verb
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of intermit
1535–45; < Latin intermittere to leave a space between, drop (for a while), leave off, equivalent to inter- inter- + mittere to send, let go
Explanation
To intermit is to stop doing something for a while. You might intermit your Spanish classes this summer so you can take a full-time job as a lifeguard. Intermit is a formal or old-fashioned way to say "pause," or sometimes "pause periodically." It's much more common to use the adjective intermittent for things that start and stop, and both words come from the Latin inter, "between," and mittere, "to send." If you regularly intermit your dog training sessions, it's going to take a lot longer to teach Spot to heel!
Vocabulary lists containing intermit
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.
See Examples For:
With the cold war's intermit tent crises no longer seeming so momentous, one eye of U.S. foreign policy has shifted to the long view.
From Time Magazine Archive
There was no answer and no intermit to the sobs and tears she was pouring on my letter.
From Woven with the Ship A Novel of 1865 by Brady, Cyrus Townsend
The girls were full of curiosity, but they dared not intermit their work, for everything had its allotted time.
From Villa Eden: The Country-House on the Rhine by Auerbach, Berthold
The worthy bishop, who was certainly at any time more at home in the cabinet than in the church, did not intermit his toil or yield to discouragement.
From History of the Rise of the Huguenots Volume 2 by Baird, Henry Martyn
The bell doth toll for him that thinks it doth; and though it intermit again, yet from that minute that that occasion wrought upon him, he is united to God.
From Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions Together with Death's Duel by Donne, John
His only systematic reading was a persistent, though frequently intermitted, exploration of religious biographies and the literature of religious conversion, in preparation for the Gifford Lectures.
From The Letters of William James, Vol. II by James, William
The doctors say in their account that it was while they intermitted the holding of our feet.
From The Death-Blow to Spiritualism Being the True Story of the Fox Sisters by Davenport, Reuben Briggs
The heart-sounds were so weak that the presence or absence of bruit could not be safely predicated; meantime, the pulsations intermitted in a most alarming manner.
From Neuralgia and the Diseases that Resemble it by Anstie, Francis E.
The habits of study are not easily retained during the long stretches of watch-keeping intermitted with hilarious trips ashore.
From An Ocean Tramp by McFee, William
He desired to drink, but could not swallow, his pulse intermitted, his tongue swelled, his throat was excoriated, his breath difficult and interrupted.
From Beggars on Horseback by Jesse, F. Tennyson (Fryniwyd Tennyson)
Mrs Ndisang said "no reason was given" as to why intermission was refused "but it was very clear intermitting was not an option".
From BBC ● Apr. 24, 2023
When the pulses are slow, regular, and nearly natural they usually become frequent, small, irregular, sometimes intermitting.
From New, Old, and Forgotten Remedies: Papers by Many Writers by Anshutz, Edward Pollock
But it happens, sometimes that a distinctly intermitting neuralgia occurs as an early symptom of phthisis; in fact, where there is a predisposition to neurotic affections, I believe that this is not very uncommon.
From Neuralgia and the Diseases that Resemble it by Anstie, Francis E.
But whenever the intermitting Fever is simple and uncombined, it ever has, and ever will render the Patient all possible Service.
From Advice to the people in general, with regard to their health by Tissot, S. A. D. (Samuel Auguste David)
This Disease is sometimes combined too with an intermitting Fever; in which Case the Dysentery must be removed first, and the intermittent afterwards.
From Advice to the people in general, with regard to their health by Tissot, S. A. D. (Samuel Auguste David)
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
