Bear is the most general of these words; it is metaphorically to hold up or keep up a burden of care, pain, grief, annoyance, or the like, without sin more..Bear is the most general of these words; it is metaphorically to hold up or keep up a burden of care, pain, grief, annoyance, or the like, without sinking, lamenting, or repining. Allow and permit involve large concession of the will; put up with and tolerate imply decided aversion and reluctant withholding of opposition or interference; whispering is allowed by the school-teacher who does not forbid nor censure it; one puts up with the presence of a disagreeable visitor; a state tolerates a religion which it would be glad to suppress. To endure is to bear with strain and resistance, but with conscious power; endure conveys a fuller suggestion of contest and conquest than bear. One may choose to endure the pain of a surgical operation rather than take anesthetics; he permits the thing to come which he must brace himself to endure when it comes. To afford is to be equal to a pecuniary demand, i. e., to be able to bear it. To brook is quietly to put up with provocation or insult. Abide combines the senses of await and endure; as, I will abide the result. Compare ABIDE; SUPPORT.(noun)