second-rate, a. and n.
[See rate n.1 9, 9 b.]
A. adj. Of the second ‘rate’ (said of ships). Hence, Of the second class in point of quality or excellence; usually in vaguer (depreciative) sense. Not first-rate, of only moderate quality.
| 1669 Sir G. Downing in St. Papers Dom. 1668–9 (1894), 286 A second-rate ship. 1748 Lady M. W. Montagu Let. to C'tess. Bute 10 May (1893) II. 164 Any of the second-rate theatres in London. 1815 Scott Guy M. ii, The Laird himself was one of those second-rate sort of persons, that are to be found frequently in rural situations. 1875 Ruskin Lect. Art i. 20 The severe exclusion of all second-rate, superfluous, or even attractively varied examples. |
B. n.
1. Naut. A war-vessel of the second rate (see rate n.1 9).
| 1679 Lond. Gaz. No. 1442/4 There are now two Second-rates upon the Stocks. 1748 Smollett Rod. Rand. xxvii. (1760) I. 211 This he had procured by his interest at the Navy-Office; as also another [warrant] for himself, by virtue of which he was removed into a second rate. |
2. transf. A person or thing of inferior class.
| 1799 Monthly Rev. XXX. 95 We still think that she [a lady novelist] ranks, with a degree of respect, as a ‘second-rate’. 1804 Southey in Robberds Mem. W. Taylor I. 518 With reference to these poets, I place Dryden at the head of the second-rates. 1894 Westm. Gaz. 10 Oct. 2/3 We look upon him [Sardou] as a second-rate who might have been almost first-rate had he been sincere. |
Hence second-rateness (less frequently second-ratedness), the quality of being second-rate; second-rater, one who or something which is second-rate.
| 1826 Hood Backing the Favourite 33 The second-raters seemed then a safer hit. 1865 Mrs. Whitney Gayworthys II. 26 She forgot the old feeling of failure and of second-rateness, she found herself of consequence. 1891 G. H. Kingsley Sp. & Trav. (1900) 463 Some have to be contented with the second-ratedness of a swirly hole, as against the profundity of Lake Superior. 1905 G. B. Shaw Irrational Knot p. xiii, This consoles us for the undeniable secondrateness of the people we do know. 1916 E. Pound Lett. (1971) 87 Virgil is a second-rater, a Tennysonianized version of Homer. 1945 R. Knox God & Atom vi. 84 We tacitly acknowledged in ourselves a kind of moral second-rateness which served as an excuse for low standards. 1955 Second-rater [see beached ppl. a. 3]. 1976 Times Lit. Suppl. 17 Dec. 1576/4 The second-rateness of Douglas (but to be second-rate is to be next to first-rate). 1977 Times Lit. Suppl. 22 Apr. 481/2 His adamant opposition to American participation in Hitler's war damned him conclusively, for me, as a mean-minded second-rater or worse. |