different between beget vs instruct

English

Etymology

From Middle English begeten, bi?eten, from Old English be?ietan (“to get, find, acquire, attain, receive, take, seize, happen, beget”), [influenced by Old Norse geta ("to get, to guess")] from Proto-Germanic *bigetan? (“to find, seize”), equivalent to be- +? get. Cognate with Old Saxon bigetan (“to find, seize”), Old High German bigezan (“to gain, achieve, win, procure”).

Pronunciation

• (UK, US) IPA^(key): /bi???t/, /b????t/, /b????t/
• Rhymes: -?t

Verb

beget (third-person singular simple present begets, present participle begetting, simple past begot or (archaic) begat, past participle begotten or (rare) begot) (transitive)

1. To father; to sire; to produce (a child).
   • 2003, William H. Frist, Shirley Wilson, Good People Beget Good People: A Genealogy of the Frist Family, Rowman & Littlefield (?ISBN), page 110:

     I believe good people beget good people. If you marry the right person, then you will have good children. But everywhere else in life, too, good people beget good people. In your work, when you hire good people, they, in turn, will hire good ...

2. To cause; to produce.
3. To bring forth.
   • 1614, Ben Jonson, Bartholmew Fayre, Induction:

     If there bee neuer a Seruant-mon?ter i' the Fayre, who can helpe it, he ?ayes ; nor a ne?t of Antiques ? ? Hee is loth to make Nature afraid in his Playes, like tho?e that beget Tales, Tempe?ts, and ?uch like Drolleries, […]
4. (Britain dialectal) To happen to; befall.

Derived terms

• begetter
• begetting
• begotten

Related terms

• begettal, ill-begotten, misbegotten, unbegot, unbegotten, forebegotten

Translations

See also

• sire

References

• beget in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• beget in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

English

Etymology

From Latin ?nstr?ctus, perfect passive participle of ?nstru? (“I instruct; I arrange, furnish, or provide”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??n?st??kt/
• Rhymes: -?kt

Verb

instruct (third-person singular simple present instructs, present participle instructing, simple past and past participle instructed)

1. (transitive) To teach by giving instructions.

   Synonyms: educate, guide

   • c. 1604, William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure, Act I, Scene 3,^[1]

     Supply me with the habit and instruct me

     How I may formally in person bear me

     Like a true friar.

   • 1682, Aphra Behn, The False Count, London: Jacob Tonson, Act III, Scene 2, p. 33,^[2]

     What a dishonour’s this, to me, to have so Dull a Father, that needs to be instructed in his Duty.

   • 1751, Samuel Johnson, The Rambler, No. 156, 14 September, 1751, in Volume 5, London: J. Payne and J. Bouquet, 1752, p. 177,^[3]

     […] the design of tragedy is to instruct by moving the passions,

   • 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter, Chapter 10,^[4]

     […] I should deem you a man sore sick, it may be, yet not so sick but that an instructed and watchful physician might well hope to cure you.

   • 1974, Robert M. Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, New York: William Morrow, Part 4, Chapter 29, p. 353,^[5]

     At the Laundromat I instruct Chris on how to operate the drier, start the washing machines […]

2. (transitive) To tell (someone) what they must or should do.

   Synonyms: command, direct, order

   Usage note: "instruct" is less forceful than "order", but weightier than "advise"

   • c. 1591, William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part 1, Act III, Scene 1,^[6]

     What, shall a child instruct you what to do?

   • 1848, William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair, Chapter 39,^[7]

     All the servants were instructed to address her as “Mum,” or “Madam” […]

   • 1989, John Irving, A Prayer for Owen Meany, New York: Ballantine, 1997, Chapter 5, p. 195,^[8]

     Observing that the Christ Child’s nose was running, she deftly wiped it; then she held the handkerchief in place, while instructing him to “blow.”

Related terms

Translations

Noun

instruct (plural instructs)

1. (obsolete) Instruction.

Adjective

instruct (not comparable)

1. (obsolete) Arranged; furnished; provided.
   • c. 1615, George Chapman (translator), Homer’s Odysses, London: Nathaniell Butter, Book 4, p. 62,^[9]

     For he had neither ship, instruct with oares,

     Nor men to fetch him from those stranger shores.

2. (obsolete) Instructed; taught; enlightened.
   • 1671, John Milton, Paradise Regained, London: John Starkey, Book 1, lines 438-441, p. 24,^[10]

     Who ever by consulting at thy shrine

     Return’d the wiser, or the more instruct

     To flye or follow what concern’d him most,

     And run not sooner to his fatal snare?

Anagrams

• unstrict