- Aberrant: departing from the right, normal, or usual course; deviating from the ordinary, usual, or normal type; exceptional; abnormal
- Abridge: to reduce in scope : diminish; to shorten by omission of words without sacrifice of sense
- Abscond: to leave quickly and secretly, especially to avoid legal action
- Acumen: keen insight; shrewdness; expertise
- Altruism: unselfish regard for the welfare of others
- Amiable: having or showing pleasant, good-natured personal qualities; affable; friendly; sociable; agreeable; willing to accept the wishes, decisions, or suggestions of another or others
- Apodictic: incontestable because of having been demonstrated or proved to be demonstrable; necessarily true or logically certain
- Appease: to calm or soothe, as by granting concessions; to satisfy or please
- Astute: having or showing shrewdness and perspicacity; crafty, wily
- Banal: commonplace; trite
- Belie: to give a false impression of; to show (something) to be false or wrong
- Bemuse: to bewilder or confuse (someone)
- Bolster: to prop us; to reinforce; or, a long pillow
- Brink: the edge, especially of a precipice
- Cerebral: of the brain or the intellect
- Chide: to scold quietly
- Circumspect: careful to consider all consequences and possible consequences; prudent
- Cloister: to seclude from the world in or as if in a cloister (a place or state of seclusion)
- Confounded: bewildered; confused; perplexed
- Copacetic: fine; completely satisfactory; OK
- Curtail: to cut short; to reduce; to lessen
- Deft: skillful; dexterous
- Defunct: no longer existing; dead
- Deign: to condescend reluctantly and with a strong sense of the affront to one's superiority that is involved; stoop
- Deluge: a great flood of water; inundation; flood; a drenching rain; downpour; anything that overwhelms like a flood
- Diadem: a crown; Royal dignity or authority
- Diffident: lacking confidence; shy; insecure
- Discern: to detect; to recognize or identify as separate and distinct : discriminate
- Dulcet: sweet to the taste; pleasing to the ear; generally pleasing or agreeable
- Ebb: to flow back or away, as the water of a tide; to decline or decay; fade away
- Effusive: unduly demonstrative; lacking reserve; pouring out; overflowing
- Elation: a feeling or state of great joy or pride; exultant gladness; high spirits
- Emulate: to try to equal or excel; imitate with effort to equal or surpass
- Encroach: to intrude on the possession or rights of another
- Euphemism: a word or phrase substituted for one that may be offensive
- Gratuitous: given freely; without cause
- Gregarious: fond of the company of others; sociable; living in flocks or herds, as animals
- Guile: craftiness; cunning
- Immutable: unchangeable; changeless
- Impede: to slow the progress of; to obstruct
- Incite: to provoke to action; to instigate
- Inconceivable: unimaginable; unthinkable; unbelievable; incredible
- Insipid: uninteresting; dull; lacking flavor
- Lament: to express grief, sorrow, or remorse; or an expression of sorrow or affliction
- Laudable: worthy of praise
- Lethargic: sluggish; listless; apathetic
- Lissome: lithe; easily flexed; nimble
- Mitigate: to become or make less intense or severe
- Odious: deserving or causing hatred; hateful; detestable; highly offensive; repugnant; disgusting
- Panacea: a remedy for all ills or difficulties; cure-all
- Peruse: to study thoroughly; to scrutinize
- Piety: devotion or reverence
- Placate: to appease or pacify
- Placid: pleasantly calm or peaceful; unruffled; tranquil; serenely quiet or undisturbed
- Preamble: an introductory statement; preface; introduction; the introductory part of a statute, deed, or the like, stating the reasons and intent of what follows; a preliminary or introductory fact or circumstance
- Prodigious: extraordinary or impressive
- Pule: to whine or whimper
- Rebuttal: argument or proof that contradicts or opposes
- Reiterate: to say or do again or repeatedly; repeat, often excessively
- Reproach: a condemnation; disgrace; or, to criticize or rebuke
- Rigorous: characterized by strictness, severity, or harshness, as in dealing with people, rules, or discipline; severely exact or accurate; precise
- Rudimentary: consisting in first principles; fundamental; of a primitive kind
- Stoic: impassive; characterized by a calm, austere fortitude; unmoved by joy or grief
- Superable: capable of being overcome; surmountable
- Tactile: relating to the sense of touch; that may be touched or perceived by touch
- Tepid: moderately warm, lukewarm; lacking in passion, force, or zest; marked by an absence of enthusiasm or conviction
- Terse: short and to the point
- Toilsome: involving hard work; difficult
- Transgression: infringement or violation of a law, command, or duty
- Transmogrify: to change in appearance or form, especially strangely or grotesquely; transform
- Transpose: to change the relative position, order, or sequence of; cause to change places; interchange
- Umbrage: a feeling of pique or resentment at some often fancied slight or insult
- Venerate: to regard with reverential respect or with admiring deference; to honor
- Veracity: devotion to the truth, truthfulness; conformity with truth or fact, accuracy; something true
- Vilify: to speak of abusively; to defame
- Wane: to diminish; to decline or decrease gradually; or a decreasing; a period of decline
- Whodunit: a narrative dealing with a murder or a series of murders and the detection of the criminal; detective story