All 4 Uses of
enable
in
The Idiot
- Lately, too, General Epanchin had been enabled with great difficulty to introduce himself into her circle.†
Chpt 1.4 *
- Vain and ambitious almost to morbidness, he had had much to put up with in the last two months, and was seeking feverishly for some means of enabling himself to lead a more presentable kind of existence.†
Chpt 1.9
- By dint of daily toil he earned enough to enable him to follow the college courses, and at last to enter the university.†
Chpt 2.8
- It is a terrible idea, but it is historic, it is statistic; it is indeed one of those facts which enables an intelligent historian to reconstruct the physiognomy of a special epoch, for it brings out this further point with mathematical accuracy, that the clergy were in those days sixty times richer and more flourishing than the rest of humanity and perhaps sixty times fatter also….†
Chpt 3.4
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."