What's the difference between please and pray?

Please


Definition:

  • (v. t.) To give pleasure to; to excite agreeable sensations or emotions in; to make glad; to gratify; to content; to satisfy.
  • (v. t.) To have or take pleasure in; hence, to choose; to wish; to desire; to will.
  • (v. t.) To be the will or pleasure of; to seem good to; -- used impersonally.
  • (v. i.) To afford or impart pleasure; to excite agreeable emotions.
  • (v. i.) To have pleasure; to be willing, as a matter of affording pleasure or showing favor; to vouchsafe; to consent.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) I can see you use humour as a defence mechanism, so in return I could just tell you that if he's massively rich or famous and you've decided you'll put up with it to please him, you'll eventually discover it's not worth it.
  • (2) We are pleased to see the process moving forward and look forward to its resolution,” a Target spokeswoman, Molly Snyder, said in an emailed statement.
  • (3) The prerequisite for all champions is the refusal to cave in, so City's equaliser with only three minutes remaining was pleasing.
  • (4) When Vladimir Putin kicks back on New Year's Eve with a glass of Russian-made champagne, and reflects on the year behind him, he is likely to feel rather pleased with himself at the way his foreign policy initiatives have gone in 2013.
  • (5) Chikavu Nyirenda, a leading political analyst, said: "She neglected to look at the local scene but spent a lot of time to please the west and promote herself."
  • (6) 3.14pm BST 14 mins: It's quite a pleasing thing that, some 22 years after the passback rule was put in place, fans still applaud a player heading the ball back to the keeper.
  • (7) I am pleased with that but disappointed with the result.
  • (8) Speaking about the player, who scored crucial goals for England during qualification for the 2014 World Cup, Hodgson said: “Andros was unlucky to lose his place in the squad when he wasn’t getting a regular game and he’s gone to Newcastle, got a regular game, and done very well there.” Expressing his delight in being selected, Townsend tweeted: “Huge honour to be named in provisional England squad for the euros ... Will give my all over next few weeks to try to make final squad!” Hodgson also declared himself pleased to include Jordan Henderson, who returned to action for Liverpool in Sunday’s 1-1 draw with West Bromwich Albion having been out since early April with damaged knee ligaments.
  • (9) This is a very nice drug and I’m sure Merck are feeling very pleased with themselves.” Matt Kennedy, who led the trial at Merck, said: “Today there are very limited therapeutic options available for people with Alzheimer’s disease, and those that exist provide only short-term improvement to the cognitive and functional symptoms.
  • (10) And he pleased the audience with an acknowledgement that social work is a tough job and social workers only human.
  • (11) [The prime minister] is very pleased we’ve been able to secure this arrangement.
  • (12) In the email King sets out ways jobcentre staff can catch out claimants, saying: "You should consider every doubt – if you are unsure then please conference with me."
  • (13) Angela Merkel says she's very pleased to accept the invitation to Davos, at a time when global economic growth is modest.
  • (14) Ladies and gentlemen, please put your hands together for Charles Antaki, he's here all week, try the Imodium.
  • (15) "This has been a challenging time for the BMJ but I am very pleased the panel has taken the view that we acted appropriately," said BMJ editor in chief, Dr Fiona Godlee.
  • (16) Two British throwers up there, it's unheard of, I'm pleased with where the sport's going."
  • (17) • If you have experiences relating to this story that you would like to share, please email us in confidence at inequality.project@theguardian.com
  • (18) As the embattled NHS chief executive was grilled in the televised hearing, committee member Valerie Vaz told him: "Please don't feel that this is a trial."
  • (19) Please, forgive me,” Choi Soon-sil, a cult leader’s daughter with a decades-long connection to Park, said through tears inside the Seoul prosecutor’s building, according to Yonhap news agency.
  • (20) "Really, really pleased," said the world silver medallist.

Pray


Definition:

  • (n. & v.) See Pry.
  • (v. i.) To make request with earnestness or zeal, as for something desired; to make entreaty or supplication; to offer prayer to a deity or divine being as a religious act; specifically, to address the Supreme Being with adoration, confession, supplication, and thanksgiving.
  • (v. t.) To address earnest request to; to supplicate; to entreat; to implore; to beseech.
  • (v. t.) To ask earnestly for; to seek to obtain by supplication; to entreat for.
  • (v. t.) To effect or accomplish by praying; as, to pray a soul out of purgatory.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) People praying, voicing their views and heart, were met with disdain and a level of force exceeding what was needed.
  • (2) Facebook Twitter Pinterest A child praying at the vigil site for Freddie Gray in Baltimore.
  • (3) I am being prayed for in the woods of northern California!
  • (4) When he had those Aids I went to my synagogue and I prayed for him.” Sterling said he admired Johnson, 53, as a “good” man, then contradicted himself.
  • (5) "I've been praying and praying to Papa," Nan cried, "but it feels like He isn't listening."
  • (6) Facebook Twitter Pinterest Muslims pray at the Al Khalil mosque in Molenbeek.
  • (7) She comes to church with me; she doesn’t pray in the way I do, but she listens.
  • (8) They will whip you if you don’t pray.” In Damascus there is a new industry of “facilitators” who offer advice to Syrians who want to get out.
  • (9) A few metres away, Francisco-Javier Muñoz, a lawyer originally from Spain, was praying.
  • (10) Since the allegations became public, fans have taken to holding up homemade signs at Florida State games: "We Support Famous Jameis", "Jameis is Innocent," and "In Jameis Christ We Pray".
  • (11) New Afghan national police officers pray during their graduation ceremony.
  • (12) The NYPD's demographics unit assembled databases on where Muslims lived, shopped, worked and prayed.
  • (13) I squeezed my eyes shut and prayed for an electromagnetic storm that would cancel out every mistake I'd ever made.'
  • (14) As she gazes down from her plane at the sprawling Amazon jungle below, she will hope and pray that, with a number of giant infrastructure projects planned in the region, history is not about to repeat itself.
  • (15) The Palestinians see this as Jewish encroachment on the site, the holiest in Judaism and the third holiest in Islam, while Jewish activists like Glick say they are being discriminated against by limiting their chances to pray atop the mount.
  • (16) The general atmosphere was that there was no point in summoning the police – the policeman is a local settler from Kiryat Arba who comes to pray with the Hebron settlers at the Tomb of the Patriarchs on Fridays.
  • (17) It stands 25km north of Damascus, near the ancient Saydnaya monastery where Christians and Muslims have prayed together for centuries.
  • (18) My mother prays for me,” said Betancourt, a Honduran.
  • (19) Barcelona’s miracle worker Lionel Messi leaves Arsenal praying for one | Barney Ronay Read more City continue to monitor Messi’s situation should he become unsettled.
  • (20) Facebook Twitter Pinterest A woman prays in front of the Flame of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Tokyo, a memorial for the victims of the atomic bombings in 1945.