pity

noun

1. (uncountable)A feeling of sympathy at the misfortune or suffering of someone or something.

   “I can't feel any pity towards the gang, who got injured while attempting to break into a flat.”

   “take pity on someone”

   “He that hath pity upon the poor lendeth unto the Lord.”

   “He[…]has no more pity in him than a dog.”

   “The most usuall way to appease those minds we have offended […] is, by submission to move them to commiseration and pitty.”

2. (uncountable)Feeling of contempt one has for someone who is hopelessly inferior.
3. (countable, singular, singular-only)Something regrettable.

   “It's a pity you're feeling unwell because there's a party on tonight.”

   “What a pity about the band breaking up. I loved them!”

   “It was a thousand pities.”

   “What pity is it / That we can die but once to serve our country!”

   “It is a thousand pities that no more detailed records than those of the guard's journals are available, but enough is known to establish them firmly among the finest feats ever achieved by "A3" Pacifics.”

4. (Early, Modern, countable, obsolete, uncountable)Piety.

   “Euen so on the other syde a mans harte is contrite, when it is cutte with compunction, mollified with pitie and deuotion, moued with prayers and exhortation, is affraide by threatninges, allured by kindnes, ashamed of dishonesty, geuing place to Gods inspiration, […]”

   “The Church of Rome beyng moued neither with pitie, zeale, truth, reasõ, nor honesty, but onely with ambition and couetousnesse refuseth none, so they will shew thẽ selues to be of that Catholicke Church. Traytours, murtherers, theeues, coseners, cutters, adulters, baudes, strumpets and all other gracelesse persons may vpon the sayd cõditiõ haue safe accesse to Rome and be of that Church.”

verb

1. (transitive)To feel pity for (someone or something).

   “You have got to pity the guy - he lost his wife, mother and job in the same month.”

   “Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him.”

   “Well! the King of France died pardoning & pitying all those who had tortured his Soul & Body, a great Pattern for us all.”

   “Nor could she get round them on a single point, and I pitied her so much that I bought bread and wine off her to console her, and I let her overcharge me, and went out into the afterglow with her benediction, followed also by the farewells of the middle-class, who were now taking their coffee at little tables outside the house.”

2. (transitive)To feel contempt for someone who is hopelessly inferior.
3. (regional, transitive)To make (someone) feel pity; to provoke the sympathy or compassion of.

   “She lenger yet is like captiv'd to bee; / That even to thinke thereof it inly pitties mee.”

   “It pitieth them to see her in the dust.”

intj

1. (abbreviation, alt-of, ellipsis)Ellipsis of what a pity.