tear down, break to pieces, break up, demolish, destroy, dismantle 与 pull down 这些词语有时可换用，有时则不能。
(1) ①tear down可表示“拆毁，拆开，拆掉，扯掉”。
- The photograph of the unpopular leader had been torn down in the night by his enemies.
那个不受欢迎的领导人的照片已被他的敌人趁着夜色扯掉了。 - They tore down the old buildings and built a hospital in its place.
他们拆掉了旧楼，在原址上建了座医院。
②tear down有时带有“不满的”意味。
- The mob shouted and tore down the statue of the former leader in the disturbance.
在动乱中，民众叫喊着拆毁了这位前国家领导人的雕像。 - To discover the trouble, the mechanics had to tear down the engine, fix it, and put it together again.
为了找出故障所在，技工们不得不拆开机器，进行修理，然后重新装好。
③tear down还表示“摧毁，驳倒，搞垮”解。
- It should't be difficult to tear down such a weak argument. But what these people want is to tear down our whole system of government! They can't be allowed to do that!
驳倒如此无力的论点不应该很困难，可是这些人的用意是要摧毁我们政府的整个体系！决不能让他们得逞！
(2) break to pieces可表示“打碎”。
- He dropped the teapot to the ground and broke it to pieces .
他把茶壶摔在了地上，成了碎片。
(3) break up可作“拆开，拆卸，拆散”解。
- His business is breaking up old cars for their parts.
他的工作就是把旧车的有用部件拆下来。 - Sentences can be broken up into clauses, and clauses into phrases.
句子可以被拆成从句，从句再被拆成短语。 - Divorce breaks up a lot of families.
离婚拆散了很多家庭。
(4) demolish指“毁掉，拆掉”，也可引申作“推翻(论据)”解。
- We've demolished that old bridge and put up a new one in its place.
我们已拆掉了那座旧桥，并在原地架起一座新桥。 - We've demolished all his arguments and he has nothing more to say.
我们推翻了他所有的论点，他再也无话可说了。
(5) destroy意思是“摧毁，毁掉，消灭”。
- The shopping center was destroyed in a fire.
购物中心被一场大火吞噬了。 - His failure in the examinations destroyed all his hopes to go to college.
他在这些考试中不及格，这摧毁了他上大学的所有希望。
(6) dismantle意为“拆开，拆卸，拆除”。
- The plant was dismantled of all its equipment and furniture.
这家工厂所有的设备和家具已全部被拆除。 - The wind dismantled the trees of their leaves.
风刮掉了树上的叶子。 - He dismantled the engine to see where the trouble lay.
他拆开发动机，检查一下故障出在哪里。
(7) pull down可作“拆掉”解，多用于建筑物。
- The single-storey houses have been pulled down to make room/way for the new building of 10 storeys. 这些平房被拆掉了，好给一幢10层新楼腾出地方来。
