- ambition
- ambition, aspiration, pretension mean strong desire for advancement.Ambition has personal advancement or preferment as its end; it may be praiseworthy but is sometimes inordinate{
ambition for fame
}{ambition to hold office
}{Iambition to acquire wealth
}{vaulting ambition, which o’erleaps itself— Shak.
}Aspiration implies as its object something felt to be above one, the striving after which is uplifting or ennobling{aspiration after knowledge
}{that spirit of his in aspiration lifts him from the earth— Shak.
}Aspiration, however, is sometimes used especially in the plural in a derogatory sense of ambition which is felt to be unwarranted or presumptuous{his aspirations must be nipped in the bud
}Pretension (see also CLAIM, PRETENSE) may be preferred to aspiration in this latter sense, for it carries a hint of presumptuousness and, therefore, of lack of real claim to the powers which fulfillment of the ambition or aspiration requires{they are always looked upon, either as neglected, or discontented because their pretensions have failed— Montagu
}More often pretension implies less driving power than ambition or aspiration and suggests the guidance of mere desire rather than the possession of the necessary gifts{it was the undergraduate literary club, whose membership included all nice boys with literary pretensions— Marquand
}
New Dictionary of Synonyms. 2014.
