different between ecstasy vs despair

English

Alternative forms

• extasy (obsolete)
• ecstacy (obsolete)

Etymology

From Old French estaise (“ecstasy, rapture”), from Latin ecstasis, from Ancient Greek ???????? (ékstasis), from ???????? (exíst?mi, “I displace”), from ?? (ek, “out”) and ?????? (híst?mi, “I stand”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??k.st?.si/

Noun

ecstasy (countable and uncountable, plural ecstasies)

1. Intense pleasure.

   Antonym: agony

   • c. 1599, William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act II, Scene 1, [1]

     This is the very ecstasy of love, / Whose violent property fordoes itself / And leads the will to desperate undertakings / As oft as any passion under heaven / That does afflict our natures.

   • 1634, John Milton, Comus, lines 623-5, [2]

     He loved me well, and oft would beg me sing; / Which when I did, he on the tender grass / Would sit, and hearken even to ecstasy,

2. A state of emotion so intense that a person is carried beyond rational thought and self-control.
3. A trance, frenzy, or rapture associated with mystic or prophetic exaltation.
   • 1692, John Dryden, Cleomenes, Act IV, Scene I, [4]

     What! are you dreaming, Son! with Eyes cast upwards / Like a mad Prophet in an Ecstasy?

4. (obsolete) Violent emotion or distraction of mind; excessive grief from anxiety; insanity; madness.
   • c. 1590, Christopher Marlowe, The Jew of Malta, Act I, [5]

     Come, let us leave him; in his ireful mood / Our words will but increase his ecstasy.

   • c. 1599, William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act III, Scene 1, [6]

     And I, of ladies most deject and wretched, / That suck'd the honey of his music vows, / Now see that noble and most sovereign reason, / Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh; / That unmatch'd form and feature of blown youth / Blasted with ecstasy.

5. (slang) The drug MDMA, a synthetic entactogen of the methylenedioxyphenethylamine family, especially in a tablet form.

   Synonyms: MDMA, molly, (modern vernacular) E, eckie, ecky, XTC, X, thizz, (obsolete) empathy

6. (medicine, dated) A state in which sensibility, voluntary motion, and (largely) mental power are suspended; the body is erect and inflexible; but the pulse and breathing are not affected.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Mayne to this entry?)

Related terms

• ecstatic

Translations

Verb

ecstasy (third-person singular simple present ecstasies, present participle ecstasying, simple past and past participle ecstasied)

1. (intransitive) To experience intense pleasure.
2. (transitive) To cause intense pleasure in.

Anagrams

• Cassety, cytases

Dutch

Alternative forms

• xtc

Etymology

Borrowed from English ecstasy.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??k.st?.si/, /??k.sti.si/
• Hyphenation: ec?sta?sy

Noun

ecstasy m (uncountable)

1. ecstasy (MDMA, recreational drug)

Portuguese

Noun

ecstasy m (usually uncountable, plural ecstasys)

1. ecstasy (drug)

English

Etymology

From Middle English dispeir, from Anglo-Norman despeir and Old French desperer (from Latin despero, desperare), or desesperer, from des- (“dis-”) + esperer (“hope”). See also desperate

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /d??sp??(?)/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /d??sp???/
• Hyphenation: des?pair

Verb

despair (third-person singular simple present despairs, present participle despairing, simple past and past participle despaired)

1. (transitive, obsolete) To give up as beyond hope or expectation; to despair of.
2. (transitive, obsolete) To cause to despair.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Sir W. Williams to this entry?)

3. (intransitive, often with “of”) To be hopeless; to have no hope; to give up all hope or expectation.

Translations

Noun

despair (countable and uncountable, plural despairs)

1. Loss of hope; utter hopelessness; complete despondency.

   He turned around in despair, aware that he was not going to survive

2. That which causes despair.
3. That which is despaired of. (Can we add an example for this sense?)

Synonyms

• desperation
• despondency
• hopelessness

Antonyms

• hope

Translations

Anagrams

• Piedras, aperids, aspired, diapers, praised, pre-AIDS