Probation. This is strictly speaking = δοκιμή, the process of proving; as ‘proof’ is = δοκίμιον or δοκιμεῖον, that by which this proving is carried out; thus toil is the δοκίμιον of soldiers (Herodian); and we now very properly keep the words apart according to this rule; but formerly this was not so.
He, sir, was lapped
In a most curious mantle, wrought by the hand
Of his queen-mother, which for more probation
I can with ease produce.
Shakespeare, Cymbeline, act v. sc. 5.
Also Philip the Evangelist had three daughters. Neither can it help to say that these children were born before his election; for this is but a simple saying, and no probation.—Frith, Works, 1572, p. 325.
Prodigious. This notes little now but magnitude. Truer to its etymology once (from ‘prodigium’ = prōd + agium from ajo, see Brugmann, § 509), it signified the ominous or ominously prophetic.
Blood shall put out your torches, and instead
Of gaudy flowers about your wanton necks,