The Collaborative International Dictionary
Anything \A"ny*thing\, n.
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Any object, act, state, event, or fact whatever; thing of any kind; something or other; aught; as, I would not do it for anything.
Did you ever know of anything so unlucky?
--A. Trollope.They do not know that anything is amiss with them.
--W. G. Sumner. -
Expressing an indefinite comparison; -- with as or like.
I fear your girl will grow as proud as anything.
--Richardson.Note: Any thing, written as two words, is now commonly used in contradistinction to any person or anybody. Formerly it was also separated when used in the wider sense. ``Necessity drove them to undertake any thing and venture any thing.''
--De Foe.Anything but, not at all or in any respect. ``The battle was a rare one, and the victory anything but secure.''
--Hawthorne.Anything like, in any respect; at all; as, I can not give anything like a fair sketch of his trials.
Usage examples of "anything like".
The last time I saw a patient in anything like this situation, it was a pony that had been mistaken for a deer and shot in the foreleg.