See can but hope in All languages combined, or Wiktionary
{
"etymology_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "can do nothing but hope,can do naught but hope"
},
"expansion": "Ellipsis of can do nothing but hope or can do naught but hope",
"name": "ellipsis"
}
],
"etymology_text": "Ellipsis of can do nothing but hope or can do naught but hope.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "can but hope",
"tags": [
"present",
"singular",
"third-person"
]
},
{
"form": "could but hope",
"tags": [
"past"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "<~,-,could,->"
},
"expansion": "can but hope (third-person singular simple present can but hope, no present participle, simple past could but hope, no past participle)",
"name": "en-verb"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "verb",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "British English",
"parents": [],
"source": "w"
},
{
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{
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"examples": [
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"bold_text_offsets": [
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3,
15
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],
"text": "We can but hope that he returns alive.",
"type": "example"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To be unable to do anything (about something) other than hope [with that (+ clause); or (informal) with clause; or with so or (negative) not]; especially with long odds."
],
"id": "en-can_but_hope-en-verb-WQcAyFXe",
"info_templates": [
{
"args": {
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"2": ":that(clause)",
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},
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"extra_data": {
"tags": [
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[
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"(UK, dated) To be unable to do anything (about something) other than hope [with that (+ clause); or (informal) with clause; or with so or (negative) not]; especially with long odds."
],
"tags": [
"UK",
"dated",
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]
}
],
"word": "can but hope"
}
{
"etymology_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "can do nothing but hope,can do naught but hope"
},
"expansion": "Ellipsis of can do nothing but hope or can do naught but hope",
"name": "ellipsis"
}
],
"etymology_text": "Ellipsis of can do nothing but hope or can do naught but hope.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "can but hope",
"tags": [
"present",
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"third-person"
]
},
{
"form": "could but hope",
"tags": [
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}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "<~,-,could,->"
},
"expansion": "can but hope (third-person singular simple present can but hope, no present participle, simple past could but hope, no past participle)",
"name": "en-verb"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "verb",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
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"text": "We can but hope that he returns alive.",
"type": "example"
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],
"glosses": [
"To be unable to do anything (about something) other than hope [with that (+ clause); or (informal) with clause; or with so or (negative) not]; especially with long odds."
],
"info_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "en",
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"extra_data": {
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[
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],
"raw_glosses": [
"(UK, dated) To be unable to do anything (about something) other than hope [with that (+ clause); or (informal) with clause; or with so or (negative) not]; especially with long odds."
],
"tags": [
"UK",
"dated",
"no-past-participle",
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]
}
],
"word": "can but hope"
}
Download raw JSONL data for can but hope meaning in English (2.0kB)
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2026-03-25 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2026-03-03 using wiktextract (05c257f and 9d9a410). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.