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What is "indulge"

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indulge
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
indulge
verb
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
indulge your passion for sth (=do something that you enjoy doing very much)
▪ The money enabled him to indulge his passion for horses.
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADVERB
in
▪ But many fans have said no to perhaps the biggest potential moneyspinner a club can indulge in, relocation.
▪ She wanted to be indulged in all this, and who was I not to go along with her?
▪ My principal inheritance was a justification for any irresponsibility I cared to indulge in thereafter.
▪ This will be hard because of the excesses of grandiloquence the politicians have indulged in.
▪ Don't encourage the unthinking sprinkling of salt over food that many people indulge in.
▪ The new obsession with trendy design was indulged in by scattering diamond-shaped symbols around the pages.
▪ Howard Samuel had indulged in, as was not unusual, an enjoyable dinner.
▪ One is that environmental protection is too expensive to indulge in without thought of costs and benefits.
■ NOUN
activity
▪ Wednesday, he indulged in his favorite activity.
▪ Second, there are physical objects, indulging in this activity, but constrained by precise mathematical laws.
experiment
▪ They may be too keen to indulge in social experiments.
▪ In the 1920s, the United States indulged in a similar experiment when it outlawed the distribution and sale of alcoholic beverages.
fantasy
▪ The banks were used as limitless reservoirs to fertilise growth, indulge political fantasy and bribe the governments' friends.
▪ If people want to indulge in fantasies about the glories of nature, that is their business.
▪ Sometimes he would find himself indulging in fantasy, would picture them together in London in his new flat.
▪ And some allow us to indulge in the fantasy of living in an expensive house with lots of servants.
love
▪ She writes a little poetry and prose, and indulges her great love of cooking, at which she excels.
▪ Teaching lets me to indulge my love of history.
▪ He must have started as a joke, to indulge his love of singing and of local folk music.
man
▪ A friend recently told me her man didn't indulge in self help.
▪ Or, to put it another way, would men be able to indulge themselves if every woman was really faithful?
▪ Now you will forgive an old man for indulging in his memories.
▪ However, unlike in birds, it was not just the wives of low-ranking men who indulged.
▪ No man could go on indulging himself with something he despised and not lose something vital to his integral self.
opportunity
▪ Living as he does in Moycullen, he has ample local opportunities to indulge in these pastimes.
passion
▪ Here he was able to indulge a growing passion for literature, but not poetry, he recollects.
▪ Jermyn reminisces about a certain woman with whom he once indulged his passion and vanity.
▪ But instances like the Primitives get rarer and already one feels ashamed for indulging such backward passions.
▪ Turn to the Net to indulge your passion.
people
▪ I liked the way people admired and indulged them.
▪ While it might cut down on drug-related crime, the total level of harm certainly would skyrocket, as more people indulged.
▪ Don't encourage the unthinking sprinkling of salt over food that many people indulge in.
▪ If people want to indulge in fantasies about the glories of nature, that is their business.
▪ To talk of planning and decision making is, to these people, to indulge in self-delusion.
■ VERB
allow
▪ Bech's querulous voice allows Updike to indulge in equal parts of satire and wish-fulfilment.
▪ My privileged position allows me to indulge in self-pity and despair.
▪ Winnie allowed herself to indulge in happy daydreams for some five minutes, and then pulled herself together sharply.
▪ And some allow us to indulge in the fantasy of living in an expensive house with lots of servants.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ Katie's a spoiled brat because her parents indulge her too much.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Indulge

Indulge \In*dulge"\, v. i. To indulge one's self; to gratify one's tastes or desires; esp., to give one's self up (to); to practice a forbidden or questionable act without restraint; -- followed by in, but formerly, also, by to. ``Willing to indulge in easy vices.''
--Johnson.

Indulge

Indulge \In*dulge"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Indulged; p. pr. & vb. n. Indulging.] [L. indulgere to be kind or tender to one; cf. OIr. dilgud, equiv. to L. remissio, OIr. dligeth, equiv. to L. lex, Goth. dulgs debt.]

  1. To be complacent toward; to give way to; not to oppose or restrain;

    1. when said of a habit, desire, etc.: to give free course to; to give one's self up to; as, to indulge sloth, pride, selfishness, or inclinations;

    2. when said of a person: to yield to the desire of; to gratify by compliance; to humor; to withhold restraint from; as, to indulge children in their caprices or willfulness; to indulge one's self with a rest or in pleasure.

      Hope in another life implies that we indulge ourselves in the gratifications of this very sparingly.
      --Atterbury.

  2. To grant as by favor; to bestow in concession, or in compliance with a wish or request.

    Persuading us that something must be indulged to public manners.
    --Jer. Taylor.

    Yet, yet a moment, one dim ray of light Indulge, dread Chaos, and eternal Night!
    --Pope.

    Note: It is remarked by Johnson, that if the matter of indulgence is a single thing, it has with before it; if it is a habit, it has in; as, he indulged himself with a glass of wine or a new book; he indulges himself in idleness or intemperance. See Gratify.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
indulge

1630s, "to grant as a favor;" 1650s, of both persons and desires, "to treat with unearned favor;" a back-formation from indulgence, or else from Latin indulgere "to be complaisant." Related: Indulged; indulging.

Wiktionary
indulge

vb. 1 (context intransitive often followed by "in" English): To yield to a temptation or desire. 2 (context transitive English) To satisfy the wishes or whims of. 3 To give way to (a habit or temptation); not to oppose or restrain. 4 To grant an extension to the deadline of a payment. 5 To grant as by favour; to bestow in concession, or in compliance with a wish or request.

WordNet
indulge

  1. v. give free rein to; "The writer indulged in metaphorical language"

  2. yield (to); give satisfaction to [syn: gratify, pander]

  3. enjoy to excess [syn: luxuriate]

  4. treat with excessive indulgence; "grandparents often pamper the children"; "Let's not mollycoddle our students!" [syn: pamper, featherbed, cosset, cocker, baby, coddle, mollycoddle, spoil]

Usage examples of "indulge".

Unlike Adams, who, except for books, indulged himself in no expenditures beyond what were necessary, Jefferson was continually in and out of Philadelphia shops, buying whatever struck his fancy.

There was further discussion of the sort Aman indulges in when carrying out these quasi-poetic analogies of his, about soft feathers and delicate coloring but even when he is being smooth-tongued and soft-headed he can be acute.

Speaking of the strangeness at first sight, presented to the Anglican mind, of some of their principles and opinions, I bid the reader go forward hopefully, and not indulge his criticism till he knows more about them, than he will learn at the outset.

Lady Appleton indulge in any of the well-known treatments, yet surely she knew them.

Some cities prefer the traditional cruelties of bearbaiting or cockfights, while others indulge their baser appetites with gladiators and arenas.

She does not want to marry Bharata Rahon, but though the King indulges her in every other whim, he is adamant in this matter.

Occasionally Blackie could not resist the temptation to indulge himself in a few jazzy silk ties and handkerchiefs and ascots in florid patterns and brilliant colors, but he made certain never to wear them when he was seeing Emma.

But so far from perishing in the flower of his age, Fritz Brunner had the pleasure of laying his stepmother in one of those charming little German cemeteries, in which the Teuton indulges his unbridled passion for horticulture under the specious pretext of honoring his dead.

South Cardiganshire it seems that about eighty years ago the population, rich and poor, male and female, of opposing parishes, turned out on Christmas Day and indulged in the game of football with such vigour that it became little short of a serious fight.

The Clockmaker was evidently excited by his own story, and to indemnify himself for these remarks on his countrymen, he indulged for some time in ridiculing the Nova Scotians.

It was postponed till the next, and the princes, counts, barons, and knights spent the winter in the capital, unless their purses forbade them to indulge in the luxuries of Court life.

Having no certain way of determining which one might be the correct one, he indulged himself in a bit of a psychic crapshoot, leaving the choice to fate, or to whatever he imagined might be fate.

Begin was ready to indulge messianic Jewish settlers and ultra-Orthodox rabbis who wanted to use the Israeli parliament to delegitimize the Reform and Conservative branches of Judaism.

She never indulged in romantic reflections in which the image of Denbigh was associated.

General Denbigh had indulged his younger son too blindly and too fondly to expect that implicit obedience the admiral calculated to a certainty on, and with every prospect of not being disappointed, from his daughter.