generous: [16] Generous comes via Old French genereux from Latin generōsus, which originally meant ‘of noble birth’ (a sense which survived in English into the late 17th century – Richard Knolles, for instance, in his General history of the Turks 1603, wrote of ‘many knights of generous extraction’). It was a derivative of genus in the sense ‘birth, stock, race’, and harks back semantically to its ultimate source in the Indo-European base *gen- ‘produce’ (see GENERAL). Its semantic progression from ‘nobly born’ through ‘noble-minded, magnanimous’ to ‘liberal in giving’ took place largely in Latin. => general
generous (adj.)
1580s, "of noble birth," from Middle French généreux (14c.), from Latin generosus "of noble birth," figuratively "magnanimous, generous," from genus (genitive generis) "race, stock" (see genus). Secondary senses of "unselfish" (1690s) and "plentiful" (1610s) in English were present in French and in Latin. Related: Generously; generousness.
实用例句
1. Not everyone thinks that the government is being particularly generous.
并非所有人都认为政府特别慷慨。
来自柯林斯例句
2. It's the wages that count. Not over-generous, but there you are.
重要的是工钱，不要过于慷慨，但也没办法。
来自柯林斯例句
3. He's generous and, you know, very nice, very polite.
他很大方而且，你知道，很友善，很有礼貌。
来自柯林斯例句
4. He was generous enough to congratulate his successor on his decision.
他十分大度地祝贺他的继任者做出了决定。
来自柯林斯例句
5. Francis poured a generous measure of the whisky into a fresh glass.
