cringe vs retreat

cringe

noun
  • An act or disposition of servile obeisance. 

  • A gesture or posture of cringing (recoiling or shrinking). 

  • A crick (“painful muscular cramp or spasm of some part of the body”). 

  • Awkwardness or embarrassment which causes an onlooker to cringe; cringeworthiness. 

verb
  • To experience an inward feeling of disgust, embarrassment, or fear; (by extension) to feel very embarrassed. 

  • To cower, flinch, recoil, shrink, or tense, as in disgust, embarrassment, or fear. 

  • To bow or crouch in servility. 

  • To act in an obsequious or servile manner. 

adj
  • Inducing awkwardness, embarrassment, or secondhand embarrassment; cringemaking, cringeworthy, cringy. 

retreat

noun
  • The act of pulling back or withdrawing, as from something dangerous, or unpleasant. 

  • A peaceful, quiet place affording privacy or security. 

  • The act of reversing direction and receding from a forward position. 

  • A bugle call or drumbeat signaling the lowering of the flag at sunset, as on a military base. 

  • A military ceremony to lower the flag. 

  • The move of a piece from a threatened position. 

  • A period of retirement, seclusion, or solitude. 

  • A period of meditation, prayer or study. 

  • A signal for a military withdrawal. 

  • Withdrawal by military force from a dangerous position or from enemy attack. 

verb
  • To slope back. 

  • To withdraw military forces 

  • To shrink back due to generally warmer temperatures. 

  • To withdraw from a position, go back. 

  • a retreating forehead 

How often have the words cringe and retreat occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )