Care, n.
Etymology: [AS. caru, cearu; akin to OS. kara sorrow Goth. kara lament, and to Gr. . Not akin to cure. Cf. Chary.]
1. A burdensome sense of responsibility; trouble caused by onerous duties; anxiety; concern; solicitude. Care keeps his wath in every old man's eye, And where care lodges, sleep will never lie. Shak.
2. Charge, oversight, or management, implying responsibility for safety and prosperity. The care of all the churches. 2 Car. xi. 28 Him thy care must be to find. Milton. Perlexed with a thousand cares. Shak.
3. Attention or heed; caution; regard; heedfulness; watchfulness; as, take care; have a care. I thank thee for thy care and honest pains. Shak.
4. The object of watchful attention or anxiety. Right sorrowfully mourning her bereaved cares. Spenser.
1 more senses
Syn. -- Anxiety; solicitude; concern; caution; regard; management; direction; oversight. -- Care, Anxiety, Solicitude, Concern. These words express mental pain in different degress. Care belongs primarily to the intellect, and becomes painful from overburdened thought. Anxiety denotes a state of distressing uneasiness fron the dread of evil. Solicitude expresses the same feeling in a diminished dagree. Concern is opposed to indifference, and implies exercise of anxious thought more or less intense. We are careful about the means, solicitous and anxious about the end; we are solicitous to obtain a good, axious to avoid an evil.
1 other Webster entry under this spelling
Care, v. i. [imp. & p. p. Cared; p. pr. & vb. n. Caring.]
To be anxious or solictous; to be concerned; to have regard or interest; -- sometimes followed by an objective of measure. I would not care a pin, if the other three were in. Shak. Master, carest thou not that we perish Mark. iv. 38. To care for. (a) To have under watchful attention; to take care of. (b) To have regard or affection for; to like or love. He cared not for the affection of the house. Tennyson.
Shades of meaning
Care concerns what we possess; anxiety, often, what we do not; riches bring many cares; poverty brings many anxieties. Care also signifies watchful attention, in view of possible harm; as, "This side up with care;" "Take care of yourself;" or, as a sharp warning, "Take care!" Caution has a sense of possible harm and risk only to be escaped, if at all, by careful deliberation and observation. Care inclines to the positive, caution to the negative; care is shown in doing, caution largely in not doing. Precaution is allied with care, prudence with caution; a man rides a dangerous horse with care; caution will keep him from mounting the horse; precaution looks to the saddle-girths, bit and bridle, and all that may make the rider secure. Circumspection is watchful observation and calculation, but without the timidity implied in caution. Concern denotes a serious interest, milder than anxiety; as, concern for the safety of a ship at sea. Heed implies attention without disquiet; it is now largely displaced by attention and care. Solicitude involves especially the element of desire, not expressed in anxiety, and of hopefulness, not implied in care. A parent feels constant solicitude for his children's welfare, anxiety as to dangers that threaten it, with care to guard against them. Watchfulness recognizes the possibility of danger, wariness the probability. A man who is not influenced by caution to keep out of danger may display great wariness in the midst of it. Care has also the sense of responsibility, with possible control, as expressed in charge, management, oversight; as, these children are under my care; send the money to me in care of the firm. Compare alarm; anxiety; prudence.
Prepositions
Take care of the house; for the future; about the matter.