abandoned

abandoned, reprobate, profligate, dissolute fundamentally mean utterly depraved. Abandoned and reprobate were originally applied to sinners and to their acts.

One who is abandoned by his complete surrender to a life of sin seems spiritually lost or morally irreclaimable

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I disdain . . . to paint her as she is, cruel, abandoned, glorying in her shame!— Cowper

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One who is reprobate is abandoned and therefore rejected by God or by his fellows; reprobate implies ostracism by or exclusion from a social group for a serious offense against its code

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don’t count on my appearing your friend too openly . . . remember always that I’m a reprobate old clergyman— Hugh Walpole

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Profligate and dissolute convey little if any suggestion of divine or social condemnation but both imply complete moral breakdown and self-indulgence to such an extreme that all standards of morality and prudence are disregarded. One who is profligate openly and shamelessly flouts all the decencies and wastes his substance in dissipation

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rescue the Empire from being gambled away by incapable or profligate aristocrats— Froude

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One who is dissolute has completely thrown off all moral and prudential restraints on the indulgence of his appetites

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see them spending and squandering and being irresponsible and dissolute and not caring twopence for the way two thirds of the world live— Rose Macaulay

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Analogous words: depraved, debauched, perverted, debased (see under DEBASE): degenerate, corrupt (see VICIOUS): wanton, lewd, lascivious, libidinous, lecherous (see LICENTIOUS)

Antonyms: redeemed, regenerate

Contrasted words: saved, rescued, reclaimed, delivered (see RESCUE)