I get this "A Word A Day" email, and the one this morning was "obnubilate," which means to darken over or cloud. I do not now, nor have I ever...

I get this "A Word A Day" email, and the one this morning was "obnubilate," which means to darken over or cloud. Archive 2010-02-01

As every work of man's or of nature's hand universally contains within itself the elements of its own destruction (or if that term be not agreeable to the Philosopher, of its own dissolution), so every mind contains that which on some one point is certain to thwart and obnubilate the healthy exercise of that reason for which it may have been celebrated, when directed to all things else. North Carolina University Magazine, Volume 1 Number 1, February 1852

In some unlucky dispositions there is such an envious kind of pride that they cannot endure that any but themselves should be set forth for excellent; so that when they hear one justly praised they will either seek to dismount his virtues, or, if they be like a clear light, they will stab him with a _but_ of detraction; as if there were something yet so foul as did obnubilate even his brightest glory. Pearls of Thought

“I intend to put in my album such collector’s items as patulous (spreading, open, gaping) and obnubilate (cloud over, darken, obscure),” my brother Kilpo writes. No Uncertain Terms

“I intend to put in my album such collector’s items as patulous (spreading, open, gaping) and obnubilate (cloud over, darken, obscure),” my brother Kilpo writes. No Uncertain Terms

“I intend to put in my album such collector’s items as patulous (spreading, open, gaping) and obnubilate (cloud over, darken, obscure),” my brother Kilpo writes. No Uncertain Terms

Apparently the press secretary is a reader of Ehrlich’s elitist dictionary, or is a fan of Kilpatrick’s delicious column, or—most fittingly for one working in his beclouded state—has been perusing Robert Burton’s 1621 Anatomy of Melancholy: “So doth this melancholy vapour obnubilate the mind.” No Uncertain Terms

Apparently the press secretary is a reader of Ehrlich’s elitist dictionary, or is a fan of Kilpatrick’s delicious column, or—most fittingly for one working in his beclouded state—has been perusing Robert Burton’s 1621 Anatomy of Melancholy: “So doth this melancholy vapour obnubilate the mind.” No Uncertain Terms