English Dictionary

FOOLISHLY

Pronunciation (US): Play  (GB): Play

IPA (US): 

 Dictionary entry overview: What does foolishly mean? 

FOOLISHLY (adverb)
  The adverb FOOLISHLY has 1 sense:

1. without good sense or judgmentplay

  Familiarity information: FOOLISHLY used as an adverb is very rare.


 Dictionary entry details 


FOOLISHLY (adverb)


Sense 1

Meaning:

Without good sense or judgment

Synonyms:

foolishly; unwisely

Context example:

He acted foolishly when he agreed to come

Antonym:

wisely (in a wise manner)

Pertainym:

foolish (devoid of good sense or judgment)


 Context examples 


It was the same good friend whose warning I had so foolishly rejected.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

I never wish to offend, but I am so foolishly shy, that I often seem negligent, when I am only kept back by my natural awkwardness.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

One day last week—on Thursday night, to be more exact—I found that I could not sleep, having foolishly taken a cup of strong café noir after my dinner.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Foolishly, in the past, he had conceived that all well-groomed persons above the working class were persons with power of intellect and vigor of beauty.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

All of us had an ample share of the treasure and used it wisely or foolishly, according to our natures.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

And he, for all his grey years and sage experience, behaved quite as puppyishly and even a little more foolishly.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

Supposing even that they had never become intimate friends; that she had never been admitted into Miss Fairfax's confidence on this important matter—which was most probable—still, in knowing her as she ought, and as she might, she must have been preserved from the abominable suspicions of an improper attachment to Mr. Dixon, which she had not only so foolishly fashioned and harboured herself, but had so unpardonably imparted; an idea which she greatly feared had been made a subject of material distress to the delicacy of Jane's feelings, by the levity or carelessness of Frank Churchill's.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

Each wanted to be first at drawing the water, and so they were in such a hurry that all let their pitchers fall into the well, and they stood very foolishly looking at one another, and did not know what to do, for none dared go home.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

Catherine trembled at the emphasis with which he spoke, and sat pale and breathless, in a most humble mood, concerned for his children, and detesting old chests; and the general, recovering his politeness as he looked at her, spent the rest of his time in scolding his daughter for so foolishly hurrying her fair friend, who was absolutely out of breath from haste, when there was not the least occasion for hurry in the world: but Catherine could not at all get over the double distress of having involved her friend in a lecture and been a great simpleton herself, till they were happily seated at the dinner-table, when the general's complacent smiles, and a good appetite of her own, restored her to peace.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

My blindness to what was going on, led me to act by them in a way that I must always be ashamed of, and I was very foolishly tempted to say and do many things which may well lay me open to unpleasant conjectures, but I have no other reason to regret that I was not in the secret earlier.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)



 Learn English with... Proverbs 
"If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen." (English proverb)

"Who knows to praise sure knows to insult." (Albanian proverb)

"First think, then speak." (Armenian proverb)

"Away from the eye, out of the heart." (Dutch proverb)



ALSO IN ENGLISH DICTIONARY:


© 2000-2023 AudioEnglish.org | AudioEnglish® is a Registered Trademark | Terms of use and privacy policy
Contact