Do you ever have presentiments, Mr. Flintwich?' 'I am not sure that I know what you mean by the term, sir,' replied that gentleman. 'Say, in this case, Mr. Flintwich, undefined anticipations of pleasure to come.' 'I can't say I'm sensible of such a sensation at present,' returned Mr. Flintwich, with the utmost gravity. Nothing sensational said here, perhaps, but Mr. Flintwich shows a sensitivity to words that, like "presentiment," are related to the Latin verb sentire, ("to feel"). He uses two of these words, and we've added three more. The quote is from Charles Dickens' Little Dorrit, and the words are "sensible," "sensation," "sensational," "sensitivity," and "sense."
Recent Examples on the WebThe lavishness turns quickly into horror — Godwin gives us buckets of blood unasked for in the original — and then into a presentiment of Lear on the heath. Jesse Green, New York Times, 19 Jan. 2020 Seen from behind, men and women bundled up in heavy coats are saturated with a mute presentiment, that of people beginning to endure. Han Kang, Harper's magazine, 10 Feb. 2019 Those years, of course, marked respectively the peak of the frenzied optimism of the last business cycle and the first chilling presentiments of what was to come. Gerard Baker, WSJ, 25 Jan. 2019 During the 1919 scenes she is occasionally stopped in her tracks by presentiments of what’s in store around the corner. Jesse Green, New York Times, 10 Oct. 2017
Word History
Etymology
French pressentiment, from Middle French, from pressentir to have a presentiment, from Latin praesentire to feel beforehand, from prae- + sentire to feel — more at sense