REPENT

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does repent mean? 

• REPENT (verb)
  The verb REPENT has 2 senses:

1. turn away from sin or do penitence

2. feel remorse for; feel sorry for; be contrite about

  Familiarity information: REPENT used as a verb is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• REPENT (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they repent    ... he / she / it repents   
Past simple: repented   
Past participle: repented   
-ing form: repenting   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Turn away from sin or do penitence

Classified under:

Verbs of feeling

Synonyms:

atone; repent

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Derivation:

repentant (feeling or expressing remorse for misdeeds)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Feel remorse for; feel sorry for; be contrite about

Classified under:

Verbs of feeling

Synonyms:

regret; repent; rue

Hypernyms (to "repent" is one way to...):

experience; feel (undergo an emotional sensation or be in a particular state of mind)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Derivation:

repentance (remorse for your past conduct)

repentant (feeling or expressing remorse for misdeeds)

 Context examples 

Say your prayers, Miss Eyre, when you are by yourself; for if you don't repent, something bad might be permitted to come down the chimney and fetch you away.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Take my word for it, that if you are in too great a hurry, you will certainly live to repent it.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

I wish you may not repent it.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

I hope he may repent of all the wickedness and sin to which he has been a party.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

His attachment excited gratitude, his general character respect; but she could not approve him; nor could she for a moment repent her refusal, or feel the slightest inclination ever to see him again.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)

Emma did not repent her condescension in going to the Coles.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

Indeed, I can easily believe that it was a very great relief to you, to acknowledge your situation to me, and be assured that you shall never have reason to repent it.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

Probably I should have told the whole story to the doctor, for I was in mortal fear lest the captain should repent of his confessions and make an end of me.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Man, you shall repent of the injuries you inflict.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

The little tailor demanded of the king the promised reward; he, however, repented of his promise, and again bethought himself how he could get rid of the hero.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)