disabuse
verb
Did you know?
Taken as a product of its parts, one might assume that disabuse means “to not abuse.” While the usage has changed over the years, that assumption isn’t entirely wrong. We know the verb abuse as a word with various meanings having to do with bad physical or verbal treatment, as well as incorrect or excessive use, but when disabuse first appeared in the 17th century, there was a sense of abuse, now obsolete, that meant “to deceive.” Francis Bacon used that meaning, for example, when he wrote in 1605, “You are much abused if you think your virtue can withstand the King’s power.” The prefix dis- has the sense of undoing the effect of a verb, so it’s logical that disabuse means “to undeceive.” English speakers didn’t come up with the idea of joining dis- to abuse all on their own, however. It was the French who first appended their prefix dés- to their verb abuser; our disabuse is modeled after the French word désabuser.
Examples of disabuse in a Sentence
The Editors, National Review, 17 Dec. 2024
For starters, we should be disabused of the canard that an incumbent president would be handcuffed in discharging constitutional duties if subject to prosecution.
—Bruce Fein, Baltimore Sun, 4 Dec. 2024
The unequal distribution of the 2015 nuclear deal’s benefits, alongside the growth of poverty after the imposition of new sanctions, served to disabuse the lower strata of Iranian society of any notion that diplomacy and engagement would remedy their economic pain.
—Hadi Kahalzadeh, Foreign Affairs, 11 Mar. 2021
But her first few studies quickly disabused her of this notion.
—science.org, 30 Oct. 2024
See all Example Sentences for disabuse 
Dictionary Entries Near disabuse
Cite this Entry
“Disabuse.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/disabuse. Accessed 30 Dec. 2024.
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disabuse
verb
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