let

To let someone do something is to say yes to it, or simply not to stop it. Let me carry that for you. My parents would not let me stay out past ten.

Let takes a bare verb after it, as in let him go or let it rest, never let him to go, and the past tense is let, unchanged. Let's is short for let us and is how English makes a suggestion: let's eat, let's not argue about it now. In British English it also means renting out a property, so you see a flat to let and a landlord who let the house to students. The word builds a whole shelf of everyday phrases: let go, let someone down, let someone know, let in, let off. Do not swap it with leave, because you let someone do something but you leave something behind.

Phrases it lives in

• let alone — and certainly not the bigger thing just mentioned
• let someone down — fail to do what they were counting on you for