mercy

Noun

mercy (countable and uncountable, plural mercies)

1. (uncountable) Relenting; forbearance to cause or allow harm to another.
   • She took mercy on him and quit embarrassing him.

   Synonyms:

   ruth, kindness, leniency, quarter

   Antonyms:

   mercilessness, ruthlessness, cruelty

2. (uncountable) Forgiveness or compassion, especially toward those less fortunate.
   • Have mercy on the poor and assist them if you can.
   • He despaired of God's mercy in the same fact, where this presumed of it; he by a decollation of all hope annihilated his mercy, this by an immoderancy thereof destroyed his justice1650, Thomas Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica: […], 2nd edition, London: […] A[braham] Miller, for Edw[ard] Dod and Nath[aniel] Ekins, […], →OCLC

   Synonyms:

   pity, sympathy, bowels, commiseration, compassion, empathy, fellow feeling, remorse, rue, ruth

3. (uncountable) A tendency toward forgiveness, pity, or compassion.
   • Mercy is one of his many virtues.
4. (countable) Instances of forbearance or forgiveness.
   • Do not withhold Your tender mercies from me, O Lord1982, Bible (NKJV), Psalm 40:11a
5. (countable) A blessing; something to be thankful for.
   • It was a mercy that we were not inside when the roof collapsed
6. (uncountable) A children's game in which two players stand opposite with hands grasped and twist each other's arms until one gives in.

Verb

mercy (third-person singular simple present mercies, present participle mercying, simple past and past participle mercied)

1. To feel mercy
   • I despised her; but I mercied her, too, and gave her sweet berries to eat, and led her to my lodge, and said to my best wife, ' Get up from my best skin, for the white squaw is a guest, and is weary.'1866, Sarah Hammond Palfrey, Herman: Or, Young Knighthood, page 189
   • At another time, forgetting "his verse," he attempted part of the Lord's Sermon on the Mount, by repeating, "Blessed are the merciful, for they shall be mercied!"1867, Henry Mills Alden, Lee Foster Hartman, Frederick Lewis Allen, Harper's Magazine - Volume 34, page 402
2. To show mercy; to pardon or treat leniently because of mercy
   • In the middle of the room is a young Infanta intended for Marguerite Theresa, born in 1651, daughter of Philip the fourth, whose portrait Velasquez took in 1658, to send to Leopold, who had just been elected Emperor of Germanyd and who mercied her in 1666.1833, Etienne Achille Réveil, Museum of Painting and Sculpture
   • Remember that kid that kept yelling that his father was mercied?” “Mercied?” - “The kid that kept saying his father was killed?1963, John Brunner, Listen! The Stars!, page 46

Interjection

1. Expressing surprise or alarm.
   • Mercy! Look at the state of you!
   • 'Three o'clock if possible,' he replied brazenly. 'Six o'clock in any case.'
     Clifton gave a little shriek of young-ladylike dismay.
     'Mercy! Today?' she exclaimed. 'Why, you dear creature, do you know—'
     'I know what you can do when you like,' he got in.1927, Ernest Bramah [pseudonym; Ernest Brammah Smith], Max Carrados Mysteries

Proper noun (1) capitalized: Mercy

Mercy

1. A female given name from English.
   • Mr Pecksniff was a moral man — a grave man, a man of noble sentiments and speech — and he had had her christened Mercy. Mercy! oh, what a charming name for such a pure–souled Being as the youngest Miss Pecksniff! Her sister’s name was Charity. There was a good thing! Mercy and Charity!1842 December – 1844 July, Charles Dickens, chapter 2, in The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit, London: Chapman and Hall, […], published 1844, →OCLC

Proper noun (2) capitalized: Mercy

Mercy (plural Mercys)

1. A surname from French.