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Inflame vs Rankle - What's the difference?

inflame | rankle |

As verbs the difference between inflame and rankle

is that inflame is to set on fire; to kindle; to cause to burn, flame, or glow while rankle is to cause irritation or deep bitterness.

inflame

English

Verb

(inflam)
  • To set on fire; to kindle; to cause to burn, flame, or glow.
  • * Chapman
  • We should have made retreat / By light of the inflamed fleet.
  • (figuratively) To kindle or intensify, as passion or appetite; to excite to an excessive or unnatural action or heat.
  • to inflame desire
  • * Milton
  • more, it seems, inflamed with lust than rage
  • * Dryden
  • But, O inflame and fire our hearts.
  • To provoke to anger or rage; to exasperate; to irritate; to incense; to enrage.
  • * Shakespeare
  • It will inflame you; it will make you mad.
  • *, chapter=12
  • , title= The Mirror and the Lamp , passage=To Edward
  • To put in a state of inflammation; to produce morbid heat, congestion, or swelling, of.
  • to inflame the eyes by overwork
  • To exaggerate; to enlarge upon.
  • * Addison
  • A friend exaggerates a man's virtues, an enemy inflames his crimes.
  • *1773 , (Oliver Goldsmith),
  • *:As you say, we passengers are to be taxed to pay all these fineries. I have often seen a good sideboard, or a marble chimney-piece, though not actually put in the bill, inflame a reckoning confoundedly.
  • To grow morbidly hot, congested, or painful; to become angry or incensed.
  • Synonyms

    * provoke * fire * kindle * irritate * exasperate * incense * enrage * anger * excite * arouse

    rankle

    English

    Verb

    (rankl)
  • (intransitive) To cause irritation or deep bitterness.
  • To fester.
  • a splinter rankles in the flesh
  • * Rowe
  • a malady that burns and rankles inward
  • * Burke
  • This would have left a rankling wound in the hearts of the people.

    Quotations

    * 1590 — , Book I, Canto X *: But yet the cause and root of all his ill,
    Inward corruption and infected sin,
    Not purg'd nor heald, behind remained still,
    And festring sore did rankle yet within, * 1850 — , chapter XIV *: You are beside him, sleeping and waking. You search his thoughts. You burrow and rankle in his heart! * 1890 — , chapter IX *: The close proximity of the two countries, the relative positions of their ports, made the naval situation particularly strong; and the alliance which was dictated by sound policy, by family ties, and by just fear of England's sea power, was further assured to France by recent and still existing injuries that must continue to rankle with Spain. Gibraltar, Minorca, and Florida were still in the hands of England; no Spaniard could be easy till this reproach was wiped out.

    Synonyms

    * (to cause irritation) embitter, irritate * (to fester) fester

    Anagrams

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