Both Uses of
profess
in
Animal Farm
- Boxer professed not to be sorry for what had happened.†
p. 121.2 *professed = claimed
- Only old Benjamin professed to remember every detail of his long life and to know that things never had been, nor ever could be much better or much worse — hunger, hardship, and disappointment being, so he said, the unalterable law of life.†
p. 130.8
Definitions:
-
(1)
(profess) to claim or declare -- often insincerely
-
(2)
(meaning too rare to warrant focus) meaning too rare to warrant focus:
Much more rarely, profess can mean:- to teach or be knowledgeable of -- as in "profess chemistry"
- practice as a profession -- as in "profess medicine"
- proclaim belief in or allegiance to -- as in "profess Catholicism"