Literary notes about apprehend (AI summary)
The word “apprehend” in literature is employed with a richness that spans both the concrete and the abstract. Authors use it to denote seizing or taking hold of a person or object—as in the dramatic arrests or pursuits portrayed in dramatic and biblical narratives [1, 2, 3]—while it also conveys the more subtle act of understanding or perceiving ideas and emotions [4, 5, 6]. In some works, characters express their recognition of danger, inner truths, or social realities through its use [7, 8, 9], thereby highlighting the dual capacity of the term to capture both physical and intellectual apprehension.
- They sought therefore to apprehend him: and no man laid hands on him, because his hour was not yet come. 7:31.
— from The Bible, Douay-Rheims, Complete - I do defy thy conjuration, And apprehend thee for a felon here.
— from Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare - Do you know Where we may apprehend her and the Moor?
— from The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare - [973] We can understand all things by her, but what she is we cannot apprehend.
— from The Declaration of Independence of the United States of America by Thomas Jefferson - She began to look with her own eyes; to see and to apprehend the deeper undercurrents of life.
— from The Awakening, and Selected Short Stories by Kate Chopin - I know not whether the reader will readily apprehend this reasoning.
— from An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding by David Hume - “It may, of course, be a mere coincidence, or it may point to some nervousness which would indicate that he had reason to apprehend danger.
— from The Valley of Fear by Arthur Conan Doyle - I was surprised to find it in so good a posture of defense; the destruction of Gnadenhut had made them apprehend danger.
— from Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin - I apprehend he will not have less than seven hundred a year.
— from Mansfield Park by Jane Austen
