English Synonyms and Antonyms

before the court; about a thing.
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COMPLEX.
Synonyms:
abstruse, confused, intricate, mixed, complicated, conglomerate, involved, multiform, composite, entangled,
manifold, obscure, compound, heterogeneous, mingled, tangled.
That is complex which is made up of several connected parts. That is compound in which the parts are not
merely connected, but fused, or otherwise combined into a single substance. In a composite object the
different parts have less of unity than in that which is complex or compound, but maintain their distinct
individuality. In a heterogeneous body unlike parts or particles are intermingled, often without apparent order
or plan. Conglomerate (literally, globed together) is said of a confused mingling of masses or lumps of various
substances. The New England pudding-stone is a conglomerate rock. In a complex object the arrangement and
relation of parts may be perfectly clear; in a complicated mechanism the parts are so numerous, or so
combined, that the mind can not readily grasp their mutual relations; in an intricate arrangement the parts are
so intertwined that it is difficult to follow their windings; things are involved which are rolled together so as
not to be easily separated, either in thought or in fact; things which are tangled or entangled mutually hold
and draw upon each other. The conception of a material object is usually complex, involving form, color, size,
and other elements; a clock is a complicated mechanism; the Gordian knot was intricate; the twining serpents
of the Laocoon are involved. We speak of an abstruse statement, a complex conception, a confused heap, a
heterogeneous mass, a tangled skein, an intricate problem; of composite architecture, an involved sentence; of
the complicated or intricate accounts of a great business, the entangled accounts of an incompetent or
dishonest bookkeeper.
Antonyms:
clear, homogeneous, plain, uncombined, uniform, direct, obvious, simple, uncompounded, unraveled.
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CONDEMN.
Synonyms:
Synonyms and Antonyms, by James Champlin Fernald
97

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blame, convict, doom, reprove, censure, denounce, reprobate, sentence.
To condemn is to pass judicial sentence or render judgment or decision against. We may censure silently; we
condemn ordinarily by open and formal utterance. Condemn is more final than blame or censure; a
condemned criminal has had his trial; a condemned building can not stand; a condemned ship can not sail. A
person is convicted when his guilt is made clearly manifest to others; in somewhat archaic use, a person is said
to be convicted when guilt is brought clearly home to his own conscience (convict in this sense being allied
with convince, which see under PERSUADE); in legal usage one is said to be convicted only by the verdict of
a jury. In stating the penalty of an offense, the legal word sentence is now more common than condemn; as, he
was sentenced to imprisonment; but it is good usage to say, he was condemned to imprisonment. To denounce
is to make public or official declaration against, especially in a violent and threatening manner.
From the pulpits in the northern States Burr was denounced as an assassin.
COFFIN Building the Nation ch. 10, p. 137. [H. '83.]
To doom is to condemn solemnly and consign to evil or destruction or to predetermine to an evil destiny; an
inferior race in presence of a superior is doomed to subjugation or extinction. Compare ARRAIGN;
REPROVE.
Antonyms:
absolve, applaud, exonerate, pardon, acquit, approve, justify, praise.
Prepositions:
The bandit was condemned to death for his crime.
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CONFESS.
Synonyms:
accept, allow, concede, grant, acknowledge, avow, disclose, own, admit, certify, endorse, recognize.
We accept another's statement; admit any point made against us; acknowledge what we have said or done,
good or bad; avow our individual beliefs or feelings; certify to facts within our knowledge; confess our own
faults; endorse a friend's note or statement; grant a request; own our faults or obligations; recognize lawful
authority; concede a claim. Confess has a high and sacred use in the religious sense; as, to confess Christ
before men. It may have also a playful sense (often with to); as, one confesses to a weakness for
confectionery. The chief present use of the word, however, is in the sense of making known to others one's
own wrong-doing; in this sense confess is stronger than acknowledge or admit, and more specific than own; a
person admits a mistake; acknowledges a fault; confesses sin or crime. Compare APOLOGY; AVOW.
Antonyms:
cloak, deny, disown, hide, screen, conceal, disavow, dissemble, mask, secrete, cover, disguise, dissimulate,
repudiate, veil.
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Synonyms and Antonyms, by James Champlin Fernald
98

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CONFIRM.
Synonyms:
assure, fix, sanction, substantiate, corroborate, prove, settle, sustain, establish, ratify, strengthen, uphold.