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Webster 1913 Edition

Please

Please

,
Verb.
T.
[
imp. & p. p.
Pleased
;
p. pr. & vb. n.
Pleasing
.]
[OE.
plesen
, OF.
plaisir
, fr. L.
placere
, akin to
placare
to reconcile. Cf.
Complacent
,
Placable
,
Placid
,
Plea
,
Plead
,
Pleasure
.]
1.
To give pleasure to; to excite agreeable sensations or emotions in; to make glad; to gratify; to content; to satisfy.
I pray to God that it may
plesen
you.
Chaucer.
What next I bring shall
please
thee, be assured.
Milton.
2.
To have or take pleasure in; hence, to choose; to wish; to desire; to will.
Whatsoever the Lord
pleased
, that did he.
Ps. cxxxv. 6.
A man doing as he wills, and doing as he
pleases
, are the same things in common speech.
J. Edwards.
3.
To be the will or pleasure of; to seem good to; – used impersonally.
“It pleased the Father that in him should all fullness dwell.”
Col. i. 19.
To-morrow, may it
please
you.
Shakespeare
To be pleased in
or
To be pleased with
,
to have complacency in; to take pleasure in.
–
To be pleased to do a thing
,
to take pleasure in doing it; to have the will to do it; to think proper to do it.
Dryden.

Please

,
Verb.
I.
1.
To afford or impart pleasure; to excite agreeable emotions.
What
pleasing
scemed, for her now
pleases
more.
Milton.
For we that live to
please
, must
please
to live.
Johnson.
2.
To have pleasure; to be willing, as a matter of affording pleasure or showing favor; to vouchsafe; to consent.
Heavenly stranger,
please
to taste
These bounties.
Milton.
That he would
please
8give me my liberty.
Swift.

Webster 1828 Edition

Please

PLEASE

,
Verb.
T.
s as z. [L. placere, placeo.]
1.
To excite agreeable sensations or emotions in; to gratify; as, to please the taste; to please the mind.
Their words pleased Hamor, and Shechem, Hamor's son. Gen.34.
Leave such to trifle with more grace than ease,
Whom folly pleases, and whose follies please.
2.
To satisfy; to content.
What next I bring shall please
Thy wish exactly to thy heart's desire.
3.
To prefer; to have satisfaction in; to like; to choose.
Many of our most skilful painters were pleased or recommend this author to me.
To be pleased in or with, to approve; to have complacency in. Matt.3.
To please God, is to love his character and law and perform his will, so as to become the object of his approbation.
They that are in the flesh cannot please God. Rom.8.

PLEASE

,
Verb.
I.
s as z. To like; to choose; to prefer.
Spirits, freed from mortal laws, with ease
Assume what sexes and what shapes they please.
1.
To condescend; to comply; to be pleased; a word of ceremony.
Please you, lords,
In sight of both our battles we may meet.
The first words that I learnt were, to express my desire that he would please to give me my liberty.
Please expresses less gratification than delight.

Definition 2024

please

please

English

Alternative forms

  • pleace (used from the Middle English period up to the 15th century, and in Scots until the 17th century)

Verb

please ‎(third-person singular simple present pleases, present participle pleasing, simple past and past participle pleased)

  1. (transitive) To make happy or satisfy; to give pleasure to.
    Her presentation pleased the executives.‎
    I'm pleased to see you've been behaving yourself.‎
    • 1922, Michael Arlen, “Ep./1/1”, in “Piracy”: A Romantic Chronicle of These Days:
      And so it had always pleased M. Stutz to expect great things from the dark young man whom he had first seen in his early twenties ; and his expectations had waxed rather than waned on hearing the faint bruit of the love of Ivor and Virginia—for Virginia, M. Stutz thought, would bring fineness to a point in a man like Ivor Marlay, […].
  2. (intransitive, ergative) To desire; to will; to be pleased by.
    Just do as you please.‎
    • Bible, Psalms cxxxv. 6
      Whatsoever the Lord pleased, that did he.
Synonyms
Antonyms
Derived terms
Related terms
Translations

Etymology 2

Short for if you please, an intransitive, ergative form taken from if it pleases you,[1][2] which replaced pray.

Alternative forms

  • (for the exaggerated way it is often pronounced as the expression of annoyance) puh-lease

Adverb

please ‎(not comparable)

  1. Used to make a polite request.
    Please, pass the bread.
    Would you please sign this form?
    Could you tell me the time, please?
    May I take your order, please?
  2. Used as an affirmative to an offer.
    —May I help you? —Please.
  3. An expression of annoyance or impatience.
    Oh, please, do we have to hear that again?
Translations
Derived terms

Etymology 3

Calque of German bitte

Adverb

please ‎(not comparable)

  1. (regional, Cincinnati) Said as a request to repeat information.
    • 1973: "Bitte or Bitter?", Cincinnati, August 1973, page 109
      Fellow: May I have a few days off to get married?
      Reply, in the Cincinnati idiom by a boss who had heard the sound but not the sense:
      Boss: Please?
    • 1978: Virginia Watson-Rouslin, "A Foreign View", Cincinnati, September 1978, page 110
      Even though I heard it was supposed to be German-Catholic background, there’s only one thing German — they say ‘please’ [for the more common ‘pardon me’], which comes from bitte.
    • 1979: "Winners: Contest No. 13—The Laugh’s On Us", Cincinnati, September 1979, volume 12, issue 12, page 15
      “…He explained in broken English that one of his daughters was ill and he probably could not be there. I did not understand all that he said, so asked, ‘Please?’ per Cincinnati custom. ‘There is no need to plead. I will be there if she is feeling better,’ he replied.”
    • 1998: Jose I. Sarasua, "Come to Cincinnati... Please?", Cost Engineering, volume 40, issue 5, 5 May 1998, page 9
      Cincinnati are some of the most polite persons I have ever met in the US. When asking someone a question, instead of saying “Excuse me,” or “Pardon,” they say “Please?”
    • 2001: Jeff Robinson, "Say what?", Ohio Magazine, April 2001, page 77
      By the same token, one contestant who doesn’t hear a particular question could say “Pardon me?” while another could say “Please?” Again, neither would be lying if he said he was from Ohio.
    • 2008: Henry Hitchings, The Secret Life of Words: How English Became English, ISBN 0374254109, page 255
      In Maine, where as much as a quarter of the population has French ancestry, you may hear a stray hair called a couette, and in parts of Ohio please is used in the same way as the German bitte, to invite a person to repeat something just said – apparently a remnant of the bilingual schooling once available in Cincinnati.
    • 2011: Ellen McIntyre, Nancy Hulan, Vicky Layne, Reading Instruction for Diverse Classrooms: Research-Based, Culturally Responsive Practice, Guilford Press, ISBN 1609180569, page 72
      Ellen grew up outside of Cincinnati and believed her own talk was the “norm,” while others were speakers of dialects. She was in graduate school before she learned that not all people say, Please? to mean Can you repeat that?
Synonyms

References

  1. 1 2 “please” in Dictionary.com Unabridged, v1.0.1, Lexico Publishing Group, 2006.
  2. ↑ “please” in Douglas Harper, Online Etymology Dictionary (2001).

Statistics

Most common English words before 1923: outside · beside · worth · #696: please · quiet · exclaimed · regard

Anagrams

Etymology

From Middle English plesen, plaisen, from Old French plaise, conjugated form of plaisir or plaire, from Latin placēre ‎(“to please, to seem good”)[1], from the Proto-Indo-European *plā-k- ‎(“wide and flat”). Displaced native Middle English quemen, queamen ‎(“to please”) (from Old English cwēman ‎(“to please”)), Middle English biluvien ‎(“to please, delight”) (from Middle English bi-, be- + luvien ‎(“to love”)), Middle English liken ‎(“to like, please”) (from Old English līcian ‎(“to please, be like”)), Middle English lusten, listen ‎(“to be pleasing, delight”) (from Old English lystan ‎(“to please”)).

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /pliːz/
  • Rhymes: -iːz
  • Homophone: pleas

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