Word Direct Answers

What does "gentle" mean?

Gentle: Quiet and refined in manners; not rough, harsh, or stern; mild; meek; bland; amiable; tender; as, a gentle nature, temper, or disposition; a gentle manner; a gentle address; a gentle voice.

Additional senses

  1. 2.A compellative of respect, consideration, or conciliation; as, gentle reader. "Gentle sirs." "Gentle Jew." "Gentle servant." Shak.
  2. 3.Not wild, turbulent, or refractory; quiet and docile; tame; peaceable; as, a gentle horse.
  3. 4.Soft; not violent or rough; not strong, loud, or disturbing; easy; soothing; pacific; as, a gentle touch; a gentle gallop. "Gentle music." Sir J. Davies. O sleep! it is a gentle thing. Coleridge. The gentle craft, the art or trade of shoemaking. -- Gentle, Tame, Mild, Meek. Gentle describes the natural disposition; tame, that which is subdued by training; mild implies a temper which is, by nature, not easily provoked; meek, a spirit which has been schooled to mildness by discipline or suffering. The lamb is gentle; the domestic fowl is tame; John, the Apostle, was mild; Moses was meek.
  4. 5.One well born; a gentleman. [Obs.] Gentles, methinks you frown. Shak.
  5. 6.A trained falcon. See Falcon-gentil.
  6. 7.(Zoöl.) A dipterous larva used as fish bait.
  7. 8.To make genteel; to raise from the vulgar; to ennoble. [Obs.] Shak.
  8. 9.To make smooth, cozy, or agreeable. [R. or Poet.] To gentle life's descent, We shut our eyes, and think it is a plain. Young.
  9. 10.To make kind and docile, as a horse. [Colloq.]

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