- stoop
- stoop{vb Stoop, condescend, deign can mean to descend below the level (as in rank or dignity) where one belongs or thinks he belongs to do something.Stoop implies a descent not only in rank or dignity but also, and more often, from a relatively high moral plane to a lower one; the term, therefore, can suggest disgraceful or shameful action>>{
stoop to fraud
}{to think that you should stoop to lying
}Often the term implies a lowering of one's standards (as of conduct) or a debasement of one's principles for some unworthy end (as to satisfy greed or ambition){aspiring to be the leader of a nation of third-rate men, he had to stoop to the common level— Mencken
}{his ambition was still to paint huge historical pictures; but meanwhile, to keep the pot boiling, he was prepared to stoop to a pettier kind of art— Huxley
}{but on the material side, Mr. Archer, if one may stoop to consider such things— Wharton
}Condescend may imply the stooping of one who is actually exalted in power, rank, or dignity so as to accommodate himself to intercourse with those who are his inferiors; in this sense the term usually suggests graciousness and courtesy and a waiving of formalities{Spain's mighty monarch, in gracious clemency, does condescend, on these conditions, to become your friend— Dryden
}Often, however, the term implies an assumption of superiority and a patronizing manner that tends to offend or affront the person who is regarded as an inferior{no beggar ever felt him condescend, no prince presume— J. R. Lowell
}{those who thought they were honoring me by condescending to address a few words to me—F. W. Robinson
}{he had, of course, every right to condescend. He was the success, the young man of twenty-three with a hit on Broadway— Wouk
}Deign implies a temperament or frame of mind that makes one haughty, arrogant, or contemptuous more often than it implies high rank or dignity or high standards of conduct; it usually means to stoop to what one believes is not fully in keeping with one's dignity or to something that one is reluctant to do or say or offer; therefore the term is most common with scarcely, hardly, or in negative constructions{[the] very dog will hardly deign to bark at you— Arnold
}{my father she deigned to talk with because he was a simple and friendly man and vaguely a relation— Bromfield
}{never deigned to make money in any considerable amount; but he has no doubt that he could do so if he tried— Gorer
}
New Dictionary of Synonyms. 2014.
