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Derogate   Listen
verb
Derogate  v. t.  (past & past part. derogated; pres. part. derogating)  
1.
To annul in part; to repeal partly; to restrict; to limit the action of; said of a law. "By several contrary customs,... many of the civil and canon laws are controlled and derogated."
2.
To lessen; to detract from; to disparage; to depreciate; said of a person or thing. (R.) "Anything... that should derogate, minish, or hurt his glory and his name."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Derogate" Quotes from Famous Books



... conviction of its excellence, and the experience of its blessings. I can not, indeed, help admiring the wisdom and fortune of this great man. By the phrase 'fortune,' I mean not in the smallest degree to derogate from his merit. But, notwithstanding his extraordinary talent and exalted integrity, it must be considered as singularly fortunate that he should have experienced a lot which so seldom falls to the portion of humanity, and have passed through such a variety of scenes ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing

... my hands, who had been attacking Mr. Hastings's life and conduct, a pedigree. I was appealing to the records of the Company; they answer by sending me to the Herald's Office. Many of your Lordships' pedigrees are obscure in comparison with that of Mr. Hastings; and I only wonder how he came to derogate from such a line of nobles by becoming a contractor ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XII. (of XII.) • Edmund Burke

... to derogate from the balance in our favor as it stands on the entries, and reduces it from four millions, as it there appears, to no more than 2,500,000l. His observation on the looseness and inaccuracy of the export entries is just; and that the error is always an error of excess, I readily ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... freedom of that day brought God and Heaven upon the stage, and exhibited Jesus in every circumstance of his life and death; yet on no occasion does the play descend from the high standard of reverence which such a subject demanded, or derogate from the dignity of the celestial Father and Son. That this was partly due to the Bible will be admitted at once. But there is great credit due to the writer (or writers) who could keep so true ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne

... its laws and to execute its functions in all places does not derogate from the power of the State to execute its laws at the same time and in the same places. The one does not exclude the other, except where both can not be executed at the same time. In that case the words of the Constitution itself show which is to ...
— Messages and Papers of Rutherford B. Hayes - A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents • James D. Richardson

... sportfulness of wit and fancy doth contain an intrinsic and inseparable turpitude; since it may be so cleanly, handsomely, and innocently used, as not to defile or discompose the mind of the speaker, nor to wrong or harm the hearer, nor to derogate from any worthy subject of discourse, nor to infringe decency, to disturb peace, to violate any of the grand duties incumbent on us (piety, charity, justice, sobriety), but rather sometimes may yield advantage in those respects; it cannot ...
— Sermons on Evil-Speaking • Isaac Barrow

... plenipotentiaries, where disputes or difficulties had arisen about rank; that General Washington might recollect he had, last summer, addressed a letter to "the honourable William Howe;" that Lord, and General Howe, did not mean to derogate from his rank, or the respect due to him, and that they held his person and character in the highest esteem;—but that the direction, with the addition of &c. &c. &c. implied every thing which ought to follow. Colonel Patterson ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 2 (of 5) • John Marshall

... efforts in the work of creation. For if deformed beings are sometimes born even now, when the scheme of the universe is fully developed, many more may have been "sent before their time scarce half made up," when the planet itself was in the embryo state. But if these notions appear to derogate from the perfection of the Divine attributes, and if these mummies be in all their parts true representations of the human form, may we not refer them to the future rather than the past? May we not be looking into the womb of Nature, and ...
— The Harvard Classics Volume 38 - Scientific Papers (Physiology, Medicine, Surgery, Geology) • Various

... up as it were in chains. Far from the man who cries aloud for justice, this compromise, by his money, with his persecutors! No, my Father, this is not the way that shall lead me back to my country. I will return with hasty steps, if you or any other can open to me a way that shall not derogate from the fame and honour of d.; but if by no such way Florence can be entered, then Florence I shall never enter. What! shall I not every where enjoy the light of the sun and the stars? and may I not seek and contemplate, in every corner of the earth, under the canopy of ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 4 • Lord Byron

... either of Dr. Hutton or of Pope, for they were not born in Ireland, therefore they cannot make bulls; and assuredly their mistakes will not, in the opinion of any person of common sense or candour, derogate from ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. IV • Maria Edgeworth

... Hospitality) sedulously discharging, at the same Time, the different Duties of the pastoral Function; when a foreign Fidler shall run away with tripple that Sum, or more, for one Night's Performance. I would by no Means be understood to derogate from the Merits of fine Performers in the different Parts of Musick, or endeavour to diminish their reasonable Perquisites: But, surely, such Men and such Things are not to be thought of, in Competition with those, who, by Teaching and Preaching, refine ...
— An Essay on the Antient and Modern State of Ireland • Henry Brooke

... universalis: and in 595 Gregory the Great strongly condemned the use of such a phrase, at the same time repudiating its use for his own see. "The Council of Chalcedon," he wrote, "offered the title of universal to the Roman pontiff, but he refused to accept it, lest he should seem thereby to derogate from the honour of his brother bishops." [6] And to the emperor Maurice he said still more distinctly, "I confidently affirm that whosoever calls himself sacerdos universalis, or desires to be so called by others, is in his pride ...
— The Church and the Barbarians - Being an Outline of the History of the Church from A.D. 461 to A.D. 1003 • William Holden Hutton

... as well as his intentions and his abilities. He will believe that I do not differ from him wantonly and on trivial grounds. He is very sure that it was not his embracing one way which determined me to take the other. I have not in newspapers, to derogate from his fair fame with the nation, printed the first rude sketch of his bill with ungenerous and invidious comments. I have not, in conversations industriously circulated about the town, and talked on the benches of this House, attributed ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... being, and saving always the Right of our said high Court of Admiralty of England, and also of the Judge and Register of the same Court, from whom or either of them it is not our Intention in any thing to derogate, by these Presents) and also to arrest and cause and command to be arrested all Ships, Persons, Things, Goods, Wares and Merchandizes for the Premisses and every of them and for other Causes whatsoever concerning ...
— Privateering and Piracy in the Colonial Period - Illustrative Documents • Various

... the last Duke of Gordon. "Jenny" married the fourth Duke, Alexander, in 1767. The career of the Duke's youngest brother George, identified with the "Gordon Riot," caused the family much embarrassment, and even threatened to derogate from the Duchess's dominance with ...
— Some Old Time Beauties - After Portraits by the English Masters, with Embellishment and Comment • Thomson Willing

... late legislative assembly, which sought to derogate from the dignity and prerogatives of Your Majesty—even presuming to require you to divest yourself of your crown in their presence—who deprived you of your Council of State—denied you a voice in the ...
— Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chili, Peru and Brazil, - from Spanish and Portuguese Domination, Volume 2 • Thomas Cochrane, Tenth Earl of Dundonald

... things are presented by images. Nor is that signal passage wherewith the book comes to a close. Be it permitted to cite it here again. It has taken its place, it is among the paragons of our literature. Our language will not lapse or derogate while this prose stands for appeal: "I lingered . . . under that benign sky; watched the moths fluttering among the heath and harebells, listened to the soft wind breathing through the grass, and wondered how anyone could ever imagine unquiet slumbers for the sleepers ...
— Hearts of Controversy • Alice Meynell

... present powerful passion. When once a woman has got the length to undervalue the immediate shame, ruin and disgrace she has to dread from being detected in an amour, religious motives never can restrain her from indulging her inclinations. Far be it from me, by any thing here said, to derogate in the least from the utility of this great and fundamental article in all religions, the commonly received doctrine of rewards and punishments in a future state. On the contrary, I am sensible of its utility in the highest ...
— Critical Remarks on Sir Charles Grandison, Clarissa, and Pamela (1754) • Anonymous

... on the human species? Such are, nevertheless, the fatal opinions with which the mind of nations has been fed for thousands of years: they are so dangerous, that if by a happy want of just inference, he did not derogate in his conduct from these afflicting ideas, he would fall into the most abject stupidity. How could man occupy himself with a perishable world, ready every moment to crumble into atoms? How dream of rendering ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 1 • Baron D'Holbach

... to that act. Again, there are special occasions, in view of which the legislator undertakes to regulate the whole outward conduct of a man by positive enactment, as with a soldier on parade: what is not there commanded, is forbidden. But these instances do not derogate from our general proposition, which is proved in this way. The office of law is not to loose, but to bind. It declares, not what the subject may do, but what he must or must not. It does not bring liberty, but restriction. Therefore, if any one wishes to assert a ...
— Moral Philosophy • Joseph Rickaby, S. J.

... not, as thou dost imagine, played at that low game as to derogate from thy neighbour; yet thou hast played at that high game as to derogate from thy God; for thou hast robbed God of the glory of salvation; yea, declared, that as to that there is no trust to be put in him. "Lo, this is the man that made not God his strength; but trusted in the abundance ...
— The Pharisee And The Publican • John Bunyan

... and in the hours of his gentle morning potations, was content habitually to slumber. The Captain's gait we have described as "rolling;" which in fact it was; but without meaning at all, by that expression, to derogate from its firmness: for firm it also was as the tread of a hippopotamus; and wheresoever the sole of his vast splay foot was planted, there a man would have sworn it had taken root like a young oak: but a figure as broad as his could do no other than roll ...
— Walladmor: - And Now Freely Translated from the German into English. - In Two Volumes. Vol. I. • Thomas De Quincey

... the hands best qualified to conduct them. The law must not exist for the advantage of the minority, nor for that of the majority, but for the entire community.—In regard to this first article no one must derogate from it, neither the minority nor the majority, neither the Assembly elected by the nation, nor the nation itself, even if unanimous. It has no right arbitrarily to dispose of the common weal, to put ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 2 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 1 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... hat slouched over his brows, he traversed the short interval of space betwixt his own apartments and those of the Lady Penelope. In a buck of the old school, one of Congreve's men of wit and pleasure about town, this would have been a departure from character; but the present fine man does not derogate from his quality, even by exhibiting all the moody and gentlemanlike solemnity of Master Stephen.[II-C] So, Lord Etherington was at liberty to carry on his reflections, without attracting observation.—"I have put a stopper into the mouth of that ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott

... of, or derogate in the least, from the respect and obedience you owe your parents. It is their sacred duty and right to advise you; and to whom should you look for a more disinterested advice? A young girl would indeed be an object of pity if, instead of finding a truly Christian tenderness ...
— Serious Hours of a Young Lady • Charles Sainte-Foi

... Lady Emily, with young Stanley and the Bailie, for Edward and the rest of the party remained on the terrace to examine a new greenhouse stocked with the finest plants. The Baron resumed his favourite topic—'However it may please you to derogate from the honour of your burgonet, Colonel Talbot, which is doubtless your humour, as I have seen in other gentlemen of birth and honour in your country, I must again repeat it as a most ancient and distinguished bearing, ...
— Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete • Sir Walter Scott

... unwise it is to derogate from the ancient rights of those on whom it is incumbent to prove the purity of blood of the sovereign of this land. However, Rameses sits on the throne; may life bloom for him, with health and strength!"—[A formula which even in private letters constantly ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... unbending. The fat old gendarme was putting her through a set of tricks, which she executed with complete aplomb and intelligence. There was nothing violent in these exercises; nothing a dog of the best breeding in the world could have felt to derogate from dignity. She was much petted and applauded for her performances, and was rewarded by two or three lumps of sugar, which she ate without any of the vulgar haste characteristic of most dogs in their dealings ...
— Schwartz: A History - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray

... tributary lay From one who cringeth not to titled state Conventional, and lacketh will to prate Of comeliness—though thine, to which did pay The haughty Childe his tuneful homage, may No minstrel deem a harp-theme derogate. I reckon thee among the truly great And fair, because with genius thou dost sway The thought of thousands, while thy noble heart With pity glows for Suffering, and with zeal Cordial relief and solace to impart. Thou didst, while I rehearsed Toil's wrongs, reveal Such ...
— The Baron's Yule Feast: A Christmas Rhyme • Thomas Cooper

... with joy, and his heart was warmed with the pleasing sensations of affection and confidence, by the same letter, from which ALMORAN had extracted the bitterness of jealousy and resentment, and as he had no idea that an act of courtesy to his brother could derogate from his own dignity or importance, he indulged the honest impatience of his heart to communicate the pleasure with which it overflowed: he was, indeed, somewhat disappointed, to find no traces of satisfaction in the countenance of ALMORAN, when he saw the same paper in his hand, which had impressed ...
— Almoran and Hamet • John Hawkesworth

... personal coming of Christ, and not any providential interposition, is here symbolized, is self-evident. For, while no created object can adequately symbolize Him, it would derogate from the dignity of his character and position to be a symbol of some inferior object. In all mere providential interpositions, foreshown by symbolic imagery, the predicted events are represented by corresponding acts of symbolic agents. War between nations ...
— A Brief Commentary on the Apocalypse • Sylvester Bliss

... Kyushu. They were received with great cordiality by the prince, who evinced the utmost curiosity concerning the Portuguese who were on this ship. Pinto naively confesses that "we rendered him answers as might rather fit his humor than agree with the truth, ... that so we might not derogate from the great opinion he had ...
— Japan • David Murray

... no means wish to derogate from Dr Grantly's high position in his own archdeaconry,—to which, as you are aware, I am not attached,—nor to criticise his conduct in any respect. It would be unbecoming in me to do so. But I cannot accept it as a point in ...
— The Last Chronicle of Barset • Anthony Trollope

... I mean to derogate nothing from the diligence or integrity of the present, or of any former board of Green Cloth. But what skill can members of Parliament obtain in that low kind of province? What pleasure can they have ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... place and you baith!" reiterated Campbell. "The only drap o' gentle bluid that's in your body was our great-grand-uncle's that was justified* at Dumbarton, and you set yourself up to say ye wad derogate frae your ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... Glenarvan's advice, they resolved to affect utter indifference before the natives. It was the only way to impress these ferocious natures. Savages in general, and particularly the Maories, have a notion of dignity from which they never derogate. They respect, above all things, coolness and courage. Glenarvan was aware that by this mode of procedure, he and his companions would spare themselves ...
— In Search of the Castaways • Jules Verne

... justified it to his own conscience on the ground that it was in keeping with his character as second Crusoe. Robinson Crusoe, in his estimation, was the greatest and most glorious man that ever lived. Charlie had taken him for his model in life; and it would derogate from the dignity of his position, while enacting the man Crusoe,—"monarch of all he surveyed,"—to obey as the child Charlie. He was willing, when in the house, to do what was expected of him, as a boy under subjection; but when he was in his Crusoe cave, alias the ...
— The Cabin on the Prairie • C. H. (Charles Henry) Pearson

... whatever pleased him to the advantage of Agesilaus, would dare to bring them into comparison." Does he speak of paralleling Lysander to Sylla. "There is," says he, "no comparison, either in the number of victories or in the hazard of battles, for Lysander only gained two naval battles." This is not to derogate from the Romans; for having only simply named them with the Greeks, he can have done them no injury, what disparity soever there may be betwixt them and Plutarch does not entirely oppose them to one another; there is no preference in general; ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne

... to start, to back down and postpone their departure, just to suit the convenience of his neighbours, would derogate from his own importance. His men might think ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown

... hands, arms, and of the whole body, including the pelvis—which has its own peculiar orbital and sidelong swing—were in perfect sympathy one part with another. The movements were so fascinating that one was at first almost hypnotized and disqualified for criticism and analytic judgment. Not to derogate from the propriety and modesty of the woman's motions, under the influence of her Delsartian grace one gained new appreciation of "the charm of woven paces and of ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson

... out his original intention, that, namely, of dropping these Readings altogether, as simply exhausting and unremunerative. He had long since come to realise that it could in no conceivable way whatever derogate from the dignity of his position as an author, to appear thus in various parts of the United Kingdom, before large masses of his fellow-countrymen, in the capacity of a Public Reader. His so appearing was a gratification to himself as an artist, and was ...
— Charles Dickens as a Reader • Charles Kent

... him to account for his behavior to Granvella, and alluded particularly to the livery invented in derision of the cardinal. Egmont protested that the whole affair had originated in a convivial joke, and nothing was further from their meaning than to derogate in the least from the respect that was due to royalty. "If he knew," he said, "that any individual among them had entertained such disloyal thoughts be himself would challenge him to answer for ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... who came in leaning on the arm of her father, the old Prince. The Prince knew the Neapolitan Ambassador, whom he had often seen with the Duchess. He had been one of the first to visit the Duchess of Palma. A man of intelligence and devotion to pleasure, he thought he did not at all derogate from his dignity by civility to a young and beautiful woman, who bore so nobly the name which was conferred on her by love ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various

... by a fundamental law, a Doge could not leave the city without instantly losing his power and dignity, the King answered this message to the effect that the Doge would obey as an extraordinary circumstance, that in this solitary case he would derogate from the laws of the Genoese Republic, and that, the King's will being explicit and unalterable, the Doge would none the less maintain ...
— The Memoirs of Madame de Montespan, Complete • Madame La Marquise De Montespan

... and confederation shall not at all derogate from the pre-eminence, right, and dominion whatsoever of either of the confederates in their seas, straits, and waters whatsoever; but they shall have and retain the same to themselves in the same fulness as they have hitherto enjoyed the same, and ...
— A Journal of the Swedish Embassy in the Years 1653 and 1654, Vol II. • Bulstrode Whitelocke

... more of fright than of exultation. But the lovelier, softer, simpler, and more pensive parts of the Bible are very dear to the gentle Spectator, and are finely, if faintly, reproduced in his writings. Indeed, the principle which would derogate from Addison's works, would lead to the depreciation of portions of the Scriptures too. "Ruth" is not so grand as the "Revelation;" the "Song of Solomon" is not so sublime as the "Song of Songs, which is Isaiah's;" and the story of Joseph has not the mystic grandeur or rushing ...
— The Poetical Works of Addison; Gay's Fables; and Somerville's Chase • Joseph Addison, John Gay, William Sommerville

... seldom showing himself abroad; rarely received his friends, not wishing, as he said, that the weaknesses of the man should derogate from the sacred character of the judge. This latter reason had deterred him from marrying, though he felt the need of ...
— The Mystery of Orcival • Emile Gaboriau

... General Vandeleur," retorted Charlie, "that because my sister has had the misfortune to marry you, she there and then forfeited her rights and privileges as a lady? I own, sir, that by that action she did as much as anybody could to derogate from her position; but to me she is still a Pendragon. I make it my business to protect her from ungentlemanly outrage, and if you were ten times her husband I would not permit her liberty to be restrained, nor her private messenger to ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Stories • Various

... Did he think the Life of this Child too great a Good to grant, when he thought not Christ and Glory too precious? Away with that Thought, Oh my unbelieving Heart, and with every Thought which would derogate from such rich amazing Grace, or would bring any thing in comparison with it. Art thou under these Obligations to him, and wilt thou yet complain? With what Grace, with what Decency canst thou dispute this, or any other Matter, with thy GOD? What Right have I yet to ...
— Submission to Divine Providence in the Death of Children • Phillip Doddridge

... expressions which, without intending to derogate from the high regard due to such respectable authorities, I have thus freely ventured to point out, seemed to have proceeded from mistaking the constituent letters of the conjunction in question. It would appear that d was originally a radical letter of the ...
— Elements of Gaelic Grammar • Alexander Stewart

... looked at the footman. He was perfectly serious and did not add to his words the sort of smile by which servants usually comment on the actions of a superior who seems to them to derogate ...
— Paz - (La Fausse Maitresse) • Honore de Balzac

... all unwise in so doing. His great compeer, Henry the Seventh, did not hasten to adopt the same project submitted to him by Bartholomew Columbus, sent into England[8] for that purpose by his brother Christopher; and it has not been thought to derogate ...
— The Life of Columbus • Arthur Helps

... that lady's kindness to him was considerate and incessant; but there might still be danger, and Lady Glencora felt that she was responsible that the old nobleman should do nothing, in the feebleness of age, to derogate from the splendour of his past life. What if some day his grace should be off to Paris and insist on making Madame Goesler a duchess in the chapel of the Embassy! Madame Goesler had hitherto behaved very well;—would ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope

... butternut, hemlock, basswood, and birch is cleared off to give room for saplings of soft maple, cottonwood, and brittle willow. It is felt that the inexpensiveness of leaving the forest trees standing would derogate from the dignity that should invest an article which is intended to serve ...
— The Theory of the Leisure Class • Thorstein Veblen

... width, in which I have found no difficulty to establish swarms. However, bees must not be entrusted with the charge of constructing a single comb: Nature has taught them to make parallel ones, which is a law they never derogate from, unless when constrained by some particular arrangement. Therefore, if left to themselves in these thin hives, as they cannot form two combs parallel to the plane of the hive, they will form several small ones perpendicular to it, and, in that case, all is equally lost ...
— New observations on the natural history of bees • Francis Huber

... affirm) and all the sacred Rules, Precepts and Commands of the Almighty which he hath given the Sons of Men to observe and keep in their respective Places, Orders and Degrees, would be to no purpose; which unaccountably derogate from the Divine Wisdom of the most High, who hath made nothing in vain, but hath Holy Ends in all his Dispensations to the Children ...
— History of the Negro Race in America From 1619 to 1880. Vol 1 - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George W. Williams

... sideways, and he flushed and winced. "I would not derogate from women, nor rate myself so high. I meant only that we imagine—well, monstrous heaps of nonsense. For instance, we often fancy that they care for us when they don't—and whose fault is that but ours? There's a deal of rot talked about lords of creation—when a man isn't able to be lord of ...
— A Pessimist - In Theory and Practice • Robert Timsol



Words linked to "Derogate" :   pick at, derogation, belittle, derogative, derogatory, talk down, disparage, minimize, denigrate



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