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Languish vs Falter - What's the difference?

languish | falter |

As a verb languish

is to lose strength and become weak; to be in a state of weakness or sickness.

As a noun falter is

butterfly.

languish

English

Verb

(es)
  • To lose strength and become weak; to be in a state of weakness or sickness.
  • * Bible, 2 Esdras viii. 31
  • We do languish of such diseases.
  • To pine away in longing for something; to have low spirits, especially from lovesickness.
  • He languished without his girlfriend
  • To live in miserable or disheartening conditions.
  • He languished in prison for years
  • To be neglected; to make little progress, be unsuccessful.
  • The case languished for years before coming to trial.
  • (obsolete) To make weak; to weaken, devastate.
  • * 1815 , Jane Austen, Emma
  • He is an excellent young man, and will suit Harriet exactly: it will be an "exactly so," as he says himself; but he does sigh and languish , and study for compliments rather more than I could endure as a principal.
    (Tennyson)

    falter

    English

    Noun

    (-)
  • unsteadiness.
  • Verb

    (en verb)
  • To waver or be unsteady.
  • * Wiseman
  • He found his legs falter .
  • (ambitransitive) To stammer; to utter with hesitation, or in a weak and trembling manner.
  • * Byron
  • And here he faltered forth his last farewell.
  • * Milton
  • With faltering speech and visage incomposed.
  • To fail in distinctness or regularity of exercise; said of the mind or of thought.
  • * I. Taylor
  • Here indeed the power of disinct conception of space and distance falters .
  • To stumble.
  • (figuratively) To lose faith or vigor; to doubt or abandon (a cause).
  • *
  • And remember, comrades, your resolution must never falter .
  • To hesitate in purpose or action.
  • * Shakespeare
  • Ere her native king / Shall falter under foul rebellion's arms.
  • To cleanse or sift, as barley.
  • (Halliwell)

    References