| 词组 | assay, essay |
| 释义 | assay, essay Copperud 1970, 1980 tells us these verbs are sometimes confused; the Oxford American Dictionary warns us against confusing them; Shaw 1975 exhibits the differences. Fowler 1926 says that the two verbs tend to be differentiated, and we think his summing-up of the situation comes very close to the truth. Assay is usually used in the sense of "test, evaluate" and essay in the sense "try, attempt." The differentiation, to use Fowler's word, is not complete, however. The two verbs are etymologically the same; one of the earliest senses of assay was "try, attempt": • And when Saul was come to Jerusalem, he assayed to join himself to the disciples —Acts 9:26 (AV), 1611 • ... assayed • To stanch the blood—John Dryden, Stanzas on Oliver Cromwell, 1658 This older variant still occasionally is used in current English: • ... the most versatile writer that has ever assayed to use the dialect —Henry Hess Reichard, in The Pennsylvania Germans, ed. Ralph Wood, 1942 • ... has assayed to penetrate a field that by its very nature requires consummate skill —John W. Chase, N. Y. Times Book Rev., 25 July 1954 • How they accomplished this was a mystery, for they would draw the canvas curtains about his bed before they assayed such a task —Bette Howland, Commentary, August 1972 But essay is the more usual spelling for the "try" sense. We would suggest that you use essay to avoid puzzling your readers. Here are a couple of the more usual uses of assay in its figurative application: • ... she would walk to the full-length mirror and assay herself —Mary McCarthy, New Yorker, 23 Mar. 1957 • ... I try to assay the man's or woman's importance —Alden Whitman, Saturday Rev., 11 Dec. 1971 |
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