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Retract vs Tract - What's the difference?

retract | tract |

As verbs the difference between retract and tract

is that retract is to pull back inside while tract is to pursue, follow; to track.

As a noun tract is

an area or expanse.

retract

English

Verb

(en verb)
  • To pull back inside.
    • An airplane retracts its wheels for flight.
  • (ambitransitive) To draw back; to draw up.
    • Muscles retract after amputation.
    A cat can retract its claws.
  • To take back or withdraw something one has said.
    • I retract all the accusations I made about the senator and sincerely hope he won't sue me.
  • * Bishop Stillingfleet
    • I would as freely have retracted this charge of idolatry as I ever made it.
  • * Granville
    • She will, and she will not; she grants, denies, / Consents, retracts , advances, and then flies.
  • To take back, as a grant or favour previously bestowed; to revoke.
    • (Woodward)

    Synonyms

    * take back * withcall * withdraw

    See also

    * unsay * unspeak

    tract

    English

    Etymology 1

    From tractus, the perfect passive participle of (etyl) .

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • An area or expanse.
    • an unexplored tract of sea
  • * Milton
    • the deep tract of hell
  • * Addison
    • a very high mountain joined to the mainland by a narrow tract of earth
  • A series of connected body organs, as in the digestive tract .
  • A small booklet such as a pamphlet, often for promotional or informational uses.
  • A brief treatise or discourse on a subject.
  • * Jonathan Swift
    • The church clergy at that writ the best collection of tracts against popery that ever appeared.
  • A commentator's view or perspective on a subject.
  • Continued or protracted duration, length, extent
  • * Milton
    • improved by tract of time
  • * 1843 ,
    • Nay, in another case of litigation, the unjust Standard bearer, for his own profit, asserting that the cause belonged not to St. Edmund’s Court, but to his in , involved us in travellings and innumerable expenses, vexing the servants of St. Edmund for a long tract of time
  • Part of the proper of the liturgical celebration of the Eucharist for many Christian denominations, used instead of the alleluia during Lenten or pre-Lenten seasons, in a Requiem Mass, and on a few other penitential occasions.
  • (obsolete) Continuity or extension of anything.
    • the tract of speech
    (Older)
  • (obsolete) Traits; features; lineaments.
  • * Francis Bacon
    • The discovery of a man's self by the tracts of his countenance is a great weakness.
  • (obsolete) The footprint of a wild animal.
    • (Dryden)
  • (obsolete) Track; trace.
  • * Sir Thomas Browne
    • Efface all tract of its traduction.
  • * Shakespeare
    • But flies an eagle flight, bold, and forth on, / Leaving no tract behind.
  • (obsolete) Treatment; exposition.
    • (Shakespeare)
    Related terms
    * tractate noun

    Etymology 2

    From tractus , the participle stem of (etyl) trahere.

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • (obsolete) To pursue, follow; to track.
  • * 1590 , Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene , II.i:
    • Where may that treachour then (said he) be found, / Or by what meanes may I his footing tract ?
  • (obsolete) To draw out; to protract.
    • (Ben Jonson)
    English syncopic forms ----