The Prophet: On Pleasure–The Farewell

by Kahlil Gibran
In this collection of fables, published in 1923, a prophet tells instructive stories to a group of listeners. Read the full text here.

This list covers "On Pleasure"–"The Farewell."

Here are links to our lists for the book: List 1, List 2, List 3, List 4
30 words 33 learners

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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. rebuke
    censure severely or angrily
    Some of your youth seek pleasure as if it were all, and they are judged and rebuked.
  2. chastisement
    a rebuke for making a mistake
    But regret is the beclouding of the mind and not its chastisement.
  3. shun
    avoid and stay away from deliberately
    And in their fear of seeking and remembering they shun all pleasures, lest they neglect the spirit or offend against it.
  4. forego
    do without or cease to hold or adhere to
    But even in their foregoing is their pleasure.
  5. recess
    a small dent or hollow in a surface
    Oftentimes in denying yourself pleasure you do but store the desire in the recesses of your being.
  6. omit
    leave undone or leave out
    Who knows but that which seems omitted today, waits for tomorrow?
  7. distinguish
    mark as different
    And now you ask in your heart, “How shall we distinguish that which is good in pleasure from that which is not good?”
  8. tempest
    a strong storm with violent winds
    And the passionate say, “Nay, beauty is a thing of might and dread.
    Like the tempest she shakes the earth beneath us and the sky above us.”
  9. hew
    make or shape as with an axe
    Is not religion all deeds and all reflection,
    And that which is neither deed nor reflection, but a wonder and a surprise ever springing in the soul, even while the hands hew the stone or tend the loom?
  10. forge
    a workplace where metal is worked by heating and hammering
    Take the plough and the forge and the mallet and the lute,
    The things you have fashioned in necessity or for delight.
  11. reverie
    absentminded dreaming while awake
    For in revery you cannot rise above your achievements nor fall lower than your failures.
  12. unencumbered
    free of anything that impedes or is burdensome
    And what is it to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?
  13. tenacious
    stubbornly unyielding
    We are the seeds of the tenacious plant, and it is in our ripeness and our fullness of heart that we are given to the wind and are scattered.
  14. presumption
    a premise that is taken for granted
    What visions, what expectations and what presumptions can outsoar that flight?
  15. frailty
    the state of being weak in health or body
    To measure you by your smallest deed is to reckon the power of ocean by the frailty of its foam.
  16. repose
    relax or recline in a comfortable resting position
    Yet spring, reposing within you, smiles in her drowsiness and is not offended.
  17. heedless
    marked by or paying little attention
    It is a flame spirit in you ever gathering more of itself,
    While you, heedless of its expansion, bewail the withering of your days. It is life in quest of life in bodies that fear the grave.
  18. parch
    cause to wither from exposure to heat
    You have given me my deeper thirsting after life.
    Surely there is no greater gift to a man than that which turns all his aims into parching lips and all life into a fountain.
  19. portico
    porch or entrance to a building consisting of a covered area
    And slept in the portico of the temple when you would gladly have sheltered me
  20. aloof
    distant, cold, or detached in manner
    And some of you have called me aloof, and drunk with my own aloneness
  21. unattainable
    impossible to achieve
    Stranger, stranger, lover of unreachable heights, why dwell you among the summits where eagles build their nests? Why seek you the unattainable?
  22. appease
    overcome or allay
    Descend and appease your hunger with our bread and quench your thirst with our wine.
  23. rove
    move about aimlessly or without any destination
    That which is you dwells above the mountain and roves with the wind.
  24. nebulous
    lacking definite form or limits
    Vague and nebulous is the beginning of all things, but not their end
  25. feeble
    lacking strength or vigor
    That which seems most feeble and bewildered in you is the strongest and most determined.
  26. bewildered
    extremely confused and uncertain what to do
    That which seems most feeble and bewildered in you is the strongest and most determined.
  27. deplore
    regret strongly
    Yet you shall not deplore having known blindness, nor regret having been deaf.
  28. helm
    steering mechanism for a vessel
    After saying these things he looked about him, and he saw the pilot of his ship standing by the helm and gazing now at the full sails and now at the distance.
  29. suffice
    be adequate, either in quality or quantity
    What was given us here we shall keep,
    And if it suffices not, then again must we come together and together stretch our hands unto the giver.
  30. moor
    secure with cables or ropes
    So saying he made a signal to the seamen, and straightway they weighed anchor and cast the ship loose from its moorings, and they moved eastward.
Created on Tue Sep 21 10:51:54 EDT 2021 (updated Mon Sep 27 12:39:03 EDT 2021)

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