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Merit vs Dignity - What's the difference?

merit | dignity | Related terms |

In obsolete terms the difference between merit and dignity

is that merit is the quality or state of deserving either good or bad; desert while dignity is fundamental principle; axiom; maxim.

As nouns the difference between merit and dignity

is that merit is something deserving positive recognition while dignity is a quality or state worthy of esteem and respect.

As a verb merit

is to earn or to deserve.

merit

English

Noun

(en noun)
  • Something deserving positive recognition.
  • His reward for his merit was a check for $50.
  • Something worthy of a high rating.
  • A claim to commendation or reward.
  • The quality of deserving reward.
  • * Shakespeare
  • Reputation is oft got without merit , and lost without deserving.
  • * Alexander Pope
  • To him the wit of Greece and Rome was known, / And every author's merit , but his own.
  • Reward deserved; any mark or token of excellence or approbation.
  • His teacher gave him ten merits .
  • * Prior
  • those laurel groves, the merits of thy youth
  • (obsolete) The quality or state of deserving either good or bad; desert.
  • * Shakespeare
  • Be it known, that we, the greatest, are misthought / For things that others do; and when we fall, / We answer others' merits in our name.

    Synonyms

    * (l) * (l)

    Antonyms

    * (l)

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To earn or to deserve.
  • *
  • , title=(The Celebrity), chapter=5 , passage=Although the Celebrity was almost impervious to sarcasm, he was now beginning to exhibit visible signs of uneasiness, the consciousness dawning upon him that his eccentricity was not receiving the ovation it merited .}}
  • To be worthy or deserving.
  • (obsolete, rare) To reward.
  • (Chapman)

    Derived terms

    * (l) * (l) * (l) * (l)

    Anagrams

    * ----

    dignity

    Noun

    (dignities)
  • A quality or state worthy of esteem and respect.
  • * 1752 , (Henry Fielding), , I. viii
  • He uttered this ... with great majesty, or, as he called it, dignity .
  • * 1981 , African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights , art. 5
  • Every individual shall have the right to the respect of the dignity inherent in a human being.
  • * 2008 , Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology (ECNH) [Switzerland]
  • 'The dignity' of living beings with regard to plants: Moral consideration of plants for their own sake', 3: ... the ECNH has been expected to make proposals from an ethical perspective to concretise the constitutional term ' dignity of living beings with regard to plants. Dignity of Plants
  • Decorum, formality, stateliness.
  • * 1934 , Aldous Huxley, "Puerto Barrios", in Beyond the Mexique Bay :
  • Official DIGNITY tends to increase in inverse ratio to the importance of the country in which the office is held.Columbia World of Quotations 1996.
  • High office, rank, or station.
  • * 1781 , Edward Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire , F. III. 231:
  • He ... distributed the civil and military dignities among his favourites and followers.
  • * Macaulay
  • And the king said, What honour and dignity hath been done to Mordecai for this?
  • One holding high rank; a dignitary.
  • * Bible, Jude 8.
  • These filthy dreamers speak evil of dignities .
  • (obsolete) Fundamental principle; axiom; maxim.
  • * Sir Thomas Browne
  • Sciences concluding from dignities , and principles known by themselves.

    Synonyms

    * worth * worthiness

    Coordinate terms

    * augustness, humanness, nobility, majesty, grandeur, glory, superiority, wonderfulness

    See also

    * affirmation * integrity * self-respect * self-esteem * self-worth

    References

    * *

    Anagrams

    *