Synonyms for dispense
- allocate
- allot
- disburse
- distribute
- furnish
- give away
- hand out
- apportion
- assign
- deal
- divide
- give
- lot
- measure
- partition
- portion
- prepare
- prorate
- share
- come across with
- deal out
- dish out
- divvy
- fork out
- give with
- hand over
- mete out
- shell out
Antonyms for dispense
- conceal
- hide
- hoard
- hold
- keep
- retain
- secret
- attach
- collect
- combine
- disorganize
- gather
- join
- unite
- withhold
- receive
- take
EXAMPLES FROM THE WEB FOR DISPENSE
"Unless it should be his gracious pleasure to dispense with obedience," replied Artaphernes.
It was that unless I could dress more in the mode he could dispense with my attendance.
But on the strength of this faith I would not dispense with the fire.
I am honoured with your good opinion, and I can dispense with Mr Haredale's.
They found they could dispense with Mr. Carey's further services.
She had so many secret reserves from Emile now that this one she could dispense with.
But can they, even in that chaste and 166 splendid nudity, dispense with ruffles and flounces?
However, this is just the condition of sailing when a boat can dispense with a rudder.
Perhaps I might get on so well as to be able to dispense with it almost at once.
But if I can discharge its debts it enables me to dispense with the popular code.
WORD ORIGIN
early 14c., from Old French dispenser "give out" (13c.), from Latin dispensare "disburse, administer, distribute (by weight)," frequentative of dispendere "pay out," from dis- "out" (see dis-) + pendere "to pay, weigh" (see pendant).
In Medieval Latin, dispendere was used in the ecclesiastical sense of "grant license to do what is forbidden or omit what is required" (a power of popes, bishops, etc.), and thus acquired a sense of "grant remission from punishment or exemption from law," hence "to do away with" (1570s), "do without" (c.1600). Older sense is preserved in dispensary. Related: Dispensed; dispensing.