impel
verbUK, US /ɪmˈpɛl/
Etymology From Middle English impellen, borrowed from Latin impellō.
1
To urge a person; to press on; to incite to action or motion via intrinsic motivation.
- She was a fat, round little woman, richly apparelled in velvet and lace, […]; and the way she laughed, cackling like a hen, the way she talked to the waiters and the maid,[…]—all these unexpected phenomena impelled one to hysterical mirth, and made one class her with such immortally ludicrous types as Ally Sloper, the Widow Twankey, or Miss Moucher.1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter II, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
- I feel impelled to reply to Roger Henry's letter about my article on being denied an apartment. I truly resent any insinuation that I "slunk back into that rotting old closet."1976 August 28, Michael Shernoff, “No 'Rotting Closet'”, in Gay Community News, volume 4, number 9, page 5:
1 more example
- Concern for the common good should impel us to find ways to overcome the devilish impact of these disastrous policies […]2016, Noam Chomsky, What Kind of Creatures Are We?, New York: Columbia University Press, →ISBN, page 61:
2
To drive forward; to propel an object, to provide an impetus for motion or action.
- The wind impelled the kayaks toward the shore.
- Synonyms
- propel
- Antonyms
- expel
- Derived terms
- reimpel, unimpelled