Verb

(vitiat)

to spoil, make faulty; to reduce the value, quality, or effectiveness of something

*1851 ,

There was excellent blood in his veins—royal stuff; though sadly vitiated , I fear, by the cannibal propensity he nourished in his untutored youth.

* 1997': ‘Mr Rose,’ says the Physician, ‘this man was brought to us from Russia. Precisely such a case of '''vitiated judgment as I describe at length in my Treatise on Madness. Mayhap you have read it?’ — Andrew Miller, ''Ingenious Pain

to debase or morally corrupt

*1890 , Leo Tolstoy,

*:The robber does not intentionally vitiate people, but the governments, to accomplish their ends, vitiate whole generations from childhood to manhood with false religions and patriotic instruction.

(archaic) to violate, to rape

* 1965': ‘Crush the cockatrice,’ he groaned, from his death-cell. ‘I am dead in law’ – but of the girl he denied that he had ‘attempted to '''vitiate her at Nine years old’; for ‘upon the word of a dying man, both her Eyes did see, and her Hands did act in all that was done’. — John Fowles, ''The Magus

to make something ineffective, to invalidate

*{{quote-book

, author = , title = , year = 1734 , page = 78 , passage = ...all the hinges of the animal frame are subverted, every animal function is vitiated ; the carcass retains but just life enough to make it capable of suffering. }}

Verb

(sophisticat)

To make less natural or innocent.

* 1956–1960 , (second edition, 1960), chapter ii: “Motives and Motivation”, page 38:

Psychologists have developed quasi-causal theories to explain'' the directedness of behaviour, to answer the question ‘Why are certain sorts of reasons operative?’ and these theories may well have insinuated themselves into ordinary language as part of the meaning of “motive”. It might well be, therefore, that people who are slightly sophisticated by psychological theories assume some such necessary connexion [''sc. between giving the motive for an action and making any assertions of a causal kind about a man’s emotional state].

To practice sophistry; change the meaning of, or be vague about in order to mislead or deceive.

To sophisticate the understanding. — Southey.

Yet Butler professes to stick to plain facts, not to sophisticate , not to refine. — M. Arnold.

To alter and make impure, as with the intention to deceive.

To sophisticate wine. — Howell.

They purchase but sophisticated ware. — Dryden.

To make more complex or refined.