All 5 Uses of
enable
in
The Scarlet Letter
- There is one likeness, without which my gallery of Custom-House portraits would be strangely incomplete, but which my comparatively few opportunities for observation enable me to sketch only in the merest outline.†
Chpt Intr.
- Then, she was supported by an unnatural tension of the nerves, and by all the combative energy of her character, which enabled her to convert the scene into a kind of lurid triumph.†
Chpt 5 *
- For the sake of the minister's health, and to enable the leech to gather plants with healing balm in them, they took long walks on the sea-shore, or in the forest; mingling various walks with the splash and murmur of the waves, and the solemn wind-anthem among the tree-tops.†
Chpt 9
- It imparted to the wearer a kind of sacredness, which enabled her to walk securely amid all peril.†
Chpt 13
- Now, if never before, it answered a good purpose by enabling Hester and the seaman to speak together without risk of being overheard; and so changed was Hester Prynne's repute before the public, that the matron in town, most eminent for rigid morality, could not have held such intercourse with less result of scandal than herself.†
Chpt 21
Definition:
-
(enable) to make possiblein various senses, including:
- to give someone the ability, knowledge, or authority to do something -- as in "The study will enable an informed discussion."
- to activate a computer system for use -- as in "You can enable the feature in the Settings Page."
- to permit someone to repeat bad behavior, so they reinforce the bad pattern -- as in "I don't want to enable her drug addiction."