- medium#
- medium n *mean, instrument, instrumentality, agent, agency, organ, vehicle, channelmedium adj Medium, middling, mediocre, second-rate, moderate, average, fair, indifferent mean midway, or about midway, between the extremes of a scale or measurement or evaluation.Medium usually presupposes reference to some scale of measurement or comparison, whether by literal use of an instrument, or through mental power of measuring or gauging attained by experience{
a boy of medium height
}{abook of medium size
}{a medium grade of motor oil
}{a medium gray
}{the reports . . . received from about 70 publishers, large, medium and small, of hard-cover books— Publishers' Weekly
}{cheddar ... is mild, medium, or sharp, depending on the amount of acidity in the milk— Standen
}Middling is seldom used when accurate measurement or gradation is implied; it is employed chiefly in estimations (as of quality, rank, or value) to describe what is as far removed from the worst or lowest as it is from the best or highest. It may appropriately describe something that fails to measure up to the best or the first rate yet does not merit disapproval or rejection{I discovered that I had been poised for an enormous sale or a failure—a middling success was cruel to take— Mailer
}{both of the writers lauded highly . . . contemporaries who were certainly no better than middling performers in their several avis— Montague
}{not all merchants were merchant princes. The great majority were middling people, mildly prosperous— Plumb
}In commercial use middling sometimes specifically designates the second of three grades{carded yarn spun from 1-in. middling cotton— Sheldon & Blake
}Mediocre tends to be more depreciative than middling; thus, one who describes a moving picture as middling implies that it was good, but far from excellent, but one who describes it as mediocre gives ground for the inference that it was distinctly less than what one might call good. Often the word is modified by an adverb of degree{it is a very mediocre poem
}{he has only mediocre ability
}{my performance is mediocre to the last degree— Austen
}{a best seller is the gilded tomb of a mediocre talent— L. P. Smith
}Second-rate implies a ranking midway between extremes regarded as first-rate and as third-rate{he is possessed of a good heart, and a second- or third-rate brain— Erskine
}{fears that a strong continental coalition would soon surpass Britain . . . and the United Kingdom would gradually sink from the status of a second-rate to a third- rate power— Patrick McMahon
}Frequently second-rate loses all suggestion of a position on a scale of rating and then connotes inferiority and is used interchangeably with mediocre{a second-rate singer
}{a second-rate perfor- mance
}{even an occasional notable critic like Edmund Wilson has dismissed him as second-rate— Cordell
}{a gang of second-rate imitators who enjoyed moving in the reflected glory of the man who could outrun, outdrink, outfight, outlove, and outcuss any other man in the County— Lockridge
}Moderate (see also MODERATE 1) stresses limitations in quality, intensity, or degree; it implies distance from the extreme or from either of the extremes possible to a thing of its kind{moderate wealth
}{a man of moderate ability
}{a moderate wind
}{attain moderate success
}{an infusion of moderate strength
}{I was a moderate scholar and a competent athlete— Benson
}Average (see also under AVERAGE n) implies a theoretical level at which all things of a given kind, class, or category would find themselves or would seek, if their inequalities were resolved{published an article called "The Eclipse of the Highbrow," in which the average man was exalted— Forster
}{an average June day
}However the term is applied more often to what seems of the common run or is undistinguished either by its superiority or its inferiority, or is not exceptional or outstanding in any way; thus, a man of average ability seems to have neither greater nor less ability than that of the ordinary man{the only one . . . with whom he cared to probe into things a little deeper than the average level of club and chophouse banter— Wharton
}{Mr. Shaw has understood everything but the average values of average living. His virtues, like his values, have all been exceptional— J. M. Brown
}Fair is applied to what is neither notably good nor bad, excellent nor poor, large nor small; often, only the context can reveal whether the implication is one of adequacy or of deficiency{scraped together a fair breakfast
}{the enrollment of 475 was composed largely of freshmen, with a fair representation from other classes— Kinne
}{his health was only fair
}{this region has had a fair amount of rain
}{a fair knowledge of English and a smattering of Latin— W. E. Smith
}Indifferent is applied to what is difficult to rate because it is completely unimpressive, warranting neither praise nor censure{play an indifferent game of bridge
}{it is not cluttered up with indifferent and unimportant records, and aims at . . . the best— Edward Sackville-West
}{the surprising obscurity and even indifferent Latinity of Locke the perfectionist— Times Lit. Sup.
}
New Dictionary of Synonyms. 2014.