Acquire vs Achieve - What's the difference?
acquire | achieve |
To get.
To gain, usually by one's own exertions; to get as one's own, as, to acquire a title, riches, knowledge, skill, good or bad habits.
* (Isaac Barrow) (1630-1677)
* (William Blackstone) (1723-1780)
*{{quote-book, year=1922, author=(Michael Arlen), chapter=3/19/2, title=
, passage=Ivor had acquired more than a mile of fishing rights with the house?; he was not at all a good fisherman, but one must do something?; one generally, however, banged a ball with a squash-racket against a wall.}}
To succeed in something, now especially in academic performance.
To carry out successfully; to accomplish.
* I. Taylor
(obsolete) To conclude, finish, especially successfully.
* 1590 , (Edmund Spenser), (The Faerie Queene) , III.1:
To obtain, or gain (a desired result, objective etc.), as the result of exertion; to succeed in gaining; to win.
*
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, passage=I was about to say that I had known the Celebrity from the time he wore kilts. But I see I will have to amend that, because he was not a celebrity then, nor, indeed, did he achieve fame until some time after I left New York for the West.}}
* {{quote-news, year=2013, date=January 22, author=Phil McNulty, work=BBC
, title= * (William Shakespeare), (Twelfth Night), II-v
*
(obsolete) To conclude, to turn out.
* Prior
* (William Shakespeare), (Othello), II-i
In transitive terms the difference between acquire and achieve
is that acquire is to gain, usually by one's own exertions; to get as one's own, as, to acquire a title, riches, knowledge, skill, good or bad habits while achieve is to obtain, or gain (a desired result, objective etc.), as the result of exertion; to succeed in gaining; to win.acquire
English
Verb
(acquir)- No virtue is acquired in an instant, but step by step.
- Descent is the title whereby a man, on the death of his ancestor, acquires his estate, by right of representation, as his heir at law.
“Piracy”: A Romantic Chronicle of These Days
Synonyms
* attain, earn, gain, obtain, procure, secure, winDerived terms
* acquired tasteachieve
English
Alternative forms
* (l) (obsolete )Verb
(achiev)- Supposing faculties and powers to be the same, far more may be achieved in any line by the aid of a capital, invigorating motive than without it.
- Full many Countreyes they did overronne, / From the uprising to the setting Sunne, / And many hard adventures did atchieve [...].
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- Some are born great, some achieve greatness.
- Thou hast achieved our liberty.
- Show all the spoils by valiant kings achieved .
- He hath achieved a maid / That paragons description.