different between oration vs orison

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin ?r?ti?, ?r?ti?nem, from ?r? (“I orate”) + -?ti? (“action (nominalizer)”). Cognate with and doublet of orison.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /???e???n/
• Rhymes: -e???n

Noun

oration (plural orations)

1. A formal, often ceremonial speech.

   a funeral oration; an impassioned oration; to make / deliver / pronounce an oration

   • 1752, Samuel Johnson, The Rambler, No. 207, 10 March, 1752, in Volume 6, London: J. Payne and J. Bouquet, 1752, p. 279,^[1]

     The masters of rhetorick direct, that the most forcible arguments be produced in the latter part of an oration, lest they should be effaced or perplexed by supervenient images.
2. (humorous) A lengthy speech or argument in a private setting.
   • 1854, Elizabeth Gaskell, Ruth, Chapter 16,^[2]

     Sally bustled off to set on the kettle for tea, and felt half ashamed, in the quiet of the kitchen, to think of the oration she had made in the parlour.
3. (Catholicism) A specific form of short, solemn prayer said by the president of the liturgical celebration on behalf of the people.

Related terms

Synonyms

• (formal speech): eulogy (funeral oration); homily, sermon (religious); address, discourse, harangue, lecture
• (lengthy speech in a private setting): lecture, spiel

Translations

Verb

oration (third-person singular simple present orations, present participle orationing, simple past and past participle orationed)

1. To deliver an oration; to speak.
   • 1633, John Donne (attributed translator), The Auncient History of the Septuagint. Written in Greeke, by Aristeus 1900. yeares since, London, p. 80,^[3] cited in Henry Todd, A Dictionary of the English Language, London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, 1818, Volume 3,^[4]

     They gave answers with great sufficiency touching all difficulties concerning their own law, and had marvellous promptitude both for orationing and giving judgement.

   • 1764, Samuel Foote, The Mayor of Garratt, Act II, in The Dramatic Works of Samuel Foote, Dublin: S. Price et al., 1778, Volume 1, p. 286,^[5]

     […] Master Primmer is the man for my money; a man of learning; that can lay down the law: why, adzooks, he is wise enough to puzzle the parson: and then, how you have heard him oration at the Adam and Eve of a Saturday night, about Russia and Prussia […]

   • 1876, George Meredith, Beauchamp’s Career, Leipzig: Bernhard Tauchnitz, Volume 2, Chapter 10, p. 129,^[6]

     What right have you to be lecturing and orationing? You’ve no knowledge.

Synonyms

• hold forth, orate, sermonize, speechify

Anagrams

• Ontario, Troiano

English

Etymology

From Middle English orisoun, from Anglo-Norman oreison, oresoun etc. and Old French oraisun etc., from Latin ?r?ti?, ?r?ti?nem (“discourse, prayer”) (whence also English oration).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /????s?n/, /????z?n/

Noun

orison (plural orisons)

1. A prayer.
   • 1917, Wilfred Owen, Anthem for Doomed Youth

       Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle

     Can patter out their hasty orisons.

2. Mystical contemplation or communion.
   • 1902, William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, Lecture 3:

     We shall see later that the absence of definite sensible images is positively insisted on by the mystical authorities in all religions as the sine qua non of a successful orison, or contemplation of the higher divine truths.

   • 1911, Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism: A Study of the Nature and Development of Man's Spiritual Consciousness, Part I, Chapter 3

     Only in certain occult and mystics states: in orison, contemplation, ecstasy and their allied conditions, does the self contrive to turn out the usual tenants, shut the "gateways of the flash," and let those submerged powers which are capable of picking up messages from another plane of being have their turn.

Related terms

• orate
• oration

Translations

Anagrams

• Nooris