What's the difference between promise and vow?

Promise


Definition:

  • (a.) In general, a declaration, written or verbal, made by one person to another, which binds the person who makes it to do, or to forbear to do, a specified act; a declaration which gives to the person to whom it is made a right to expect or to claim the performance or forbearance of a specified act.
  • (a.) An engagement by one person to another, either in words or in writing, but properly not under seal, for the performance or nonperformance of some particular thing. The word promise is used to denote the mere engagement of a person, without regard to the consideration for it, or the corresponding duty of the party to whom it is made.
  • (a.) That which causes hope, expectation, or assurance; especially, that which affords expectation of future distinction; as, a youth of great promise.
  • (a.) Bestowal, fulfillment, or grant of what is promised.
  • (v. t.) To engage to do, give, make, or to refrain from doing, giving, or making, or the like; to covenant; to engage; as, to promise a visit; to promise a cessation of hostilities; to promise the payment of money.
  • (v. t.) To afford reason to expect; to cause hope or assurance of; as, the clouds promise rain.
  • (v. t.) To make declaration of or give assurance of, as some benefit to be conferred; to pledge or engage to bestow; as, the proprietors promised large tracts of land; the city promised a reward.
  • (v. i.) To give assurance by a promise, or binding declaration.
  • (v. i.) To afford hopes or expectation; to give ground to expect good; rarely, to give reason to expect evil.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Yet the Tory promise of fiscal rectitude prevailed in England Alexander had been in charge of Labour’s election strategy, but he could not strategise a victory over a 20-year-old Scottish nationalist who has not yet taken her finals.
  • (2) The HTCA is promising as a potential tool for studying the biology of tumors.
  • (3) David Cameron last night hit out at his fellow world leaders after the G8 dropped the promise to meet the historic aid commitments made at Gleneagles in 2005 from this year's summit communique.
  • (4) The success in these two infertile patients who had already undergone lengthy psychotherapy is promising.
  • (5) Measuring this value therefore is a very promising procedure.
  • (6) The Coalition promises to add more misery to their lives.
  • (7) Meanwhile Ed Miliband, the Labour leader, waiting anxiously for news of the scale of the Labour advance in his first nationwide electoral test, will urge the electorate not to be duped by the promise of a coalition mark 2, predicting sham concessions by the Conservatives .
  • (8) John Lewis’s marketing, advertising and reputation are all built on their promises of good customer services, and it is a large part of what still drives people to their stores despite cheaper online outlets.
  • (9) On the basis of reports in the literature and of our own clinical experience it appears that melanocyte inhibiting factor (MIF) is a very promising therapeutic agent in the management of Parkinson's disease.
  • (10) Since the employment of microwave energy for defrosting biological tissues and for microwave-aided diagnosis in cryosurgery is very promising, the problem of ensuring the match between the contact antennas (applicators) and the frozen biological object has become a pressing one.
  • (11) The 20-25 year-old cohort was found to yield the most promising results; however, a statistical difference was not found to exist using the volume or area.
  • (12) The arrest of the Washington Post’s Tehran correspondent Jason Rezaian and his journalist wife, Yeganeh Salehi, as well as a photographer and her partner, is a brutal reminder of the distance between President Hassan Rouhani’s reforming promises and his willingness to act.
  • (13) The use of a new ultraviolet laser combined with a holographic grating spectrograph promises to increase the number of fluorescing species that can be detected simultaneously.
  • (14) So is the mock courtroom promising “justice and fairness”.
  • (15) But that promise was beginning to startle the markets, which admire Monti’s appetite for austerity and fear the free spending and anti-European views of some Italian politicians.
  • (16) Healthbars such as Nakd fit this category and promise to deliver one of your five a day, based on the quantity of freeze-dried date paste used.
  • (17) The most promising method was chemoradiotherapy using multifractionation of a daily dose of irradiation, the 4-year survival rate of 20% being achieved.
  • (18) Trials of these therapeutic schemes promise a higher efficacy of the therapeutic measures for gastroesophageal reflux.
  • (19) The glory lay in the defiance, although the outcome of the tie scarcely looks promising for Arsenal when the return at Camp Nou next Tuesday is borne in mind.
  • (20) One of the big sticking points is cash – with rich countries so far failing to live up to promise to mobilise $100bn a year by 2020 for climate finance .

Vow


Definition:

  • (n.) A solemn promise made to God, or to some deity; an act by which one consecrates or devotes himself, absolutely or conditionally, wholly or in part, for a longer or shorter time, to some act, service, or condition; a devotion of one's possessions; as, a baptismal vow; a vow of poverty.
  • (n.) Specifically, a promise of fidelity; a pledge of love or affection; as, the marriage vow.
  • (n.) To give, consecrate, or dedicate to God, or to some deity, by a solemn promise; to devote; to promise solemnly.
  • (n.) To assert solemnly; to asseverate.
  • (v. i.) To make a vow, or solemn promise.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) The strike, which Central Command said destroyed the Isis fighting position, follows Barack Obama's vow in his televised speech on Wednesday to go on the offensive against Isis more broadly in Iraq and, soon, Syria.
  • (2) But Mr Bolloré, with a 29% stake in Aegis, vowed to keep calling shareholder meetings until he gets his way.
  • (3) But Clegg also says he is not going to be cowed into taking Cameron's vow of silence about Farage's assertion that he finds Britain unrecognisable and is uncomfortable at the lack of English spoken on commuter trains out of Charing Cross.
  • (4) Cameron also believes the planned peace talks can lure Assad's acolytes to break with their leader by vowing that if he goes, the existing military and security services will be preserved, saying the aim was "to learn the lessons of Iraq".
  • (5) "We have vowed to never forget and we never will," he said.
  • (6) The Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu , has vowed the militant Islamist group Hamas, blamed by Israel for the kidnapping, will "pay a heavy price".
  • (7) China to allow pension fund to invest in stock market for first time Read more China’s state-run media has repeatedly vowed that the country’s leaders will not allow such huge losses to continue.
  • (8) The Communication Workers Union (CWU), which represents postal workers, has vowed to fight the sale, which it says will lead to a "worse deal for customers, staff and thousands of small businesses dependent on the Royal Mail".
  • (9) Von Trier, who took a " vow of silence " after being banned from the Cannes film festival in 2011 after joking about Nazism during a press conference for Melancholia, arrived at Nymphomaniac's photocall wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with the phrase "Persona Non Grata"; true to his word, he failed to attend the subsequent press conference where his actors and producer talked about the film.
  • (10) Iran has vowed to retaliate against the ISA extension, passed unanimously on Thursday, saying it violated last year’s agreement with six major powers to curb its nuclear programme in return for lifting of international financial sanctions.
  • (11) Far from being depressed, the audience turned into a heaving mass of furious geeks, who roared their anger and vowed that they would not rest until they had brought down the rotten system The "skeptic movement" (always spelt with "k" by the way, to emphasise their distinctiveness) had come to Singh's aid.
  • (12) Most remarkably: last July, 60 Minutes reported that Al Sharpton "has decided not to criticize the president about anything " – a vow that should be the ultimate disqualifying attribute for working in journalism: how can someone be employed as a political commentator if they vow never to criticize the president under any circumstances?
  • (13) Griffin vowed to lodge a complaint at the "unfair" way the Question Time programme was produced, despite the BNP's claims that his appearance sparked the "biggest single recruitment night in the party's history".
  • (14) More than 120 couples joined the mass on Sunday morning to renew their wedding vows and celebrate more than 1,700 years of marriage between them.
  • (15) Brandis has asked the ACT government not to put the new laws into effect until the court can determine their validity, but the chief minister, Katy Gallagher, has vowed to press ahead.
  • (16) Instead, he vowed: "That means I will be cautious about the promises I make.
  • (17) Before the August rebellion Uganda and Rwanda both had some troops on the eastern Congo border, by agreement with Mr Kabila and theoretically in joint operations with his forces against the tens of thousands of former Rwandan soldiers and interahamwe who have vowed to continue the genocide in Rwanda.
  • (18) Qatar had vowed to reform the industry after the Guardian exposed the desperate plight of many of its migrant workers last year.
  • (19) In his only specific growth measure, he said Britain's planning laws would have to be scrapped so more housing could be built, vowing to scrap "the suffocating bureaucracy" that he said was holding economic growth back.
  • (20) We look forward to many more years of working with Maria.” Sharapova, who has been provisionally banned while the International tennis Federation decides her fate, has thanked her fans for their support and vowed to return to the game.