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Fade vs Decline - What's the difference?

fade | decline |

As verbs the difference between fade and decline

is that fade is while decline is .

As an adjective decline is

declined.

fade

English

(wikipedia fade)

Etymology 1

From (etyl) fade, fede, of uncertain origin. Compare (etyl) . See also (l).

Adjective

(en-adj)
  • (archaic) Strong; bold; doughty
  • Etymology 2

    From (etyl) fade, vad, .

    Adjective

    (er)
  • (archaic) Weak; insipid; tasteless; commonplace.
  • * Jeffery
  • Passages that are somewhat fade .
  • * De Quincey
  • His masculine taste gave him a sense of something fade and ludicrous.

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (golf) A golf shot that (for the right-handed player) curves intentionally to the right. See slice, hook, draw.
  • A haircut where the hair is short or shaved on the sides of the head and longer on top. See also high-top fade and low fade.
  • (slang) A fight
  • Verb

    (fad)
  • To become faded; to grow weak; to lose strength; to decay; to perish gradually; to wither, as a plant.
  • * Bible, Is. xxiv. 4
  • The earth mourneth and fadeth away.
  • To lose freshness, color, or brightness; to become faint in hue or tint; hence, to be wanting in color.
  • * Milton
  • flowers that never fade
  • * {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham)
  • , title=(The China Governess) , chapter=1 citation , passage=The half-dozen pieces […] were painted white and carved with festoons of flowers, birds and cupids. To display them the walls had been tinted a vivid blue which had now faded , but the carpet, which had evidently been stored and recently relaid, retained its original turquoise.}}
  • To sink away; to disappear gradually; to grow dim; to vanish.
  • The milkman's whistling faded into the distance.
  • * Addison
  • The stars shall fade away.
  • * Shakespeare
  • He makes a swanlike end, / Fading in music.
  • * 1856 : (Gustave Flaubert), (Madame Bovary), Part III Chapter XI, translated by Eleanor Marx-Aveling
  • A strange thing was that Bovary, while continually thinking of Emma, was forgetting her. He grew desperate as he felt this image fading from his memory in spite of all efforts to retain it. Yet every night he dreamt of her; it was always the same dream. He drew near her, but when he was about to clasp her she fell into decay in his arms.
  • To cause to fade.
  • Synonyms
    * decrease, wane, become smaller (sort out synonyms by senses)

    Anagrams

    * * ----

    decline

    English

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • Downward movement, fall.(rfex)
  • A sloping downward, e.g. of a hill or road.(rfex)
  • (senseid)A weakening.(rfex)
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2012-01
  • , author=Philip E. Mirowski , title=Harms to Health from the Pursuit of Profits , volume=100, issue=1, page=87 , magazine= citation , passage=In an era when political leaders promise deliverance from decline through America’s purported preeminence in scientific research, the news that science is in deep trouble in the United States has been as unwelcome as a diagnosis of leukemia following the loss of health insurance.}}
  • A reduction or diminution of activity.
  • *
  • It is also pertinent to note that the current obvious decline in work on holarctic hepatics most surely reflects a current obsession with cataloging and with nomenclature of the organisms—as divorced from their study as living entities.

    Antonyms

    * incline

    Verb

    (declin)
  • To move downwards, to fall, to drop.
  • To become weaker or worse.
  • To bend downward; to bring down; to depress; to cause to bend, or fall.
  • * Thomson
  • in melancholy deep, with head declined
  • * Spenser
  • And now fair Phoebus gan decline in haste / His weary wagon to the western vale.
  • To cause to decrease or diminish.
  • * Beaumont and Fletcher
  • You have declined his means.
  • * Burton
  • He knoweth his error, but will not seek to decline it.
  • To turn or bend aside; to deviate; to stray; to withdraw.
  • a line that declines from straightness
    conduct that declines from sound morals
  • * Bible, Psalms cxix. 157
  • Yet do I not decline from thy testimonies.
  • To refuse, forbear.
  • * Massinger
  • Could I decline this dreadful hour?
  • * , chapter=7
  • , title= The Mirror and the Lamp , passage=“[…] This is Mr. Churchill, who, as you are aware, is good enough to come to us for his diaconate, and, as we hope, for much longer; and being a gentleman of independent means, he declines to take any payment.” Saying this Walden rubbed his hands together and smiled contentedly.}}
  • To inflect for case, number and sometimes gender.
  • * Ascham
  • after the first declining of a noun and a verb
  • (by extension) To run through from first to last; to repeat like a schoolboy declining a noun.
  • (Shakespeare)
  • (American football) To reject a penalty against the opposing team, usually because the result of accepting it would benefit the non-penalized team less than the preceding play.
  • The team chose to decline the fifteen-yard penalty because their receiver had caught the ball for a thirty-yard gain.

    Derived terms

    * declension * declination