induce

induce, persuade, prevail, get are comparable when meaning to move another by arguments, entreaties, or promises to do or agree to something or to follow a recommended course.

Induce usually implies overcoming indifference, hesitation, or opposition especially by offering for consideration persuasive advantages or gains that depend upon the desired decision being made; the term usually suggests that the decision is outwardly at least made by the one induced rather than forced upon him by the one that induces

{

only those . . . doctors who were possessed of superior courage and capable of supreme self-sacrifice could be induced to continue at the work— Heiser

}

{

the object is to induce the child to lend of his own free will; so long as authority is required, the end aimed at has not been achieved— Russell

}

{

conditions which had induced many persons to emigrate from the old country— Dewey

}

Persuade implies a winning over by an appeal, entreaty, or expostulation addressed as much to feelings as to reason; it usually implies that the one persuaded is more or less won over by the one that persuades

{

it is not very difficult to persuade people to do what they are all longing to do— Huxley

}

{

deputed by the firm of lawyers ... to persuade her to resume her married life— Powell

}

Prevail, usually with on or upon, may be employed in place of either induce or persuade, but it usually carries a stronger implication of opposition to be faced or of good arguments to be overcome

{

he had never before supposed that, could Wickham be prevailed on to marry his daughter, it would be done with so little inconvenience to himself as by the present arrangement— Austen

}

{

I will go now and try to prevail on my mother to let me stay with you— Shaw

}

{

prevailed upon the men in the sloop to sail up the river again, to rescue any survivors— M. S. Douglas

}

Get in this relation (see also GET 1) is a much more neutral term than the others discriminated and it may replace any of them when the method by which a favorable decision is brought about is irrelevant or, sometimes, is deliberately not stressed

{

finally got the boy to do his homework

}

{

tried to get the union to accept arbitration

}

{

succeeded in getting the Russians to relinquish certain claims for war damages— Americana Annual

}

Analogous words: incite, instigate, abet: *move, actuate, drive, impel: motivate, *activate, actuate

Contrasted words: *command, order, enjoin, direct, bid, charge: *prescribe, assign, define