What is the difference between breathe and breath?
breathe | breath | Related terms |
To draw air into (inhale), and expel air from (exhale), the lungs in order to extract oxygen and excrete waste gases.
To take in needed gases and expel waste gases in a similar way.
:Fish have gills so they can breathe underwater.
To use (a gas) to sustain life.
:While life as we know it depends on oxygen, scientists have speculated that alien life forms might breathe chlorine or methane.
Figuratively, to live.
:I will not allow it, as long as I still breathe .
*(rfdate) Shakespeare
*:I am in health, I breathe .
*(rfdate) Sir Walter Scott
*:Breathes there a man with soul so dead?
To draw something into the lungs.
:Try not to breathe too much smoke.
To expel air from the lungs, exhale.
:If you breathe on a mirror, it will fog up.
To pass like breath; noiselessly or gently; to emanate; to blow gently.
:The wind breathes through the trees.
*(rfdate) Shakespeare
*:The air breathes upon us here most sweetly.
*(rfdate) Byron
*:There breathes a living fragrance from the shore.
To give an impression of, to exude.
:The decor positively breathes classical elegance.
To whisper quietly.
:He breathed the words into her ear, but she understood them all.
To exchange gases with the environment.
:Garments made of certain new materials breathe well and keep the skin relatively dry during exercise.
To rest; to stop and catch one's breath.
*:
*:Thenne they lasshed to gyder many sad strokes / & tracyd and trauercyd now bakward / now sydelyng hurtlyng to gyders lyke two bores / & that same tyme they felle both grouelyng to the erthe / Thus they fought styll withoute ony reposynge two houres and neuer brethed
*(rfdate) Shakespeare
*:Well! breathe awhile, and then to it again!
To stop, to give (a horse) an opportunity to catch its breath.
:At higher altitudes you need to breathe your horse more often.
(lb) The act or process of breathing.
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*:Breezes blowing from beds of iris quickened her breath with their perfume; she saw the tufted lilacs sway in the wind, and the streamers of mauve-tinted wistaria swinging, all a-glisten with golden bees; she saw a crimson cardinal winging through the foliage, and amorous tanagers flashing like scarlet flames athwart the pines.
(lb) A single act of breathing in or out.
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*
*:Serene, smiling, enigmatic, she faced him with no fear whatever showing in her dark eyes.She put back a truant curl from her forehead where it had sought egress to the world, and looked him full in the face now, drawing a deep breath which caused the round of her bosom to lift the lace at her throat.
*'>citation
*:She knew from avalanche safety courses that outstretched hands might puncture the ice surface and alert rescuers. She knew that if victims ended up buried under the snow, cupped hands in front of the face could provide a small pocket of air for the mouth and nose. Without it, the first breaths could create a suffocating ice mask.
(lb) Air expelled from the lungs.
:
(lb) A rest or pause.
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A small amount of something, such as wind, or common sense.
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(lb) Fragrance; exhalation; odor; perfume.
:(Tennyson)
*(Francis Bacon) (1561-1626)
*:the breath of flowers
(lb) Gentle exercise, causing a quicker respiration.
*(William Shakespeare) (c.1564–1616)
*:an after dinner's breath
