Etymology Dictionary

IMBECILE,  feeble.  (F.,—L.)   'We in a manner were got out of God's possession; were, in respect to Him, become imbecile and lost;' Barrow, Sermons, vol. ii. ser. 22 (R.)   [Formerly a rare word as an adj.; but the verb to imbécill (accented on the penultimate) was rather common; see note below.]   Imbecility is in Shak. Troil. i. 3. 114.—O.F. imbecille, 'weak, feeble;' Cot.—Lat. imbecillum or imbecillem, acc. of imbecillus or imbecillis, feeble.   Root uncertain.   Der. imbecil-i-ty.   ➩ The examples in R. shew that the verb to imbécill or imbécel, to weaken, enfeeble, was once tolerably well known.   It also meant 'to diminish' or 'subtract from,' and this is probably the origin of our modern E. embezzle, to purloin, the etymology of which is not given in its proper place.   The example from Udal, on the Revelation of St. John, c. 16, shews the intermediate stage in the sense.   It runs as follows:  'The seconde plage of the seconde angell, as the seconde iudgemente of God againste the regiment of Rome, and this is imbeselynge and dimynishe [diminution] of their power and dominion, many landes and people fallynge from them.'   The quotations (in R.) from Drant's tr. of Horace, b. i. sat. 5 and sat. 6, introduce the lines:  'So tyrannous a monarchie imbecelyng freedome, than' [then]; and:  'And so imbecill all theyr strengthe that they are naught to me.'   These lines completely establish the accentuation of the verb, and further illustrate its sense.   See Embezzle, and the quotations in Richardson under embezzle, imbecile, and imbezzle.   The old word bezzle, to squander, is still the same word, with loss of the first syllable.