infirm

• POS: Adjective
• HYPHEN: in=firm

CIDE DICTIONARY

infirm, a. [L. infirmus: cf. F. infirme. See In- not, and Firm, a.].

•  Not firm or sound; weak; feeble; as, an infirm body; an infirm constitution.  [1913 Webster]

  "A poor, infirm, weak, and despised old man."  [1913 Webster]
•  Weak of mind or will; irresolute; vacillating.  Burke.  [1913 Webster]

  "Infirm of purpose!"  [1913 Webster]
•  Not solid or stable; insecure; precarious.  [1913 Webster]

  "He who fixes on false principles treads or infirm ground."

Syn. -- Debilitated; sickly; feeble; decrepit; weak; enfeebled; irresolute; vacillating; imbecile.

infirm, v. t. [L. infirmare : cf. F. infirmer.].

 To weaken; to enfeeble.  Sir W. Raleigh.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

infirm, adj.
1 physically weak, esp. through age.
2 (of a person, mind, judgement, etc.) weak, irresolute.

Derivative

infirmity n. (pl. -ies). infirmly adv.

Etymology

ME f. L infirmus (as IN-(1), FIRM(1))

THESAURUS

infirm

Adamic, abulic, adrift, afloat, afraid, ailing, alternating, amorphous, anile, backsliding, cachectic, capricious, carnal, changeable, changeful, cowardly, crabbed, crippled, crumbling, dangerous, debilitated, decrepit, desultory, deviable, disintegrating, dizzy, doddered, doddering, doddery, drained, eccentric, enervated, enfeebled, erratic, erring, exhausted, failing, faint, fainthearted, fallen, faltering, fast and loose, feeble, feebleminded, fickle, fitful, fleshly, flickering, flighty, flimsy, flitting, fluctuating, fossilized, fragile, frail, freakish, gerontal, gerontic, giddy, hazardous, healthless, ill, impetuous, impulsive, impure, in poor health, inconsistent, inconstant, indecisive, indisposed, insecure, insubstantial, invalid, invertebrate, irregular, irresolute, irresponsible, lame, languishing, lapsed, mazy, mercurial, moody, moribund, mossbacked, moth-eaten, mummylike, of easy virtue, on the decline, pale, palsied, papery-skinned, peaked, peaky, peccable, perilous, pliable, poor, poorish, postlapsarian, precarious, prodigal, provisional, rambling, ravaged with age, recidivist, recidivistic, reduced, reduced in health, restless, rickety, risky, rotten, rotten at, roving, run to seed, run-down, rusty, scatterbrained, senile, shaky, shapeless, shifting, shifty, shriveled, shuffling, sick, sickly, slippery, soft, spasmodic, spineless, stricken in years, temporary, tentative, ticklish, timeworn, tottering, tottery, treacherous, unaccountable, unangelic, uncertain, unchaste, unclean, uncontrolled, undependable, undisciplined, unfaithworthy, unfirm, unfixed, ungodly, ungood, unhealthy, unpredictable, unreliable, unrestrained, unrighteous, unsaintly, unsettled, unsolid, unsound, unstable, unstable as water, unstaid, unsteadfast, unsteady, unsturdy, unsubstantial, unsure, untrustworthy, unvirtuous, unwell, vacillating, vagrant, valetudinarian, valetudinary, variable, vicissitudinary, vicissitudinous, virtueless, volatile, wandering, wanton, wasted, wavering, wavery, wavy, wayward, weak, weak-kneed, weak-minded, weak-willed, weakened, weakly, whimsical, wishy-washy, with low resistance, withered, wizened, wobbling, wobbly

ROGET THESAURUS

infirm

Disease

N disease, illness, sickness, ailing, all the ills that flesh is heir to, morbidity, morbosity, infirmity, ailment, indisposition, complaint, disorder, malady, distemper, distemperature, visitation, attack, seizure, stroke, fit, delicacy, loss of health, invalidation, cachexy, cachexia, atrophy, marasmus, indigestion, dyspepsia, decay, decline, consumption, palsy, paralysis, prostration, taint, pollution, infection, sepsis, septicity, infestation, epidemic, pandemic, endemic, epizootic, murrain, plague, pestilence, pox, sore, ulcer, abscess, fester, boil, pimple, wen, carbuncle, gathering, imposthume, peccant humor, issue, rot, canker, cold sore, fever sore, cancer, carcinoma, leukemia, neoplastic disease, malignancy, tumor, caries, mortification, corruption, gangrene, sphacelus, sphacelation, leprosy, eruption, rash, breaking out, fever, temperature, calenture, inflammation, ague, angina pectoris, appendicitis, Asiatic cholera, spasmodic cholera, biliary calculus, kidney stone, black death, bubonic plague, pneumonic plague, blennorrhagia, blennorrhoea, blood poisoning, bloodstroke, bloody flux, brash, breakbone fever, dengue fever, malarial fever, Q-fever, heart attack, cardiac arrest, cardiomyopathy, hardening of the arteries, arteriosclerosis, atherosclerosis, bronchocele, canker rash, cardialgia, carditis, endocarditis, cholera, asphyxia, chlorosis, chorea, cynanche, dartre, enanthem, enanthema, erysipelas, exanthem, exanthema, gallstone, goiter, gonorrhea, green sickness, grip, grippe, influenza, flu, hay fever, heartburn, heaves, rupture, hernia, hemorrhoids, piles, herpes, itch, king's evil, lockjaw, measles, mumps, polio, necrosis, pertussis, phthisis, pneumonia, psora, pyaemia, pyrosis, quinsy, rachitis, ringworm, rubeola, St. Vitus's dance, scabies, scarlatina, scarlet fever, scrofula, seasickness, struma, syntexis, tetanus, tetter, tonsillitis, tonsilitis, tracheocele, trachoma, trismus, varicella, varicosis, variola, water qualm, whooping cough, yellow fever, yellow jack, fatal disease, dangerous illness, galloping consumption, churchyard cough, general breaking up, break up of the system, idiocy insanity, martyr to disease, cripple, the halt the lame and the blind, valetudinary, valetudinarian, invalid, patient, case, sickroom, sick- chamber, pathology, etiology, nosology, anthrax, bighead, blackleg, blackquarter, cattle plague, glanders, mange, scrapie, milk sickness, heartworm, feline leukemia, roundworms, quarter-evil, quarter-ill, rinderpest, virus, bacterium, bacteria, DNA virus, RNA virus, rhinovirus, rhabdovirus, picornavirus, herpesvirus, cytomegalovirus, CMV, human immunodefficiency virus, HIV, diseased, ailing, ill, ill of, taken ill, seized with, indisposed, unwell, sick, squeamish, poorly, seedy, affected with illness, afflicted with illness, laid up, confined, bedridden, invalided, in hospital, on the sick list, out of health, out of sorts, under the weather, valetudinary, unsound, unhealthy, sickly, morbid, morbose, healthless, infirm, chlorotic, unbraced, drooping, flagging, lame, crippled, halting, morbid, tainted, vitiated, peccant, contaminated, poisoned, tabid, mangy, leprous, cankered, rotten, rotten to the core, rotten at the core, withered, palsied, paralytic, dyspeptic, luetic, pneumonic, pulmonic, phthisic, rachitic, syntectic, syntectical, tabetic, varicose, touched in the wind, broken-winded, spavined, gasping, hors de combat, weakly, weakened, decrepit, decayed, incurable, in declining health, cranky, in a bad way, in danger, prostrate, moribund, morbific epidemic, endemic, zymotic.

Weakness

N weakness, debility, atony, relaxation, languor, enervation, impotence, infirmity, effeminacy, feminality, fragility, flaccidity, inactivity, anaemia, bloodlessness, deficiency of blood, poverty of blood, declension of strength, loss of strength, failure of strength, delicacy, invalidation, decrepitude, asthenia, adynamy, cachexy, cachexia, sprain, strain, reed, thread, rope of sand, house of cards, softling, weakling, infant, youth, weak, feeble, debile, impotent, relaxed, unnerved sapless, strengthless, powerless, weakly, unstrung, flaccid, adynamic, asthenic, nervous, soft, effeminate, feminate, womanly, frail, fragile, shattery, flimsy, unsubstantial, insubstantial, gimcrack, gingerbread, rickety, creaky, creaking, cranky, craichy, drooping, tottering, broken, lame, withered, shattered, shaken, crazy, shaky, palsied, decrepit, languid, poor, infirm, faint, faintish, sickly, dull, slack, evanid, spent, short-winded, effete, weather-beaten, decayed, rotten, worn, seedy, languishing, wasted, washy, laid low, pulled down, the worse for wear, unstrengthened, unsupported, unaided, unassisted, aidless, defenseless, cantilevered (support), on its last legs, weak as a child, weak as a baby, weak as a chicken, weak as a cat, weak as a rat, weak as water, weak as water gruel, weak as gingerbread, weak as milk and water, colorless, non sum qualis eram.

Vice

N vice, evil-doing, evil courses, wrongdoing, wickedness, viciousness, iniquity, peccability, demerit, sin, Adam, old Adam, offending Adam, immorality, impropriety, indecorum, scandal, laxity, looseness of morals, enphagy, dophagy, exophagy, want of principle, want of ballast, obliquity, backsliding, infamy, demoralization, pravity, depravity, pollution, hardness of heart, brutality, corruption, knavery, profligacy, flagrancy, atrocity, cannibalism, lesbianism, Sadism, infirmity, weakness, weakness of the flesh, frailty, imperfection, error, weak side, foible, failing, failure, crying sin, besetting sin, defect, deficiency, cloven foot, lowest dregs of vice, sink of iniquity, Alsatian den, gusto picaresco, fault, crime, criminality, sinner, brothel, gambling house, joint, opium den, shooting gallery, crack house, vicious, sinful, sinning, wicked, iniquitous, immoral, unrighteous, wrong, criminal, naughty, incorrect, unduteous, undutiful, unprincipled, lawless, disorderly, contra bonos mores, indecorous, unseemly, improper, dissolute, profligate, scampish, unworthy, worthless, desertless, disgraceful, recreant, reprehensible, blameworthy, uncommendable, discreditable, disreputable, Sadistic, base, sinister, scurvy, foul, gross, vile, black, grave, facinorous, felonious, nefarious, shameful, scandalous, infamous, villainous, of a deep dye, heinous, flagrant, flagitious, atrocious, incarnate, accursed, Mephistophelian, satanic, diabolic, hellish, infernal, stygian, fiendlike, hell-born, demoniacal, devilish, fiendish, miscreated, misbegotten, demoralized, corrupt, depraved, evil-minded, evil-disposed, ill-conditioned, malevolent, heartless, graceless, shameless, virtueless, abandoned, lost to virtue, unconscionable, sunk in iniquity, lost in iniquity, steeped in iniquity, incorrigible, irreclaimable, obdurate, reprobate, past praying for, culpable, reprehensible, unjustifiable, indefensible, inexcusable, inexpiable, unpardonable, irremissible, weak, frail, lax, infirm, imperfect, indiscrete, demoralizing, degrading, wrong, sinfully, without excuse, Int, O tempora!, O mores!, alitur vitium vivitque tegendo, genus est mortis male vivere, mala mens malus animus, nemo repente fuit turpissimus, the trail of the serpent is over them all, to sanction vice and hunt decorum down.