The words covered in this article are inadvertent, presume and presumption, precedent and unprecedented, comply and compliance, elude and elusive, and impunity. Previously done words that will reoccur today are promulgation, flout, and subjectivity.
Consider this couplet:
The king promulgated a law
That no one should sing, write, or draw.
Having learnt about promulgation in Day 12, you know that the king in the above couplet has announced that singing, writing and drawing are prohibited henceforth. But how would the king have made this announcement? Suppose we are in an olden time, when there was no TV, radio or newspaper. How would the king have spread the word about this new law?
Probably he sent his men with loud drums or trumpets who made the announcement in each village and city square.
Now suppose that John was a man in this kingdom who made his living by singing folk songs at the city square. The king’s trumpeter announced the new law at John’s city square, but John missed this because he woke up late that day and by the time he reached his usual performance spot, the trumpeter was already gone. So, like any other day, John picked up his instruments and started to sing.
One or two people stopped around him with horror on their face, but before he could finish his song and ask them about it, two policemen came, accused him of flouting the king’s orders, and dragged him to the police station.
“Which new law are you talking about?” John asked.
“Why, didn’t you hear the announcement that the trumpeter made just now?” the policeman mocked.
John explained that he knew of no such announcement, but the policemen refused to listen to him, and took him to jail, and eventually, John was presented before a judge.
You will soon read what happened next to John, but let’s first do five GRE words that you will encounter in that narrative.
Inadvertent
The word ‘advert’ means to turn one’s attention (to something), or to pay one’s attention.
For example –
“The British government were compelled to advert to the means of strengthening the government of the Nizam.”
Arthur Wellesley, The Dispatches of Field Marshal the Duke of Wellington
This means, the British government were compelled to pay attention to the means of strengthening the Nizam’s government.
When an author says in his essay that he shall now “advert to some other matters,” it means, that he shall now turn his attention – and that of his readers – to some other matters. In other words, that he shall now refer to some other matters.
The commercial ‘advertisements’ that surround us today are called so because they ‘call our attention’ to their products. Self-advertisement is the act of drawing public attention to oneself.
The word ‘advert’ is made up of the Latin prefix ad-, which means ‘to’ and vertere, to turn. Therefore, it denotes the action of ‘turning to (something)’ and so, of paying attention (to that thing).
This root is also found in the word ‘vertebrates’ which are animals that are able to turn around their head as well as their torso; they can do so because they have a spinal cord.
Okay, so now that you know advert, what do you think does inadvertent mean? What would be an inadvertent mistake?
It would be a mistake that happened because you were not paying attention. For example, if you are reading a book while you are walking and you bump into an old man and he falls down, you’ll say something like, “Oh, forgive me. I didn’t mean to hurt you; I just wasn’t paying attention to where I was going.”
You did not bump into the old man on purpose, you did not intend to hurt him; you hurt him inadvertently.
So, the adjective inadvertent means unintentional; happening because of lack of attention or care.
As another example, consider these lines by William Cowper:
“An inadvertent step may crush the snail,
That crawls at evening in the public path.
1785 W. Cowper Task vi. 564
This inadvertent step is an inattentive step, a step that you probably would not have taken had you been paying attention and seen that you were going to step on a snail.
Presume
To presume means to assume beforehand – to presuppose – that something is true; to take something for granted.
For example, a man who has been missing and not heard of at all for seven years is presumed by law to be dead. Say this man went missing at the start of 2010. If no proof of his being alive has surfaced by 2017, the law will start assuming and taking for granted that this man has died, because had he been alive, he would have been noticed by someone somewhere in this many years. But being missing for only 5 months or 1 year or 5 years is not sufficient to merit this presumption.
Presumption is the noun form of presume.
The presumption of innocence is a legal principle that every person accused of any crime is considered innocent until proven guilty. Since Roman empire, many legal systems around the world place the burden of proof on the one who makes an accusation, not on the one who denies it. The presumption of innocence is also an international human right under the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 11.
Did the judge who heard John’s case presume him to be innocent and ask the policemen to prove their accusation that he had knowingly flouted the king’s prohibition on singing, writing and drawing? You’ll see.
Precedent
To ‘precede’ means to come before (something).
For example, on the number line, 1 precedes 2 and 100 precedes 200. This word is made up of the Latin prefix pre- which means, before, and cedere, which means to go.
So, a precedent is that which comes before.
Suppose that you are a judge. Some years ago, in your country, a person who lived in a high-rise building fell off his balcony while talking on the phone, after which his wife sued the builder on the grounds that as the height of the balconies was lower than what the laws prescribed, it was the company’s negligence that had caused her husband’s death.
This is Case A. Let’s say that this was the first case of its kind in your country.
Now a similar case – let’s call it Case X – has been filed in your court. How will you decide the matter? Since the facts are quite similar to Case A, it will not only save you a lot of time but also help you maintain consistency of law if your judgment is the same as or similar to that of Case A.
Judges everywhere respect the precedent established by prior decisions in similar cases.
Something that has no precedent, no prior example or parallel, is said to be unprecedented.
As a usage example, let me present a quote that I really like:
“You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was Dostoevsky and Dickens who taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, or who ever had been alive.” James Baldwin
James Baldwin, in Life magazine issue dated May 24, 1963
Compliance
To comply with an order or a rule, means to follow it, to act according to it. The act of obeying an order or a rule is known as ‘compliance.’ Every citizen of a country is supposed to comply with the laws of his land. Non-compliance often leads to punishment.
Elude
To elude something means to slip away from – to escape from the grasp of – that thing.
For example, if a person worked hard but success eluded him, this means that though he worked hard and did a lot of running after success, he still could not get hold of success. Success continued to be out of his reach. Success proved elusive.
Impunity
The noun impunity means lack of punishment.
Origin: Latin prefix im-, not + poena, punishment => ‘no punishment.’
The words ‘punish’ and ‘punitive’ too are from the same root.
A usage example: The landlord’s men harassed the villagers with impunity as the local police refused to interfere in the matter.
Okay, so let’s get back to John’s story.
When the matter reached the court, John tried to explain to the judge that he had always been a law-abiding citizen and that he had broken this new law inadvertently, only because he was ignorant of it.
“You may be speaking the truth, John,” the judge said, “You may not have flouted the law but only broken it inadvertently, but your intention does not really matter here. The fact remains that once a law has been promulgated, it is then the citizen’s business to be thoroughly acquainted with it, for if ignorance of what he might know were admitted as a legitimate excuse, the law would be of little effect but might always be eluded with impunity. Letting you walk away today will not be fair to the citizens who take pains to know the laws of their land and to comply with them. It will also set a bad precedent; anyone may then claim in the court that they should not be punished for their serious crimes on the grounds that they were ignorant of the relevant laws. I cannot look into the soul of anyone to determine whether they broke the law knowingly or unknowingly, and I do not even want to take the first step down that slippery slope of subjectivity.”
Following the provisions of the new law promulgated by the king, the judge jailed John for ten years.
Here is a poem version of this story:
The king promulgated the law
Japinder Kaur
That no one should sing, write, or draw.
His men announced this all around
But John missed it and soon the sound
Of his songs filled the market square
(he earned his bread by singing there).
The soldiers dragged John into jail;
When he learned why, he turned dead pale.
“I swear,” he cried, “I did not flout
The law! Had it I known, no doubt,
I would have sworn off every song;
this was an inadvertent wrong
of which ignorance was the cause,
I comply with all known laws!”
The men just dragged John to a judge.
John cried his plea. The judge said, “Such
Not-knowing’s wrongful on your part.
The courts can’t go check someone’s heart
To see if they did know or not
The laws they broke. Citizens ought
To know all laws; the courts presume
They do. You invited your own doom
Man, with your inattentive ears,”
And then he jailed John for ten years.
Hope you enjoyed the poem. See you in Day 20!