Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use fearful in a sentence

40 example sentences · adjective, adverb

Fearful means frightening; causing fear. Example: “It is important to separate your fearful, false ego-self from your true spiritual self.”

Examples of fearful by meaning

adjectiveTending to fear; timid.

  • a fearful boy

adjectiveTerrible; shockingly bad.

  • You must miss such a fearful lot."1914, Ernest Bramah, Max Carrados

adverbExtremely; fearfully.

  • “He is fearful handsome, as you know,” she said remorsefully, “you cannot imagine, Georgiana, the joy when I first fell in love with him.”2009, Juliette Shapiro, Mr. Darcy's Decision: A Sequel to Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice
  • “It's a fearful strong charm needs dragon's blood,” he said plaintively.2014, Diana Wynne Jones, The Chrestomanci series
  • His Dardanelles expedition gave the Turk a fearful long start.2014, Michael Brock, Eleanor Brock, Margot Asquith's Great War Diary 1914-1916

More sentences with fearful

  • It is important to separate your fearful, false ego-self from your true spiritual self.From the entry ego-self
  • Fearful of falling, he inched along the window ledge.From the entry inch
  • Their conversations had become more fearful, even superstitious in the past month.2023 October 12, HarryBlank, “Fire in the Hole”, in SCP Foundation, archived from the original on 22 May 2024. From the entry settle one's account
  • Our experience of time isn’t just different because we are fearful or bored, cooped up or overworked.2020 May 8, Arielle Pardes, “There Are No Hours or Days in Coronatime”, in Wired, archived from the original on 29 Mar 2023. From the entry coronatime
  • That is what my eating abroad had been: fearful, niminy-piminy slivers of prosciutto and single olives.2018, Laura Freeman, The Reading Cure: How Books Restored My Appetite. From the entry niminy-piminy
  • The negative belief is always more petty, self-serving, unallowing, resistant, fearful, and unloving.2014, Sean Morgan, Tracy Phillips, Mastery of Change. From the entry unloving
  • Reactions at Sun's campus, an hour's drive from San Francisco, ranged from the fearful to the incredulous.2009 March 18, Reuters, “Sun Micro Troops Fearful, Incredulous About IBM”, in Wired.com, archived from the original on 30 Jun 2013. From the entry incredulous
  • Maybe all I really am is the sum of all these connections, these fearful longings and graspings.2009, Jed McKenna, Spiritually Incorrect Enlightenment. From the entry grasping
  • “Alms, sire,” he croaked, his eyes wide and fearful, his face lean and hungry.2004 09, Julie D'Arcy, Silverdawn, Mundania Press, →ISBN, page 17. From the entry pelerine
  • The merchant of mistrust dismisses these words as hyperbole and remains grim, sullen, fearful.2000 October, Brennan Manning, “The Way of Trust”, in Ruthless Trust: The Ragamuffin’s Path to God, [San Francisco, Calif.]…. From the entry happies
  • But many are fearful that the show will die quickly in a tough Sunday-night time slot.2000 September 19, Aaron Barnhart, “Bowling for a hit: NBC strikes comedic gold with CBS reject ‘Ed’”, in The Kansas City Star…. From the entry O someone of little faith
  • Byrne of Chicago in a fearful Democratic Party squabble, Illinois State Senator Richard M.1980 November 9, “Headliners: Victory, Chicago-Style”, in New York Times, retrieved 26 May 2013. From the entry disendorse
  • Her son wrote badly, as if fearful of marking the page at all.1969, William Trevor, chapter 11, in Mrs. Eckdorf in O’Neill’s Hotel, Penguin, published 1973, page 177. From the entry mark
  • Morton was in fearful time pressure and at first did not realize he was mated.1938 May, Fred Reinfeld, “The US Championship Tournament”, in Chess Review. From the entry perceive
  • He neither knows himself nor his outriders; he berserks a fearful dimension and dismounts, miraculously, in bed!1937, Djuna Barnes, Nightwood, New Directions Publishing, published 2006, →ISBN, page 87. From the entry berserk
  • Or does it make you fearful of the future?2019 December 12, Jessica Guynn, “Facebook disinformation in the 2020 presidential election: What you can do to stop its spread”, in USA…. From the entry ragebait
  • As I stand to address them they take a fearful step backwards with their hands outstretched in placating gestures.2015, Alain Robert, With Bare Hands, Maverick Publishing Limited. From the entry backwards
  • Or their flattering of the fearful, forty-inch-chest reginacide?2012, Simon Law, “Cambridge – golden willows by the riverside”, in Out of London Walks: Great Escapes by Britain’s Best Walking Tour…. From the entry reginacide
  • Fearful that the publicity would cripple his presidential buildup, Kennedy paid an emergency call on Washington superlawyer Clark Clifford.2011, Christopher J. Matthews, Kennedy & Nixon: The Rivalry that Shaped Postwar America, page 115. From the entry superlawyer
  • Edna, though fearful, was also very responsible, and telephoned Tedwardo, her longtime dancing buddy, to take over her contractual obligations.2011, Elura Nanos, Michele Sileo, Legalese to English: Civil Procedure. From the entry omphalophobia
  • As the workers butted up against the fence, the bosses grew more fearful and finally two fired their shotguns.2010 November 20, Barry Bearak, “Zambia uneasily balances Chinese investment and workers’ resentment”, in The New York Times (Africa…. From the entry jounce
  • This means you have to move in when everyone else is fearful, and step back when everyone else is euphoric.2010, Michael C. Thomsett, “The Contrarian Approach to Trading”, in Getting Started in Stock Investing and Trading (Getting Started in ……. From the entry contrarian
  • Land otters were fearful hybrid beings of the spirit world.1994, Resources in Education, page 114. From the entry kushtaka
  • Fearful of missing a roll-call, Representative Charles E.1991 June 8, Richard Berke, “Sizzling 40-Year Streak Of Never Missing a Vote”, in New York Times, retrieved 26 Nov 2010. From the entry duck out
  • “Guns,” I said with fearful jocularity, “in a holy place?”1980, Anthony Burgess, chapter 74, in Earthly Powers, London: Hutchinson. From the entry jocularity
  • Other fearful flyers are stymied by territory-boundedness—an unadventurous spirit.1972, Cosmopolitan, New York, N.Y.: Hearst Corporation, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 108, column 1. From the entry psychocentric
  • An ism does not have to possess the fearful implements of state power to cut off a deviant or heretical member.1965, Bertram David Wolfe, Marxism, One Hundred Years in the Life of a Doctrine, page 357. From the entry ism
  • In the evenings the younger guides gave exhibitions of schuhplattler, slapping their hairy thighs and chamois-leather shorts with fearful cries.1965, John Gale, “Part One”, in Clean Young Englishman, London: Hodder & Stoughton, published 2015, →ISBN. From the entry schuhplattler
  • "A fearful apparition," murmured Norman of Torn.1914 January–May, Edgar Rice Burroughs, chapter VII, in The Outlaw of Torn, Chicago, Ill.: A[lexander] C[aldwell] McClurg, published 1927…. From the entry helm
  • To none of these evidences of a fearful tragedy of a long dead day did little Tarzan give but passing heed.1912 October, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “Tarzan of the Apes”, in The All-Story, New York, N.Y.: Frank A. Munsey Co., →OCLC; republished as…. From the entry inure
  • But the unembodied Justice, whereof that other is either an emblem, or else is a fearful indescribability, is not so visible!1910, Thomas Carlyle, The Sense of Beauty, Burt, page 15. From the entry indescribability
  • DfT left train operators to 'take the heat' - which they dutifully did, fearful of speaking up and 'biting the hand that feeds'.2020 September 23, Nigel Harris, “Comment: We MUST seize the moment”, in Rail, page 3. From the entry dutifully
  • Your trench coat, your chinos, your Father’s Day necktie—your closet overflows with gear that was originally worn by stout patriots, fearful conscripts, and paid killers.2019 March 6, Troy Patterson, “From Grunt Style to 'Warcore,' Civilians Are Embracing Military Fashion”, in The New Yorker. From the entry warcore
  • Now everyone from his table was jigging around in a fearful, nervous rugbylike scrum, while people from other tables were rushing over to shout suggestions.2018, Laura Childs, Pekoe Most Poison, Penguin, →ISBN, page 10. From the entry rugbylike
  • If you’re fearful of agendas, bro-science, half-science and the world of online foodwriting at large, turn to the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.2018 August 22, Will Price, “10 Healthy Cookbooks Every Athlete Should Read”, in Gear Patrol, New York, N.Y., archived from the original…. From the entry foodwriting

Meaning of fearful

  1. adjective Frightening; causing fear.
  2. adjective Tending to fear; timid.
  3. adjective Terrible; shockingly bad.

Full definition of fearful

Questions about fearful in a sentence

How do you use fearful in a sentence?
Fearful is used as an adjective and adverb. For example: “It is important to separate your fearful, false ego-self from your true spiritual self.”
What is a short sentence with fearful?
“a fearful boy”
What does fearful mean?
Fearful means frightening; causing fear.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: fearful (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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