Grade 12 College Vocabulary, Week 30

Definition: Deep blue in color, like a clear sky.

From the reading: "Ister, with hardening winds, congeals its cerulean waters, Under a roof of ice, winding its way to the sea." (Poems of Longfellow)

Synonyms:

azure, sky-blue

Antonyms:

(none exact)

Root:Latin caeruleus, dark blue.

Definition: To dissect; to analyze something in minute detail, as if cutting it apart.

From the reading: "Then let them anatomize Regan; see what breeds about her heart." (King Lear)

Synonyms:

dissect, analyze, scrutinize

Antonyms:

synthesize, combine

Root:Greek anatome, "a cutting up," from ana- "up" + temnein "to cut."

Definition: To affirm openly and confidently; to vouch for or guarantee.

From the reading: "I dare avouch it, sir: what, fifty followers?" (King Lear)

KJV link: "Thou hast avouched the LORD this day to be thy God, and to walk in his ways" (Deuteronomy 26:17)

Synonyms:

affirm, assert, vouch for

Antonyms:

deny, disavow, retract

Root:Old French avochier, from Latin advocare, "to call to" (ad- + vocare): to call upon as a witness.

Definition: A league or alliance, especially of persons or states joined for a common end; sometimes a conspiracy.

From the reading: "And what confederacy have you with the traitors, Late footed in the kingdom?" (King Lear)

Synonyms:

league, alliance, coalition

Antonyms:

division, schism, disunion

Root:Latin confoederatio, from con- "together" + foedus, foederis, "treaty, league."

Definition: To set on fire; to arouse or inflame a feeling.

From the reading: "Edmund, enkindle all the sparks of nature To quit this horrid act." (King Lear)

Synonyms:

ignite, inflame, arouse

Antonyms:

extinguish, quench, dampen

Root:English en- "in, into" + kindle, from Old Norse kynda, "to light a fire."

Definition: Sudden and dramatic; jolting into action; relating to electric current produced by chemical action.

From the reading: "It could be explained as an awful galvanic life working in what would have been a corpse." (Orthodoxy)

Synonyms:

electrifying, stirring, rousing

Antonyms:

deadening

Root:from Luigi Galvani, Italian physiologist.

Definition: Incapable of being wrong; free from error.

Context (original sentence): The Reformers held Scripture to be the inerrant word of God.

Synonyms:

infallible, unerring, faultless

Antonyms:

fallible

Root:Latin in-, not + errare, to wander.

Definition: Aiming at peace; conciliatory.

Context (original sentence): The bishop wrote an irenic letter to heal the quarrel between the parishes.

Synonyms:

peaceable, conciliatory, pacific

Antonyms:

polemical, belligerent

Root:Greek eirene, peace.

Definition: Hanging down loosely; swinging freely.

From the reading: "Now all the plagues that in the pendulous air Hang fated o’er men’s faults light on thy daughters!" (King Lear)

Synonyms:

hanging, drooping, dangling

Antonyms:

fixed, rigid, upright

Root:Latin pendulus, from pendere, "to hang."

Definition: Soothing; relieving pain.

From the reading: "Then said she: 'It is indeed as thou sayest, for we have not yet come to the curing of thy sickness; as yet these are but lenitives conducing to the treatment of a malady hitherto obstinate." (The Consolation of Philosophy)

Synonyms:

soothing, palliative, emollient

Antonyms:

irritating

Root:Latin lenire, to soften.

Definition: A lack of good judgment; an act or remark that shows it.

From the reading: "All’s not offence that indiscretion finds And dotage terms so." (King Lear)

Synonyms:

imprudence, folly, blunder

Antonyms:

discretion, prudence, tact

Root:Latin in- "not" + discretio, "separation, discernment," from discernere, "to distinguish."

Definition: In force and producing an effect; (of a word) most important; (noun) a worker or a secret agent.

From the reading: "There is means, madam: Our foster nurse of nature is repose, The which he lacks; that to provoke in him Are many simples operative, whose power Will close the eye of anguish." (King Lear)

Synonyms:

effective, active, functioning

Antonyms:

inoperative, ineffective, defunct

Root:Latin operari, "to work," from opus, operis, "work."

Definition: The relation between a cause and its effect; the producing of an effect.

From the reading: "If the chain of causation can be broken for a madman, it can be broken for a man." (Orthodoxy)

Synonyms:

cause and effect, agency, origination

Antonyms:

chance, randomness

Root:Latin causa, "cause, reason."

Definition: The doctrine that every event, including human choice, is fixed by prior causes, leaving no real freedom of will.

From the reading: "Obviously if any actions, even a lunatic's, can be causeless, determinism is done for." (Orthodoxy)

Synonyms:

fatalism, necessitarianism

Antonyms:

free will, libertarianism (in philosophy)

Root:Latin determinare, "to bound, fix," from de- + terminus, "boundary."

Definition: The present occasion or purpose; used in the phrase for the nonce.

From the reading: "Or sith that ye see me, for the nonce, some worsted, do ye think to quit my party?" (The Black Arrow)

Synonyms:

present, time being

Antonyms:

(none exact)

Root:Middle English for then anes, for the one.

Definition: Clearness of thought or expression; a clear mind.

From the reading: "No philosopher, I fancy, has ever expressed this romantic riddle with adequate lucidity, and I certainly have not done so." (Orthodoxy)

Synonyms:

clarity, intelligibility, coherence

Antonyms:

obscurity, vagueness, confusion

Root:Latin lucidus, "bright, clear," from lux, lucis, "light."

Definition: Having a good understanding of things; perceptive.

From the reading: "And I dare say that if a person were to throw his head back and study the fretted ceiling, you would still think that his mind was the percipient, and not his eyes." (The Republic)

Synonyms:

perceptive, discerning, astute

Antonyms:

obtuse, dull

Root:Latin percipere, to perceive.

Definition: The quality of having a ready insight into things; shrewdness.

Context (original sentence): Holmes solved the case with his usual perspicacity.

Synonyms:

insight, acumen, discernment

Antonyms:

obtuseness

Root:Latin perspicax, seeing clearly.

Definition: The habit of laying down opinions as unquestionable truths without proof or room for argument.

From the reading: "But the strongest of all is the dilemma above mentioned, that these supernatural things are never denied except on the basis either of anti-democracy or of materialist dogmatism--I may say materialist mysticism." (Orthodoxy)

Synonyms:

arrogance of opinion, doctrinairism, inflexibility

Antonyms:

open-mindedness, skepticism, humility

Root:Greek dogma, "opinion, decree," from dokein, "to seem good."

Definition: A person whose power comes from wealth.

From the reading: "There he had only to be a plutocrat again--a plutocrat called away suddenly on business." (The Innocence of Father Brown)

Synonyms:

tycoon, magnate, capitalist

Antonyms:

pauper

Root:Greek ploutos, wealth + kratos, power.