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Condign vs Condescend - What's the difference?

condign | condescend |

As an adjective condign

is (rare) fitting, appropriate, deserved, especially denoting punishment.

As a verb condescend is

(lb) to come down from one's superior position; to deign (to do something).

condign

English

Adjective

(en adjective)
  • (rare) Fitting, appropriate, deserved, especially denoting punishment
  • * 1591 ?, William Shakespeare, Henry VI Part ii , Act 3, Scene 1:
    • Unless it were a bloody murderer, / Or foul felonious thief that fleeced poor passengers, / I never gave them condign punishment:
  • * 1885 , William Schwenk Gilbert, The Mikado , Act I:
    • Pooh-bah: And so, / Although / I wish to go, / And greatly pine / To brightly shine, / And take the line / Of a hero fine, / With grief condign / I must decline –
  • * 1962 , Vladimir Nabokov, Pale Fire :
    • For a Christian, no Beyond is acceptable or imaginable without the participation of God in our eternal destiny, and this in turn implies a condign punishment for every sin, great and small.
  • * 2004 , George F. Will, "Voters' Obligations", in The Washington Post , October 21, 2004:
    • [A]n undervote usually reflects either voter carelessness, for which the voter suffers the condign punishment of an unrecorded preference, or reflects the voter's choice not to express a preference[.]

    condescend

    English

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • (lb) To come down from one's superior position; to deign (to do something).
  • *1665 , (John Dryden), (The Indian Emperour) , act 1, sc.2:
  • *:Spain's mighty monarch/ In gracious clemency, does condescend / On these conditions, to become your friend.
  • *1847 , (Anne Bronte), Agnes Grey , Ch.5:
  • *:Fanny and little Harriet he seldom condescended to notice; but Mary Ann was something of a favourite.
  • (lb) To treat (someone) as though inferior; to be patronizing (toward someone); to talk down (to someone).
  • *1861 , (Charles Dickens), (Great Expectations) , Ch.29:
  • *:"You must know," said Estella, condescending to me as a brilliant and beautiful woman might, "that I have no heart."
  • *1880 , , Clever Woman of the Family , Ch.7:
  • *:Ermine never let any one be condescending to her, and conducted the conversation with her usual graceful good breeding.
  • *
  • *:At her invitation he outlined for her the succeeding chapters with terse military accuracy?; and what she liked best and best understood was avoidance of that false modesty which condescends , turning technicality into pabulum.
  • To consent, agree.
  • *1671 , (John Milton), (Samson Agonistes) , lines 1134-36:
  • *:Can they think me so broken, so debased / With corporal servitude, that my mind ever / Will condescend to such absurd commands?
  • *1868 , (Horatio Alger), Struggling Upward , Ch.3:
  • *:"This is the pay I get for condescending to let you go with me."
  • To come down.

    • Usage notes

    * This is a catenative verb that takes the to infinitive . See * In sense “to talk down”, the derived participial adjective condescending (and corresponding adverb condescendingly) are more common than the verb itself.

    Synonyms

    * (come down from superior position) acquiesce, deign, stoop, vouchsafe * patronize, put on airs * (consent) yield * (come down) descend

    Related terms

    * condescendence * condescension

    External links

    * *