dispense: [14] Dispense comes ultimately from Latin dispendere ‘weigh out’ (partial source of English spend). This was a compound verb formed from the prefix dis- ‘a(chǎn)way’ and pendere ‘weigh’, a relative of pendēre ‘hang’, from which English gets pendulum, pendant, and penthouse. It had a derivative, dispensāre, denoting repeated action: hence ‘pay out, distribute’, senses which passed into English via Old French dispenser. In medieval Latin dispensāre also came to mean ‘a(chǎn)dminister justice’, and hence ‘exempt, condone’; this was the source of the English usage dispense with ‘do without’. => pendulum, pendant, penthouse, spend
dispense (v.)
early 14c., from Old French dispenser "give out" (13c.), from Latin dispensare "disburse, administer, distribute (by weight)," frequentative of dispendere "pay out," from dis- "out" (see dis-) + pendere "to pay, weigh" (see pendant).
In Medieval Latin, dispendere was used in the ecclesiastical sense of "grant license to do what is forbidden or omit what is required" (a power of popes, bishops, etc.), and thus acquired a sense of "grant remission from punishment or exemption from law," hence "to do away with" (1570s), "do without" (c. 1600). Older sense is preserved in dispensary. Related: Dispensed; dispensing.
雙語例句
1. For two weeks, the cash machine was unable to dispense money.
該自動取款機已有兩個星期不能提供現(xiàn)金。
來自柯林斯例句
2. We'd dispense with charity drives.
我們將不再進行慈善捐款運動.
來自《簡明英漢詞典》
3. I can dispense with this dictionary.
我沒有這本詞典也行.
來自《現(xiàn)代英漢綜合大詞典》
4. It's all part of a conspiracy to dispense with the town centre all together and move everything out to Meadowhall.
徹底拋開市中心而把所有東西都搬到梅多霍爾購物中心,這完全是一場陰謀的一部分.
來自柯林斯例句
5. We cannot dispense with the idea of the speed of light.