Expeditious vs Celerity - What's the difference?
expeditious | celerity |
Fast, prompt, speedy.
* 1815 , , Emma , ch. 38,
(of a process or thing) Completed or done with efficiency and speed; facilitating speed.
* 1816 , , The Antiquary , vol. 1, ch. 7,
* 1844 , , Barry Lyndon , ch. 14,
(in literary usage) Speed.
* 1851 , Herman Melville, Moby-Dick , chapter 48:
* 1937 , Dorothy L. Sayers, Busman’s Honeymoon , chapter 11:
(oceanography) The speed of individual waves (as opposed to the speed of groups of waves).
As an adjective expeditious
is fast, prompt, speedy.As a noun celerity is
(in literary usage) speed.expeditious
English
Adjective
(en adjective)- Our coachman and horses are so extremely expeditious !—I believe we drive faster than any body.
- As they thus pressed forward, longing doubtless to exchange the easy curving line, which the sinuosities of the bay compelled them to adopt, for a straighter and more expeditious path, Sir Arthur observed a human figure on the beach.
- Now, there was a sort of rough-and-ready law in Ireland in those days, which was of great convenience to persons desirous of expeditious justice.
celerity
English
Noun
(-)- The phantoms, for so they then seemed, were flitting on the other side of the deck, and, with a noiseless celerity , were casting loose the tackles and bands of the boat which swung there.
“My parsnip wine is really extra good this year. Dr Jellyfield always takes a glass when he comes—which isn’t very often, I’m pleased to say, because my health is always remarkably good.”
“That will not prevent me from drinking to it,” said Peter, disposing of the parsnip wine with a celerity which might have been due to eagerness but, to Harriet, rather suggested a reluctance to let the draught linger on the palate.