Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • transitive verb To wish to have or see happen.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A desire; a desired thing; preference.
  • To feel a desire for or the want of; miss; desire.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To desire; to feel the want of; to lack; to miss; to want.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb To miss, to feel the absence of, to long for.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin dēsīderāre, dēsīderāt-, to desire; see desire.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin, from the participle stem of the verb dēsīderāre ("to desire").

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Examples

  • 'I do not desiderate that pie!' was his way of putting it.

    In The Time Of Light dj barber 2010

  • Nay, looking at the general state of things at this day, I desiderate for a School of the Church, if an additional School is to be granted to us, a more central position than

    Harvard Classics Volume 28 Essays English and American Various

  • But what more comfort could a man desiderate than is given by the Holy Spirit?

    The Doctrines of Predestination, Reprobation, and Election Robert Wallace

  • Evidently, if these two foregoing statements are true, Mr. Froude must join us in thinking that a man whose mind could be warped by external influences from the softest commiseration for the sufferings of his kind, one year, into being the cold-blooded deviser of the readiest method for slaughtering unarmed holiday - makers, the very next year, is not the kind of ruler whom he and we so cordially desiderate.

    West Indian Fables by James Anthony Froude Explained by J. J. Thomas

  • We desiderate means of instruction which involve no interruption of our ordinary habits; nor need we seek it long, for the natural course of things brings it about, while we debate over it.

    Harvard Classics Volume 28 Essays English and American Various

  • Over against the criticism of our day even moderately critical writers offer comments such as Skinner (p. 11): "It is a bold thing to desiderate a treatment more worthy of the theme, or more impressive in effect, than we find the severely chiselled outlines and stately cadences of the first chapter of Genesis."

    Exposition of Genesis: Volume 1 1892-1972 1942

  • And tenderness, too—but does that appear a mawkish thing to desiderate in life?

    Beyond Life 1921

  • Then, too, consider his philanthropy! and deliberate how insufferable would be our case if you and I, and all our fellow parishioners, were to-day hobnobbing with other beasts in the Garden which we pretend to desiderate on Sundays!

    Jurgen A Comedy of Justice James Branch Cabell 1918

  • "Truth is not hidden from the Friend of God," replied the hasheesh-eater, "I have erred being drunken with the hasheesh, for in the desiderate city, even in London, so thick upon the ways is the white sea-sand with which the city glimmers that no sound comes from the path of the charioteers, but they go softly like a light sea-wind."

    Tales of Wonder Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett Dunsany 1917

  • London the desiderate city the sky is so deep a blue that by this alone the traveller may know where he has come, and may end his fortunate journey.

    Tales of Wonder Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett Dunsany 1917

Comments

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  • from Carlyle's "Sartor Resartus"

    January 11, 2009