different between instruct vs suppose

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

English

Etymology

From Middle English supposen, borrowed from Old French supposer, equivalent to prefix sub- (“under”) + poser (“to place”); corresponding in meaning to Latin supponere (“to put under, to substitute, falsify, counterfeit”), suppositum. See pose.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /s??p??z/, [s??p???z]
• (US) IPA^(key): /s??po?z/, [s??p?o?z]

• (syncope, contraction)
  • (UK) IPA^(key): /?sp??z/, [?sp??z]
  • (US) IPA^(key): /?spo?z/, [?spo?z]
• Rhymes: -??z

Verb

suppose (third-person singular simple present supposes, present participle supposing, simple past and past participle supposed)

1. (transitive) To take for granted; to conclude, with less than absolute supporting data; to believe.
2. (transitive) To theorize or hypothesize.
3. (transitive) To imagine; to believe; to receive as true.
   • Let not my lord suppose that they have slain all the young men, the king's sons; for Amnon only is dead.
4. (transitive) To require to exist or to be true; to imply by the laws of thought or of nature.

   Purpose supposes foresight.

   • 1752, Charlotte Lennox, The Female Quixote

     One falsehood always supposes another, and renders all you can say suspected.

5. (transitive) To put by fraud in the place of another.

Synonyms

• assume (1,2)
• See also Thesaurus:suppose

Derived terms

• supposable
• supposed to (idiom)
• supposedly

Descendants

• Chinese Pidgin English: supposey

Translations

French

Verb

suppose

1. first-person singular present indicative of supposer
2. third-person singular present indicative of supposer
3. first-person singular present subjunctive of supposer
4. third-person singular present subjunctive of supposer
5. second-person singular imperative of supposer

Italian

Verb

suppose

1. third-person singular past historic of supporre