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Debase   /dəbˈeɪs/   Listen
Debase

verb
(past & past part. debased; pres. part. debasing)
1.
Corrupt morally or by intemperance or sensuality.  Synonyms: corrupt, debauch, demoralise, demoralize, deprave, misdirect, pervert, profane, subvert, vitiate.  "Socrates was accused of corrupting young men" , "Do school counselors subvert young children?" , "Corrupt the morals"
2.
Lower in value by increasing the base-metal content.  Synonym: alloy.
3.
Corrupt, debase, or make impure by adding a foreign or inferior substance; often by replacing valuable ingredients with inferior ones.  Synonyms: adulterate, dilute, load, stretch.



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"Debase" Quotes from Famous Books



... Burley threw off a rude but spirited translation of that divine lyric. "O materialist!" cried the boy, with his bright eyes suffused. "Schiller calls on the gods to take him to their heaven with them; and you would debase the gods to ...
— My Novel, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... Dominic also arrived at the poverty of the gospel, but the road by which he reached it was different indeed from that which St. Francis had followed; while the latter had soared to it as on wings, had seen in it the final emancipation from all the anxieties which debase this life, St. Dominic considered it only as a means; it was for him one more weapon in the arsenal of the host charged with the defence of the Church. We must not see in this a mere vulgar calculation; his ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier

... harangued with equal skill and energy on military affairs, proposed that the forces should be augmented by adding new levies to the old companies, without increasing the number of officers; as such an augmentation served only to debase the dignity of the service, by raising the lowest of mankind to the rank of gentlemen; and to extend the influence of the minister, by multiplying his dependents. He therefore moved for a resolution, that the augmenting ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett

... M. Bergson's system precludes ethics: I cannot think that observation just. Apart from the moral inspiration which appears throughout his philosophy, which is indeed a passionate attempt to exalt (or debase) values into powers, it offers, I should say, two starting-points for ethics. In the first place, the elan vital ought not to falter, although it can do so: therefore to persevere, labour, experiment, propagate, must be duties, and the opposite must be sins. In the second place, freedom, ...
— Winds Of Doctrine - Studies in Contemporary Opinion • George Santayana

... the utmost point consistent with due subordination to the objects displayed. To enter a room in the Louvre is an education in itself; but two steps on the filthy floor and under the iron forks, half scaffold, half gallows, of the big Norwood glass bazaar, debase mind and eye at once below possibility of looking at anything with profit all the day afterwards. I have just heard that a French picture dealer is to have charge of the picture gallery there, and that the whole interior is to become virtually a large cafe, when—it is hoped—the glass monster ...
— On the Old Road, Vol. 2 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin


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