passiˈuncle nonce-wd.
[f. passion, with dim. ending -uncle, after Hartley's vibratiuncle.]
A petty or contemptible passion.
| 1834 De Quincey Autobiog. Sk. Wks. 1889 I. 174 Now, of men and women generally, parodying that terminology, we ought to say—not that they are..at all capable of passions, but of passiuncles. 1840 ― Soc. of Lakes ibid. II. 385 Many..of whom I have already said, borrowing the model of the word from Hartley, that they have not so much passions as passiuncles. |