- novice
- novice, novitiate, apprentice, probationer, postulant, neophyte are comparable when applied to one who is a beginner, especially in a trade, a profession, a career, or a sphere of life.Novice and the less common novitiate may be applied to anyone who comes under this description, since inexperience is their chief distinguishing implication{
a novice in writing
}{a novice in mountain climbing had better not start with Mount Everest— Guérard
}{acquaint the novice with the manuscripts about which the experts talk— Monaghan
}{show the Communist novitiate as a human being with idealistic impulses— Daniel Bell
}{novitiates to the druidic priesthood required twenty years' training in the mysteries—C. W. Ferguson
}Novice is specifically applied to a new member of a religious order who is undergoing training before taking first and usually not the final vows.Apprentice is applicable to a beginner who is serving under another as his master or teacher{a graduate assistant would begin as an apprentice to a full-time staff member— H. R. Bowen
}{the breathless, the fructifying adoration of a young apprentice in the atelier of some great master of the Renaissance— Brooks
}In such applications it emphasizes subjection to supervision and discipline rather than inexperience. It often denotes a young person who is starting his working career as a beginner at a skilled trade under an arrangement involving both work and on-the-job tuition and often a planned schedule of supplementary study or applies to an enlisted man in the United States Navy (usually called in full apprentice seaman) who is receiving instruction in seamanship, gunnery, and the rudiments of a general education.Probationer designates a beginner who is on trial for a period of time and must prove his aptitude for the work or life{the young ones who are seeking recognition and establishment—the graduate students and the instructors—in general, the probationers in the field— R. M. Weaver
}{the brevity and vanity of this life, in which we are but probationers— Richardson
}Postulant implies candidacy for admission (as into a religious order); it may also imply acceptance for a period of probation{the Essenes had books of their own which the postulant for admission to their sect had to swear to preserve— Jeffery
}{words . . . often answering to calls too subtile for analysis, are constantly presenting themselves as postulants for recognition— Fitzedward Hall
}Neophyte usually suggests initiation, and is applicable to one who is learning the ways, methods, or principles of something (as an art, a science, a society, a club, or a religious faith) with which he is newly connected{such an encounter usually perplexes the neophyte at first— M. C. Cooke
}It often carries connotations of innocence and youthful eagerness derived from its association with a newly baptized person or convert to Christianity{the old philosopher of Monticello was more than pleased with this ardent neophyte .... Not since his own years abroad had Jefferson seen such an eager student— Brooks
}
New Dictionary of Synonyms. 2014.
