Dictionary

beneficient en · ADJ

Pronunciation

• /ˌbɛnəˈfɪʃənt/

Etymology

Modification of beneficent after beneficial.

Meanings

1. (proscribed, sometimes) beneficent
   • 1929, Time, 25 March, 1929, "Apple Salt," https://web.archive.org/web/20130721133038/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,846362,00.html Last week. Dr. John Christian Krantz Jr., chemist and pharmacist at Johns Hopkins, announced that that laboratory of many a beneficient drug had created a salt substitute, which has proved palatable during a year's tests.
   • 1981, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, Writers in Politics: Essays, London: Heinemann, Part 1, Chapter 3, p. 47, And not the least, they smashed the racialist view of peasants as uncultured recipients of cultures from beneficient foreigners.

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