These words refer to a humble, deferential, urgent or formal request for help. Plead may suggest a dignified humility, but in any case it stresses urgency: pleading for another chance. Even in legal uses, where it is now formalistic for any request or for a stating of position, as in pleading guilty. Beg is much more informal than plead and is devoid of legal application. Furthermore, it may join to the urgency implicit in plead a note not so much of humility as of abjectness: begging them at least to spare the lives of his children. In less extreme uses a sense of debasement may still be present, suggesting an insistent, continual harrying of someone who is in a position to grant a favour: begging hopelessly for another date; begging to be allowed to go outside and play.

Appeal may not always suggest as great an urgency as plead , but it suggests an even greater dignity, implying a request based on reference to moral imperatives: appealing to the crowd’s sense of fair play. Legally, it suggests a request, in the name of justice, the one’s objection be sustained or that a decision against one be reversed appealing to the judge for a ruling; appealing to a higher court. Beseech , entreat , implore , pray and supplicate are nearly synonymous terms which have great emotional power and suggest a very earnest appeal for aid. Usually the person or body appealed to has power to grant the request as a kind of indulgence without having to make major concessions. All may appear in widely differing contexts, although pray and supplicate would be used more in a religious sense: to pray for rescue; to supplicate the protection of the Almighty. Entreat and beseech are similar in meaning to beg but are much more formal; entreat carries the notion of persistence while beseech has a sense of greater desperation: He entreated them to make another effort; I beseech you for one more chance. Implore is like beseech but has not quite the same formality or archaic flavour and would be more commonly used for a desperate appeal : I implore your forgiveness. All these words are used hyperbolically when appeal , beg or even ask would be quite fitting.

Sue is seldom used intransitively in the legal sense and is extremely formal to the point to stuffiness in more ordinary contexts, except in some set phrases: sue for damages.