Table Of ContentROBINSON CRUSOE
Webster’s Thesaurus Edition for PSAT®, SAT®, GRE®, LSAT®,
GMAT®, and AP® English Test Preparation
Daniel Defoe
PSAT is a registered trademark of the College Entrance Examination Board and the National Merit Scholarship
Corporation neither of which sponsors or endorses this book; SAT is a registered trademark of the College
Board which neither sponsors nor endorses this book; GRE, AP and Advanced Placement are registered
trademarks of the Educational Testing Service which neither sponsors nor endorses this book, GMAT is a
registered trademark of the Graduate Management Admissions Council which is neither affiliated with this book
nor endorses this book, LSAT is a registered trademark of the Law School Admissions Council which neither
sponsors nor endorses this product. All rights reserved.
Robinson Crusoe
Webster’s Thesaurus Edition for PSAT®, SAT®, GRE®, LSAT®,
GMAT®, and AP® English Test Preparation
Daniel Defoe
PSAT® is a registered trademark of the College Entrance Examination Board and the National Merit
Scholarship Corporation neither of which sponsors or endorses this book; SAT® is a registered trademark of the
College Board which neither sponsors nor endorses this book; GRE®, AP® and Advanced Placement® are
registered trademarks of the Educational Testing Service which neither sponsors nor endorses this book,
GMAT® is a registered trademark of the Graduate Management Admissions Council which is neither affiliated
with this book nor endorses this book, LSAT® is a registered trademark of the Law School Admissions Council
which neither sponsors nor endorses this product. All rights reserved.
ICON CLASSICS
Published by ICON Group International, Inc.
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San Diego, CA 92121 USA
www.icongrouponline.com
Robinson Crusoe: Webster’s Thesaurus Edition for PSAT®, SAT®, GRE®, LSAT®, GMAT®, and AP®
English Test Preparation
This edition published by ICON Classics in 2005
Printed in the United States of America.
Copyright ©2005 by ICON Group International, Inc.
Edited by Philip M. Parker, Ph.D. (INSEAD); Copyright ©2005, all rights reserved.
All rights reserved. This book is protected by copyright. No part of it may be reproduced, stored in a
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International, Inc.
PSAT® is a registered trademark of the College Entrance Examination Board and the
National Merit Scholarship Corporation neither of which sponsors or endorses this book;
SAT® is a registered trademark of the College Board which neither sponsors nor endorses
this book; GRE®, AP® and Advanced Placement® are registered trademarks of the
Educational Testing Service which neither sponsors nor endorses this book, GMAT® is a
registered trademark of the Graduate Management Admissions Council which is neither
affiliated with this book nor endorses this book, LSAT® is a registered trademark of the Law
School Admissions Council which neither sponsors nor endorses this product. All rights
reserved.
ISBN 0-497-01029-1
iii
Contents
PREFACE FROM THE EDITOR..........................................................................................1
CHAPTER I.......................................................................................................................3
CHAPTER II....................................................................................................................15
CHAPTER III...................................................................................................................27
CHAPTER IV...................................................................................................................45
CHAPTER V....................................................................................................................65
CHAPTER VI...................................................................................................................79
CHAPTER VII..................................................................................................................93
CHAPTER VIII...............................................................................................................103
CHAPTER IX.................................................................................................................113
CHAPTER X..................................................................................................................129
CHAPTER XI.................................................................................................................141
CHAPTER XII................................................................................................................155
CHAPTER XIII...............................................................................................................171
CHAPTER XIV...............................................................................................................183
CHAPTER XV................................................................................................................199
CHAPTER XVI...............................................................................................................213
CHAPTER XVII..............................................................................................................229
CHAPTER XVIII.............................................................................................................245
CHAPTER XIX...............................................................................................................261
CHAPTER XX................................................................................................................275
GLOSSARY...................................................................................................................287
Daniel Defoe 1
PREFACE FROM THE EDITOR
Designed for school districts, educators, and students seeking to maximize performance on
standardized tests, Webster’s paperbacks take advantage of the fact that classics are frequently
assigned readings in English courses. By using a running thesaurus at the bottom of each page, this
edition of Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe was edited for students who are actively building their
vocabularies in anticipation of taking PSAT®, SAT®, AP® (Advanced Placement®), GRE®,
LSAT®, GMAT® or similar examinations.1
Webster’s edition of this classic is organized to expose the reader to a maximum number of
synonyms and antonyms for difficult and often ambiguous English words that are encountered in
other works of literature, conversation, or academic examinations. Extremely rare or idiosyncratic
words and expressions are given lower priority in the notes compared to words which are “difficult,
and often encountered” in examinations. Rather than supply a single synonym, many are provided
for a variety of meanings, allowing readers to better grasp the ambiguity of the English language,
and avoid using the notes as a pure crutch. Having the reader decipher a word’s meaning within
context serves to improve vocabulary retention and understanding. Each page covers words not
already highlighted on previous pages. If a difficult word is not noted on a page, chances are that it
has been highlighted on a previous page. A more complete thesaurus is supplied at the end of the
book; Synonyms and antonyms are extracted from Webster’s Online Dictionary.
Definitions of remaining terms as well as translations can be found at www.websters-online-
dictionary.org. Please send suggestions to [email protected]
The Editor
Webster’s Online Dictionary
www.websters-online-dictionary.org
1 P S A T ® i s a r e g i s t e r e d t r a d e m a r k o f t h e College Entrance Examination Board and the National Merit
Scholarship Corporation neither of which sponsors or endorses this book; SAT® is a registered trademark of the
College Board which neither sponsors nor endorses this book; GRE®, AP® and Advanced Placement® are
registered trademarks of the Educational Testing Service which neither sponsors nor endorses this book,
GMAT® is a registered trademark of the Graduate Management Admissions Council which is neither affiliated
with this book nor endorses this book, LSAT® is a registered trademark of the Law School Admissions Council
which neither sponsors nor endorses this product. All rights reserved.
Daniel Defoe 3
CHAPTER I
I WAS born in the year 1632, in the city of York, of a good family, though not
of that country, my father being a foreigner of Bremen, who settled first at Hull.
He got a good estate by merchandise, and leaving off his trade, lived afterwards
at York, from whence he had married my mother, whose relations were named
Robinson, a very good family in that country, and from whom I was called
Robinson Kreutznaer; but, by the usual corruption of words in England, we are
now called - nay we call ourselves and write our name - Crusoe; and so my
companions always called me.%
I had two elder brothers, one of whom was lieutenant-colonel to an English
regiment of foot in Flanders, formerly commanded by the famous Colonel
Lockhart, and was killed at the battle near Dunkirk against the Spaniards. What
became of my second brother I never knew, any more than my father or mother
knew what became of me.
Being the third son of the family and not bred to any trade, my head began to
be filled very early with rambling thoughts. My father, who was very ancient,
had given me a competent share of learning, as far as house-education and a
country free school generally go, and designed me for the law; but I would be
satisfied with nothing but going to sea; and my inclination to this led me so
strongly against the will, nay, the commands of my father, and against all the
entreaties and persuasions of my mother and other friends, that there seemed to
Thesaurus
commanded: (adj) lawful. fancy, affection, tendency, leaning, desultory, discursive, erratic,
commands: (n) orders, instructions, drift, appetite, dip, proclivity, bias. excursive, meandering, diffuse, loose,
information, guidelines. ANTONYMS: (n) disinclination, errant; (adj, n) wandering.
companions: (n) circle, entourage, reluctance, aversion, indifference, ANTONYMS: (adj) coherent, abrupt,
people. unwillingness, antipathy, dislike, conclusive, pithy, taciturn, compact.
foreigner: (adj, n) stranger; (n) horror. regiment: (n) corps, battalion, legion,
outlander, outsider, unknown, killed: (n) casualty; (adj) fallen. host, brigade, division, multitude,
barbarian, gringo, newcomer, merchandise: (v) market, deal; (n) cohort; (v) control, organize, regulate.
immigrant, deportee, traveler; (adj) freight, cargo, product, commodity, whence: (adv) wherefrom, hence,
foreign. ANTONYMS: (n) inhabitant, goods, consignment, wares; (adj) because, for, why, wherefore, how,
domestic, citizen. commodities, ware. then, then thence so, how comes it,
inclination: (n, v) desire, bent; (n) rambling: (adj) disjointed, incoherent, how happens it.
4 Robinson Crusoe
be something fatal in that propensity of nature, tending directly to the life of
misery which was to befall me.%
My father, a wise and grave man, gave me serious and excellent counsel
against what he foresaw was my design. He called me one morning into his
chamber, where he was confined by the gout, and expostulated very warmly
with me upon this subject. He asked me what reasons, more than a mere
wandering inclination, I had for leaving father's house and my native country,
where I might be well introduced, and had a prospect of raising my fortune by
application and industry, with a life of ease and pleasure. He told me it was men
of desperate fortunes on one hand, or of aspiring, superior fortunes on the other,
who went abroad upon adventures, to rise by enterprise, and make themselves
famous in undertakings of a nature out of the common road; that these things
were all either too far above me or too far below me; that mine was the middle
state, or what might be called the upper station of low life, which he had found,
by long experience, was the best state in the world, the most suited to human
happiness, not exposed to the miseries and hardships, the labour and sufferings
of the mechanic part of mankind, and not embarrassed with the pride, luxury,
ambition, and envy of the upper part of mankind. He told me I might judge of
the happiness of this state by this one thing - viz. that this was the state of life
which all other people envied; that kings have frequently lamented the miserable
consequence of being born to great things, and wished they had been placed in
the middle of the two extremes, between the mean and the great; that the wise
man gave his testimony to this, as the standard of felicity, when he prayed to
have neither poverty nor riches.
He bade me observe it, and I should always find that the calamities of life
were shared among the upper and lower part of mankind, but that the middle
station had the fewest disasters, and was not exposed to so many vicissitudes as
the higher or lower part of mankind; nay, they were not subjected to so many
distempers and uneasinesses, either of body or mind, as those were who, by
vicious living, luxury, and extravagances on the one hand, or by hard labour,
want of necessaries, and mean or insufficient diet on the other hand, bring
Thesaurus
adventures: (n) experiences, fortunes, blessedness, beatitude, luck, of life, necessity, must.
confessions, journal, life, biography, felicitousness, joy, fortune, ecstasy, propensity: (n) proclivity, leaning,
autobiography, personal narrative. enjoyment, appropriateness. disposition, bias, bent, aptitude,
aspiring: (adj) aspirant, wishful, ANTONYM: (n) infelicity. aptness, proneness, predisposition,
enterprising, envious, desirous, foresaw: (v) foresee. predilection, penchant. ANTONYM:
coming; (v) aspire, vaulting. gout: (n) taste, relish, arthritis, go-out; (n) inability.
ANTONYM: (adj) desperate. (v) cephalalgia, earache, otalgia, riches: (n, v) money; (n) affluence,
bade: (v) bid, command, bad. odontalgia, neuralgia, lumbago, abundance, fortune, opulence, plenty,
befall: (v) bechance, become, happen, sciatica. prosperity, exuberance, treasure,
fall, arise, come about, occur, betide, hardships: (n) difficulty. resources; (v) gold.
chance, transpire, pass. lamented: (adj) mourned, bewailed. vicissitudes: (n) changeability, life,
felicity: (n) happiness, bliss, necessaries: (n) necessary, necessaries variableness, variability.
Daniel Defoe 5
distemper %upon themselves by the natural consequences of their way of living;
that the middle station of life was calculated for all kind of virtue and all kind of
enjoyments; that peace and plenty were the handmaids of a middle fortune; that
temperance, moderation, quietness, health, society, all agreeable diversions, and
all desirable pleasures, were the blessings attending the middle station of life;
that this way men went silently and smoothly through the world, and
comfortably out of it, not embarrassed with the labours of the hands or of the
head, not sold to a life of slavery for daily bread, nor harassed with perplexed
circumstances, which rob the soul of peace and the body of rest, nor enraged
with the passion of envy, or the secret burning lust of ambition for great things;
but, in easy circumstances, sliding gently through the world, and sensibly tasting
the sweets of living, without the bitter; feeling that they are happy, and learning
by every day's experience to know it more sensibly,
After this he pressed me earnestly, and in the most affectionate manner, not
to play the young man, nor to precipitate myself into miseries which nature, and
the station of life I was born in, seemed to have provided against; that I was
under no necessity of seeking my bread; that he would do well for me, and
endeavour to enter me fairly into the station of life which he had just been
recommending to me; and that if I was not very easy and happy in the world, it
must be my mere fate or fault that must hinder it; and that he should have
nothing to answer for, having thus discharged his duty in warning me against
measures which he knew would be to my hurt; in a word, that as he would do
very kind things for me if I would stay and settle at home as he directed, so he
would not have so much hand in my misfortunes as to give me any
encouragement to go away; and to close all, he told me I had my elder brother
for an example, to whom he had used the same earnest persuasions to keep him
from going into the Low Country wars, but could not prevail, his young desires
prompting him to run into the army, where he was killed; and though he said he
would not cease to pray for me, yet he would venture to say to me, that if I did
take this foolish step, God would not bless me, and I should have leisure
hereafter to reflect upon having neglected his counsel when there might be none
to assist in my recovery.
Thesaurus
distemper: (n, v) tempera, tumult; (n) perplexed: (adj) confused, puzzled, brashness, boldness, movement.
disease, ailment, malady, paint, baffled, confounded, doubtful, tasting: (n) degustation, gustation,
coloring matter, stain, complaint; (v) distracted, disconcerted; (adj, v) savoring, relishing, sample, gustatory
water glass, fresco. intricate, complicated, lost, involved. sensation, gustatory perception,
enraged: (adj) angered, furious, ANTONYMS: (adj) unperplexed, discernment, drinking, eating,
infuriated, irate, mad, livid, incensed, assured, clear, knowing. feeding.
exasperated, raging, irritated, boiling. quietness: (n) quiet, serenity, calm, temperance: (n) moderation,
hereafter: (adv) thereafter, from now calmness, peacefulness, repose, hush, abstinence, abstemiousness, control,
on, hence, henceforth, hereinafter, composure, quietude, silence, restraint, moderateness, soberness,
afterwards; (n) afterlife, futurity, time stillness. ANTONYMS: (n) volume, forbearance, measure, gravity,
to come, great beyond, future life. disturbance, loudness, bustle, asceticism. ANTONYMS: (n)
misfortunes: (n) misfortune. wildness, turbulence, noise, turmoil, intemperance, wildness.
