Expedient vs Wise - What's the difference?
expedient | wise | Synonyms |
Simple, easy, or quick; convenient.
* Bible, John xvi. 7
* Whately
Governed by self-interest, often short-term self-interest.
* 1861 , John Stuart Mill,
(obsolete) Quick; rapid; expeditious.
* Shakespeare
A method or means for achieving a particular result, especially when direct or efficient; a resource.
* 1906 , O. Henry, :
* 2009 , (Diarmaid MacCulloch), A History of Christianity , Penguin 2010, page 709:
Showing good judgement or the benefit of experience.
(colloquial) Disrespectful.
To become wise.
(ergative, slang) Usually with "up", to inform or learn.
(archaic) Way, manner, method.
* 1850 , The Burden of Nineveh , lines 2-5
* 1866 , , A Ballad of Life , lines 28-30
* 1926 , J. S. Fletcher, Sea Fog , page 308
(dialectal) to instruct
(dialectal) to advise; induce
(dialectal) to show the way, guide
(dialectal) to direct the course of, pilot
(dialectal) to cause to turn
As adjectives the difference between expedient and wise
is that expedient is simple, easy, or quick; convenient while wise is showing good judgement or the benefit of experience.As nouns the difference between expedient and wise
is that expedient is a method or means for achieving a particular result, especially when direct or efficient; a resource while wise is way, manner, method.As a verb wise is
to become wise.As an acronym WISE is
acronym of wing-in-surface effect|lang=en.expedient
English
Adjective
(en adjective)- Most people, faced with a decision, will choose the most expedient option.
- It is expedient for you that I go away.
- Nothing but the right can ever be expedient , since that can never be true expediency which would sacrifice a greater good to a less.
- But the Expedient', in the sense in which it is opposed to the Right, generally means that which is ' expedient for the particular interest of the agent himself; as when a minister sacrifices the interests of his country to keep himself in place.
- His marches are expedient to this town.
Noun
(en noun)- He would never let her know that he was aware of the strange expedient to which she had been driven by her great distress.
- Depressingly, [...] the expedient of importing African slaves was in part meant to protect the native American population from exploitation.
External links
* * ----wise
English
Etymology 1
From (etyl) wis, wys, from (etyl) . Cognate with Dutch wijs, German weise, Swedish vis. Compare wit.Adjective
(er)- Storing extra food for the winter was a wise decision.
- They were considered the wise old men of the administration.
- "It is a profitable thing, if one is wise , to seem foolish" - Aeschylus
- Don't get wise with me!
Usage notes
* Objects: person, decision, advice, counsel, saying, etc.Antonyms
* unwise * foolishDerived terms
* crack wise * wisdom * wiseacre * wise apple * wiseass * wisecrack * wise guy * wise-hearted * wiseling * wiselike * wiseness * wizen * wizard * word to the wiseVerb
(wis)- Mo wised him up about his situation.
- ''After Mo had a word with him, he wised up.
Etymology 2
From (etyl) .Noun
(en noun)- ... the prize
- Dead Greece vouchsafes to living eyes, —
- Her Art for ever in fresh wise
- From hour to hour rejoicing me.
- A riven hood was pulled across his eyes;
- The token of him being upon this wise
- Made for a sign of Lust.
- And within a few minutes the rest of us were on our way too, judiciously instructed by Parkapple and the Brighton official, and disposed of in two taxi-cabs, the drivers of which were ordered to convey us to Rottingdean in such wise that each set his load of humanity at different parts of the village and at the same time that the bus was due to arrive at the hotel.
