| 词组 | sure, surely |
| 释义 | sure, surely The adverbs sure and surely are both reasonably old; surely is about a century earlier than sure. The OED evidence of early use shows both words occurring in the same senses, but over the centuries they have diverged. For instance, one of the chief uses of surely is persuasive; it is used with a statement that the speaker or writer is trying to get the hearer or reader to agree with. As recently as the 18th century, both adverbs could be used in this way: • Surely nothing is more reproachful to a being endowed with reason, than to resign its powers to the influence of the air —Samuel Johnson, The Idler, 24 June 1758 • ... the most undeserving people in the world must sure have the vanity to wish somebody had a regard for them —Thomas Gray, letter, 20 Dec. 1735 And both adverbs were also once used in the sense "without doubt, certainly," as by John Milton: • ... but he shall surely be put to death —Eikono-klastes, 1649 • God sure esteems the growth and completing of one virtuous person —Areopagitica, 1644 But during the 19th and 20th centuries the use of adverbial sure dropped off in mainstream British English, except in a few fixed phrases like sure enough and as sure as. Sure continued in use in the outlying forms of English, such as Scottish English, Irish English, and American English. In Irish English, sure and surely seem to have remained more or less interchangeable into the 20th century. Here is James Stephens, for instance: • "I never ate cheese," said Seumas. "Is it good?" "Surely it is," replied Pan—The Crock of Gold, 1912 • "Let me sit here for a while and play with the little dog, sir," said she, "sure the roads do be lonesome " — The Crock of Gold, 1912 In American English adverbial sure came under attack around the end of the 19th century (the earliest criticism we have found is in Scheie de Vere 1872) and continued into the early 20th century, when Vizetelly 1906 and Bierce 1909 spearheaded the attack. The assault has continued vigorously in the years since, especially in schoolbooks and college handbooks. But the long-continued attack on sure has not driven it out of use; to the contrary, adverbial sure is probably now better established in speech and in general writing than ever. Its uses are, however, clearly differentiated from those of surely. Sure is used in less formal contexts, on the whole, than surely. It is used as a simple intensifier—mostly (at least in our recent evidence) as an intensifier of verbs rather than adjectives. • A Time gal phoned me to see if I still stuck to a quote of mine she found in the Time clips.... I told her I sure did stick to it —James Thurber, letter, 9 July 1959 • You ought to write an article on Iris Murdoch.... I sure wish you would —Flannery O'Connor, letter, 27 May 1961 • ... on condition that I did not mention religion or sex. That sure cramped my style —A. S. Neill, Neill! Neill! Orange Peel!, 1972 • I can never know how much I bored her, but, be certain, she sure amused me —Norman Mailer, N. Y. Times Mag., 18 Apr. 1982 Sure is used in affirmation: • Q. Do you just take it from what you read? A. Sure, you can get a lot of it. That's a very good way to learn the craft of writing —William Faulkner, 6 May 1957, in Faulkner in the University, 1959 • Sure, it's escape music, and what's wrong with that? —Nat Hentoff, Cosmopolitan, April 1976 As a strong intensifier, sure is used when the writer or speaker expects the reader or hearer to agree: • 'Images' sure don't reflect! —George Wald, in Harper 1975, 1985 • Well, he's sure not following out your orders, if that's the case —John Erlichman, 17 Apr. 1973, quoted in The Presidential Transcripts, 1974 • Scientists are really careful when digging the bones out of the ground, but the bandits sure aren't —Sallie Luther, Ranger Rick, April 1985 • The Iranians sure have a way of bringing out the worst in us —Meg Greenfield, Newsweek, 29 Dec. 1986 And sure is regularly used in the same phrases that survive in British English—sure enough, as sure as, sure as: • ... I said, 'That son of a bitch is gonna run against me,' and sure enough I was right —Harry S. Truman, quoted in Merle Miller, Plain Speaking, 1973 • I knew it was for me as sure as I knew my own face in the mirror —E. L. Doctorow, Loon Lake, 1979 • It's a moot point whether politicians are less venal than in Twain's day. But they're sure as the devil more intrusive —Alan Abelson, Barron's, 8 May 1972 • But we all looked like that. I sure as hell did —Maurice Sendak, N.Y. Times Book Rev., 8 May 1983 Surely, in American English, tends to be used in somewhat more elevated styles than sure. It too can be used as an intensive: • I surely don't want to leave the impression that I had an unhappy childhood —Edward C. Welsh, quoted in Current Biography, January 1967 • I don't want you to get the wrong impression and I'm surely not talking about a sick cat or kitten — Susie Page, Cats Mag., October 1983 Surely is less positive, more diffident, or more neutral than sure. Its use suggests that the writer or speaker is not altogether confident that the reader or hearer will agree; the tone may be speculative or hopeful or persuasive: • This kind of derogatory remark, if persisted in by one or both parties to a marriage, will surely lead to divorce—James Thurber, Thurber Country, 1953 • ... it would surely be possible, within a few years, to program a computer to construct a grammar from a large corpus of data —Noam Chomsky, Columbia Forum, Spring 1968 • ... the worst sort of empty rant, all the more so because Wolfe himself surely knew better —William Styron, This Quiet Dust and Other Writings, 1982 • But surely a book on the avant-garde cannot be so conventional in philosophy —Karl Shapiro, Los Angeles Times Book Rev., 15 Apr. 1971 • As my reader has surely heard if he is tuned in to literary events —Mary McCarthy, Occasional Prose, 1985 • Webster's 10th Collegiate surely will include it — James J. Kilpatrick, Mayville (Ky.) Ledger-Independent, 25 Aug. 1984 • Surely if they have any real bona fides they can get a visa in Tehran —Robert C. McFarlane, quoted in The Tower Commission Report, 1987 In present-day American English, then, adverbial sure and surely are not used in quite the same contexts or for quite the same purposes, even though they share the same meanings. |
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