful attraction of her into danger, any tempting her towards him permitted on the part of her dead father, that her life might have a chance of ending that day?
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
With no material fault of temper, or difference of opinion, to prevent their being very good friends while their interests were the same, the sisters, under such a trial as this, had not affection or principle enough to make them merciful or just, to give them honour or compassion.
(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)
Great God! merciful God!
(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)
Everything supplied an amusement to the high glee of William's mind, and he was full of frolic and joke in the intervals of their higher-toned subjects, all of which ended, if they did not begin, in praise of the Thrush, conjectures how she would be employed, schemes for an action with some superior force, which (supposing the first lieutenant out of the way, and William was not very merciful to the first lieutenant) was to give himself the next step as soon as possible, or speculations upon prize-money, which was to be generously distributed at home, with only the reservation of enough to make the little cottage comfortable, in which he and Fanny were to pass all their middle and later life together.
(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)
