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Worse vs Wrest - What's the difference?

worse | wrest |

In obsolete|lang=en terms the difference between worse and wrest

is that worse is (obsolete) loss; disadvantage; defeat while wrest is (obsolete) active or motive power.

As verbs the difference between worse and wrest

is that worse is (obsolete|transitive) to make worse; to put at disadvantage; to discomfit while wrest is to pull or twist violently.

As nouns the difference between worse and wrest

is that worse is (obsolete) loss; disadvantage; defeat while wrest is the act of wresting; a wrench or twist; distortion.

As an adjective worse

is (bad).

As an adverb worse

is .

worse

English

Adjective

(head)
  • (bad)
  • Your exam results are worse than before.
    The harder you try, the worse you do.
  • More ill.
  • She was very ill last week but this week she’s worse .

    Derived terms

    * go from bad to worse * worse for wear

    Adverb

    (head)
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-07-19, author= Ian Sample
  • , volume=189, issue=6, page=34, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= Irregular bedtimes may affect children's brains , passage=Irregular bedtimes may disrupt healthy brain development in young children, according to a study of intelligence and sleeping habits.  ¶ Going to bed at a different time each night affected girls more than boys, but both fared worse on mental tasks than children who had a set bedtime, researchers found.}}
  • (ill).
  • Less skillfully.
  • More severely or seriously.
  • (sentence adverb) Used to start a sentence describing something that is worse.
  • Verb

    (wors)
  • (obsolete) To make worse; to put at disadvantage; to discomfit.
  • * (rfdate) Milton.
  • Weapons more violent, when next we meet, / May serve to better us and worse our foes.

    Statistics

    *

    Noun

  • (obsolete) Loss; disadvantage; defeat.
  • * Bible, Kings xiv. 12
  • Judah was put to the worse before Israel.
  • That which is worse; something less good.
  • Do not think the worse of him for his enterprise.
    (Webster 1913)

    Anagrams

    *

    wrest

    English

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To pull or twist violently.
  • To obtain by pulling or violent force.
  • He wrested the remote control from my grasp and changed the channel.
  • * Milton
  • Did not she / Of Timna first betray me, and reveal / The secret wrested from me
  • (figuratively) To seize.
  • * Macaulay
  • They instantly wrested the government out of the hands of Hastings.
  • * 1912 : (Edgar Rice Burroughs), (Tarzan of the Apes), Chapter 12
  • There was one of the tribe of Tarzan who questioned his authority, and that was Terkoz, the son of Tublat, but he so feared the keen knife and the deadly arrows of his new lord that he confined the manifestation of his objections to petty disobediences and irritating mannerisms; Tarzan knew, however, that he but waited his opportunity to wrest the kingship from him by some sudden stroke of treachery, and so he was ever on his guard against surprise.
  • (figuratively) To twist, pervert, distort.
  • * Bible, Exodus xxiii. 6
  • Thou shalt not wrest the judgment of thy poor.
  • * South
  • their arts of wresting , corrupting, and false interpreting the holy text
  • * 1597 , Shakespeare,
  • And, I beseech you,
    Wrest once the law to your authority;
    To do a great right do a little wrong,
    And curb this cruel devil of his will.
  • To tune with a wrest, or key.
  • Noun

    (en noun)
  • The act of wresting; a wrench or twist; distortion.
  • (Hooker)
  • (obsolete) Active or motive power.
  • (Spenser)
  • (music) A key to tune a stringed instrument.
  • * Sir Walter Scott
  • The minstrel wore round his neck a silver chain, by which hung the wrest , or key, with which he tuned his harp.
  • A partition in a water wheel by which the form of the buckets is determined.
  • Derived terms

    * wrest pin * wrest plank (Webster 1913)

    Anagrams

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