tear : Idioms & Phrases

Index

baby tears

  • noun prostrate or creeping Corsican herb with moss-like small round short-stemmed leaves
    Soleirolia soleirolii; baby tears; Helxine soleirolia.
WordNet

baby's tears

  • noun prostrate or creeping Corsican herb with moss-like small round short-stemmed leaves
    Soleirolia soleirolii; baby tears; Helxine soleirolia.
WordNet

Crocodile tears

  • noun a hypocritical display of sorrow; false or insincere weeping
    • the secretaries wept crocodile tears over the manager's dilemma
    • politicians shed crocodile tears over the plight of the unemployed
WordNet
  • false or affected tears; hypocritical sorrow; derived from the fiction of old travelers, that crocodiles shed tears over their prey.
Webster 1913

Glass tears

  • . See Rupert's drop.
Webster 1913

Job's tears

  • noun hard pearly seeds of an Asiatic grass; often used as beads
WordNet
  • (Bot.), a kind of grass (Coix Lacryma), with hard, shining, pearly grains.
Webster 1913

tear apart

  • verb express a totally negative opinion of
    trash; pan.
    • The critics panned the performance
WordNet

tear away

  • verb rip off violently and forcefully
    tear away.
    • The passing bus tore off her side mirror
WordNet

tear down

  • verb tear down so as to make flat with the ground
    rase; level; take down; dismantle; pull down; raze.
    • The building was levelled
WordNet

tear duct

  • noun any of several small ducts that carry tears from the lacrimal glands
    lachrymal duct; lacrimal duct.
WordNet

tear gas

  • noun a gas that makes the eyes fill with tears but does not damage them; used in dispersing crowds
    lachrymator; teargas; lacrimator.
WordNet

tear gland

  • noun any of the glands in the eyes that secrete tears
    lacrimal gland; lachrymal gland.
WordNet

tear into

  • verb hit violently, as in an attack
    pitch into; lace into; lam into; lay into.
WordNet

tear off

  • verb rip off violently and forcefully
    tear away.
    • The passing bus tore off her side mirror
WordNet

tear sac

  • noun either of the two dilated ends of the lacrimal ducts at the nasal ends of the eyes that fill with tears secreted by the lacrimal glands
    lacrimal sac; dacryocyst.
WordNet

tear sheet

  • noun a sheet that can be easily torn out of a publication
WordNet

tear up

  • verb tear into shreds
    rip up; shred.
WordNet

tear-falling

Tear"-fall`ing adjective
Definitions
  1. Shedding tears; tender. Poetic "Tear-falling pity." Shak.
Webster 1913

tear-thumb

Tear"-thumb` noun
Definitions
  1. (Bot.) A name given to several species of plants of the genus Polygonum, having angular stems beset with minute reflexed prickles.
Webster 1913

tearing down

  • noun complete destruction of a building
    demolishing; leveling; razing.
WordNet

To tear a cat

  • to rant violently; to rave; especially applied to theatrical ranting. Obs. Shak.
Webster 1913

To tear down

  • to demolish violently; to pull or pluck down.
Webster 1913

To tear off

  • to pull off by violence; to strip.
Webster 1913

To tear out

  • to pull or draw out by violence; as, to tear out the eyes.
Webster 1913

To tear up

  • to rip up; to remove from a fixed state by violence; as, to tear up a floor; to tear up the foundation of government or order.
Webster 1913

war-torn

  • adjective satellite laid waste by war
    war-worn.
WordNet

Wear and tear

  • noun decrease in value of an asset due to obsolescence or use
    depreciation.
WordNet
  • the loss by wearing, as of machinery in use; the loss or injury to which anything is subjected by use, accident, etc.
Webster 1913