Abstain vs Temperate - What's the difference?
abstain | temperate |
(transitive, reflexive, obsolete) Keep or withhold oneself.
Refrain from (something); hold one's self aloof; to forbear or keep from doing, especially an indulgence of the passions or appetites.
* Who abstains from meat that is not gaunt? - Shakespeare, Richard II, II-i
(obsolete) Fast.
Deliberately refrain from casting one's vote at a meeting where one is present.
* Not a few abstained from voting. -
(obsolete) Hinder; keep back; withhold.
* Whether he abstain men from marying [sic]. -
Moderate; not excessive; as, temperate heat; a temperate climate.
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*:Hepaticology, outside the temperate parts of the Northern Hemisphere, still lies deep in the shadow cast by that ultimate "closet taxonomist," Franz Stephani—a ghost whose shadow falls over us all.
*(rfdate) (William Shakespeare) (c.1564–1616)
*:She is not hot, but temperate as the morn.
*(rfdate) (1809-1892)
*:That sober freedom out of which there springs Our loyal passion for our temperate kings.
Moderate in the indulgence of the natural appetites or passions; as, temperate in eating and drinking.
*(rfdate) (Benjamin Franklin) (1706-1790)
*:Be sober and temperate , and you will be healthy.
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*:I am a temperate man and have made it a rule not to drink before luncheon. But I was so much ashamed of my first feeling about Gorman that I thought it well to break my rule.I gave my vote for whisky and soda as the more thorough-going drink of the two. A cocktail is seldom more than a mouthful.
Proceeding from temperance.
*(rfdate) (Alexander Pope) (1688-1744)
*:The temperate sleeps, and spirits light as air.
Living in an environment that is temperate, not extreme.
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(obsolete) To render temperate; to moderate; to soften; to temper.
:* It inflames temperance, and temperates wrath. Marston .