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Instigate vs Exasperate - What's the difference?

instigate | exasperate | Related terms |

Instigate is a related term of exasperate.


As verbs the difference between instigate and exasperate

is that instigate is to goad or urge forward; to set on; to provoke; to incite while exasperate is to frustrate, vex, provoke, or annoy; to make angry.

As an adjective exasperate is

(obsolete) exasperated; embittered.

instigate

English

(Webster 1913)

Verb

(instigat)
  • To goad or urge forward; to set on; to provoke; to incite.
    • He hath only instigated his blackest agents to the very extent of their malignity. -Bp. Warburton.

    Usage notes

    Commonly used with reference to evil actions; as, to instigate one to a crime.

    Synonyms

    * (to goad or urge forward): animate, encourage, impel, incite, provoke, spur, stimulate, tempt, urge

    Antonyms

    * (to goad or urge forward): halt, prevent, stop

    Derived terms

    * instigation * instigator

    External links

    * * ----

    exasperate

    English

    Verb

    (exasperat)
  • To frustrate, vex, provoke, or annoy; to make angry.
  • * , Macbeth , act 3, sc. 6:
    • this report
    Hath so exasperate the king that he
    Prepares for some attempt of war.
  • * 1851 , , Moby Dick , ch. 3:
    • The picture represents a Cape-Horner in a great hurricane; the half-foundered ship weltering there with its three dismantled masts alone visible; and an exasperated whale, purposing to spring clean over the craft, is in the enormous act of impaling himself upon the three mast-heads.
  • * 1853 , , Bleak House , ch. 11:
    • Beadle goes into various shops and parlours, examining the inhabitants; always shutting the door first, and by exclusion, delay, and general idiotcy, exasperating the public.
  • * 1987 , " Woman of the Year: Corazon Aquino," Time , 5 Jan:
    • [S]he exasperates her security men by acting as if she were protected by some invisible shield.
  • * 2007 , " Loyal Mail," Times Online (UK), 4 June (retrieved 7 Oct 2010):
    • News that Adam Crozier, Royal Mail chief executive, is set to receive a bumper bonus will exasperate postal workers.

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • (obsolete) Exasperated; embittered.
    • (Shakespeare)
  • * Elizabeth Browning
    • Like swallows which the exasperate dying year / Sets spinning.

    See also

    * exacerbate ----