Difficulty
['dɪfɪk(ə)ltɪ] or ['dɪfɪkəlti]
Definition
(noun.) the quality of being difficult; 'they agreed about the difficulty of the climb'.
(noun.) a factor causing trouble in achieving a positive result or tending to produce a negative result; 'serious difficulties were encountered in obtaining a pure reagent'.
(noun.) a condition or state of affairs almost beyond one's ability to deal with and requiring great effort to bear or overcome; 'grappling with financial difficulties'.
Typist: Nelly--From WordNet
Definition
(n.) The state of being difficult, or hard to do; hardness; arduousness; -- opposed to easiness or facility; as, the difficulty of a task or enterprise; a work of difficulty.
(n.) Something difficult; a thing hard to do or to understand; that which occasions labor or perplexity, and requires skill and perseverance to overcome, solve, or achieve; a hard enterprise; an obstacle; an impediment; as, the difficulties of a science; difficulties in theology.
(n.) A controversy; a falling out; a disagreement; an objection; a cavil.
(n.) Embarrassment of affairs, especially financial affairs; -- usually in the plural; as, to be in difficulties.
Editor: Mamie
Synonyms and Synonymous
n. [1]. Arduousness.[2]. Obstacle, impediment, bar, obstruction, barrier, hinderance, trouble, perplexity, exigency, trial, dilemma, embarrassment, emergency, pinch, pickle, stand, dead-set, set fast, dead-lock, dead-stand, stand-still, horns of a dilemma, up-hill work, sea of troubles, peck of troubles, hard row to hoe, hard nut to crack.
Checker: Wilbur
Synonyms and Antonyms
[See DIFFICULT]
Checker: Mitchell
Unserious Contents or Definition
This dream signifies temporary embarrassment for business men of all classes, including soldiers and writers. But to extricate yourself from difficulties, foretells your prosperity. For a woman to dream of being in difficulties, denotes that she is threatened with ill health or enemies. For lovers, this is a dream of contrariety, denoting pleasant courtship.
Inputed by Emilia
Examples
- The difficulty in distinguishing variable species is largely due to the varieties mocking, as it were, other species of the same genus. Charles Darwin. On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection.
- For these all follow the general principle, and having found that, we shall have no difficulty in discovering them. Plato. The Republic.
- There will be no difficulty about this affair, Alexandros? Fergus Hume. The Island of Fantasy.
- I understand the difficulty there is in your vindicating yourself. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- But here there was the difficulty of finding room, so many things having been taken in beforehand. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- You're very right, Sir,' interposed Ben Allen, just awake enough to know that he had spent his thousand pounds without the smallest difficulty. Charles Dickens. The Pickwick Papers.
- Enough then of the perfect State, and of the man who bears its image--there is no difficulty in seeing how we shall describe him. Plato. The Republic.
- The surplus water is best removed by centrifugal pumps, since sand and sticks which would clog the valves of an ordinary pump are passed along without difficulty by the rotating wheel. Bertha M. Clark. General Science.
- I said nothing about this difficulty until Sir Percival had been consulted on the subject of the desired delay. Wilkie Collins. The Woman in White.
- This made a difficulty. Jane Austen. Emma.
- One side of the window was open, which I understand was quite usual in the summer-time, and he passed without difficulty into the room. Arthur Conan Doyle. The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes.
- His solution of this difficulty was a relay system. Rupert S. Holland. Historic Inventions.
- Getting another boy with difficulty to volunteer, he launched out on his errand in the pitch-black night. Frank Lewis Dyer. Edison, His Life and Inventions.
- The freedom of choice which this allows him, is therefore much greater, and the difficulty of his task much more diminished, than at first appears. Walter Scott. Ivanhoe.
- We had enormous orders and little money, and had great difficulty to meet our payrolls and buy supplies. Frank Lewis Dyer. Edison, His Life and Inventions.
- Difficulties arise when we try to apply this wisdom in the present. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
- Seriously hoping that all our difficulties may be settled without the loss of another life, I subscribe myself, etc. Ulysses S. Grant. Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant.
- To avoid difficulties it is always us who do it. Hemingway, Ernest. For Whom The Bell Tolls.
- I am too ardent in execution, and too impatient of difficulties. Mary Shelley. Frankenstein_Or_The Modern Prometheus.
- And by reason of the employment of such vision in the past, Edison is now able to see quite clearly through the forest of difficulties after eliminating them one by one. Frank Lewis Dyer. Edison, His Life and Inventions.
- People make much more of their difficulties than they need to do. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- Men began to doubt whether the new engine could ever be made to accomplish what Watt claimed for it, but although he realized the difficulties the inventor would not allow himself to doubt. Rupert S. Holland. Historic Inventions.
- You must begin your improvements on this house, observed Elinor, and your difficulties will soon vanish. Jane Austen. Sense and Sensibility.
- Turning to geographical distribution, the difficulties encountered on the theory of descent with modification are serious enough. Charles Darwin. On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection.
- I explain very carefully so that you understand and that you understand all of the possible difficulties and the importance. Hemingway, Ernest. For Whom The Bell Tolls.
- Lydgate's odious humors and their neighbors' apparent avoidance of them had an unaccountable date for her in their relief from money difficulties. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- He had confessed a taste for the pursuit of love under difficulties; here was full gratification for that taste. Charlotte Bronte. Villette.
- The father of one of his students was engaged in the manufacture of alcohol from beetroot sugar, and Pasteur came to be consulted when difficulties arose in the manufacturing process. Walter Libby. An Introduction to the History of Science.
- Having got over my difficulties with the ladies, I found more difficulties waiting for me when I went back to my own room. Wilkie Collins. The Moonstone.
- But on Friday night he must be in town, having a Ladies' Charity, in difficulties, waiting to consult him on Saturday morning. Wilkie Collins. The Moonstone.
Inputed by Enoch