| The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000. |
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| pensive |
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| SYLLABICATION: | pen·sive |
| PRONUNCIATION: |  p n s v |
| ADJECTIVE: | 1. Deeply, often wistfully or dreamily thoughtful. 2. Suggestive or expressive of melancholy thoughtfulness. | | ETYMOLOGY: | Middle English pensif, from Old French, from penser, to think, from Latin p ns re, frequentative of pendere, to weigh. See (s)pen- in Appendix I. | | OTHER FORMS: | pensive·ly —ADVERB
pensive·ness —NOUN
| | SYNONYMS: | pensive, contemplative, reflective, meditative, thoughtful These adjectives mean characterized by or disposed to thought, especially serious or deep thought. Pensive often connotes a wistful, dreamy, or sad quality: “while pensive poets painful vigils keep” (Alexander Pope). Contemplative implies slow directed consideration, often with conscious intent of achieving better understanding or spiritual or aesthetic enrichment: “The Contemplative Atheist is rare … And yet they seem to be more than they are” (Francis Bacon). Reflective suggests careful analytical deliberation, as in reappraising past experience: “Cromwell was of the active, not the reflective temper” (John Morley). Meditative implies earnest sustained thought: The scholar was reticent, aloof, and meditative. Thoughtful can refer to absorption in thought or to the habit of reflection and circumspection: Thoughtful voters carefully considered the candidates.
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| The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by the Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. |
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