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Passive   /pˈæsɪv/   Listen
Passive

adjective
1.
Lacking in energy or will.  Synonym: inactive.
2.
Peacefully resistant in response to injustice.  Synonym: peaceful.
3.
Expressing that the subject of the sentence is the patient of the action denoted by the verb.
noun
1.
The voice used to indicate that the grammatical subject of the verb is the recipient (not the source) of the action denoted by the verb.  Synonym: passive voice.  "'The ball was thrown' is an abbreviated passive"



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WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University


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"Passive" Quotes from Famous Books



... was that to his host of passive enemies, Tarzan of the Apes added that day two active foes, both of whom remained awake long into the night planning means of revenge upon the white devil-god who had brought them into ridicule and disrepute, but with their most malevolent schemings ...
— Jungle Tales of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... what you are saying. If I have wronged you, I swear I did it unintentionally. I loved Stella from the first—who could help it? But I thought she was virtually bound to you, and I did not try to win her away. You don't know what it cost me to remain passive. I know that you have always distrusted me, but hitherto you have had no reason to. But today I found that she was free—that she did not care for you! And I found—or thought I found—that there was a chance for me. I took it. ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1905 to 1906 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... and Bedford of the present day, who appear to have lost their senses, and to be ready to peril all their great possessions to gratify the passions of the moment. He says:—'But riches do not in all cases secure even an inert and passive resistance; there are always in that description men whose fortunes, when their minds are once vitiated by passion or evil principle, are by no means a security from their actually taking their part against the ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville
... that many other causes, beside the supposed preference on the part of one sex for certain material adornments possessed by the other, influence the pairing of animals. In a very large number of cases the female is quite passive in the matter. The question is decided by a battle between the males, and the female seems, as a matter of course, to become the mate of the conqueror. In many other cases pairing seems to be the result of accident; the two ...
— The Story of Creation as told by Theology and by Science • T. S. Ackland
... England. Nixt the Royalists say conquaest is a just title to a croune. So Baleus[368] in his Sacro-sancta Regum Maiestas, cap. 17; but so be Cromwell conquered our country, ergo, he was our lawful governour and had just title to our croune. If so, whow could compliance and passive obedience to such a on be treason? In this he triumphs so, that he addes, let al the Royalists answer to this wtout contradicting themselfes if they can. No definition out of the civil Law can be brought of treason which wil comprehend necessary compliance; ...
— Publications of the Scottish History Society, Vol. 36 • Sir John Lauder


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