actuate
verb (used with object)
had actuated
-
past perfectof actuate.past perfect
Used to express a completed action that took place before another specific past action occurred.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
He did not quite understand that it was the desire to confide in and confess to his friend what had actuated his choice of moral trails.
From The Coyote A Western Story by James Roberts
"To ask protection for his wife and child, and to say that love for his country had actuated him in this thing."
From Elsie on the Hudson by Martha Finley
Something had actuated the government which he could not understand.
From Lord George Bentinck A Political Biography by Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield
The Hof Marschall—doubtless acting upon the same impulses which had actuated Archbishop Whately when he absented himself from the dinner-party at Temple-ogue—did not arrive, and, worse still, sent no apology.
From Charles Lever, His Life in His Letters, Vol. I by Edmund Downey
It was thankfully received, and understood quite in the spirit which had actuated me in forming it.
From Autobiography of Friedrich Froebel translated and annotated by Emilie Michaelis ... and H. Keatley Moore. by Emilie Michaelis
