Careful Words

operation (n.)

operation (adj.)

With crosses, relics, crucifixes,

Beads, pictures, rosaries, and pixes,—

The tools of working our salvation

By mere mechanic operation.

Samuel Butler (1600-1680): Hudibras. Part iii. Canto i. Line 1495.

  It requires a surgical operation to get a joke well into a Scotch understanding.

Sydney Smith (1769-1845): Lady Holland's Memoir. Vol. i. p. 15.