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complaisant [complaisant 词源字典]: complaisant: [17] Complaisant and complacent [17] are virtual doublets. Both come from Latin complacēre ‘please greatly’ (a compound verb formed from placēre, source of English please), but they reached English along different routes. Complaisant came via French, from complaisant, the present participle of complaire ‘gratify’, but complacent was a direct borrowing from the Latin present participle. It originally meant simply ‘pleasant, delightful’, and did not take on its present derogatory connotations (at first expressed by the now obsolete complacential) until the mid 18th century.
=> complacent, please[complaisant etymology, complaisant origin, 英语词源]
placebo: placebo: [13] Placebo started life as the first person future singular of the Latin verb placēre ‘please’ (source of English please), and hence meant originally ‘I will please’. It was the first word of the antiphon to the first psalm in the Roman Catholic service for the dead, Placēbo Dominō in rēgiōne vivōrum ‘I will please the Lord in the land of the living’. The word’s medical use emerged at the end of the 18th, and arose from the notion of a medicine ‘pleasing’ the patient rather than having any direct physiological effect.
=> please
plead: plead: [13] Essentially plead and plea are the same word. Both go back ultimately to Latin placitum ‘something pleasant’, hence ‘something that pleases both sides’, ‘something agreed upon’, and finally ‘opinion, decision’. This was a noun formed from the past participle of placēre ‘please’ (source of English please). It passed into Old French as plaid ‘agreement, discussion, lawsuit’, and formed the basis of a verb plaidier, from which (via Anglo-Norman pleder) English got plead. In later Old French plaid became plait, and Anglo-Norman took it over as plai or ple – whence English plea [13].
=> plea, please
please: please: [14] Please is at the centre of a small family of English words that go back to Latin placēre ‘please’ (a derivative of the same base as produced plācāre ‘calm, appease’, source of English implacable [16] and placate [17]). Related English words that started life in Latin include complacent, placebo, and placid [17]. It reached English via Old French plaisir, and other derivatives picked up via Old French or Anglo-Norman are plea, plead, pleasant [14], and pleasure [14] (originally a noun use of the verb plaisir).
=> complacent, implacable, placate, placebo, placid, plea, plead, pleasant, pleasure
complacence (n.): mid-15c., "pleasure," from Medieval Latin complacentia "satisfaction, pleasure," from Latin complacentem (nominative complacens), present participle of complacere "to be very pleasing," from com-, intensive prefix (see com-), + placere "to please" (see please). Sense of "pleased with oneself" is 18c.
complacent (adj.): 1650s, "pleasing," from Latin complacentem (nominative complacens) "pleasing," present participle of complacere "be very pleasing" (see complacence). Meaning "pleased with oneself" is from 1767. Related: Complacently.
complaisant (adj.): 1640s, from French complaisant (16c.), in Middle French, "pleasing," present participle of complaire "acquiesce to please," from Latin complacere "be very pleasing" (see complacent, with which it overlapped till mid-19c.). Possibly influenced in French by Old French plaire "gratify."
displace (v.): 1550s, from Middle French desplacer (15c.), from des- (see dis-) + placer "to place." Related: Displaced; displacing. Displaced person "refugee" is from 1944.
displease (v.): early 14c., from Old French desplais-, present tense stem of desplaisir "to displease" (13c.), from Latin displicere "displease," from dis- "not" (see dis-) + placere "to please" (see please). Related: Displeased; displeasing.
emplacement (n.): 1742, from French emplacement "place, situation," from verb emplacer, from assimilated form of en- "in" (see en- (1)) + placer "to place" (see place (v.)). Gunnery sense attested from 1811.
placate (v.): 1670s, a back-formation from placation or else from Latin placatus "soothed, quiet, gentle, calm, peaceful," past participle of placare "to calm, appease, quiet, soothe, assuage," related to placere "to please" (see please). Related: Placated; placating; placatingly.
placebo (n.): early 13c., name given to the rite of Vespers of the Office of the Dead, so called from the opening of the first antiphon, "I will please the Lord in the land of the living" (Psalm cxiv:9), from Latin placebo "I shall please," future indicative of placere "to please" (see please). Medical sense is first recorded 1785, "a medicine given more to please than to benefit the patient." Placebo effect attested from 1900.
placid (adj.): 1620s, from French placide (15c.) and directly from Latin placidus "pleasing, peaceful, quiet, gentle, still, calm," from placere "to please" (see please). Related: Placidly; placidness.
plea (n.): early 13c., "lawsuit," from Anglo-French plai (late 12c.), Old French plait "lawsuit, decision, decree" (9c.), from Medieval Latin placitum "lawsuit," in classical Latin, "opinion, decree," literally "that which pleases, thing which is agreed upon," properly neuter past participle of placere (see please). Sense development seems to be from "something pleasant," to "something that pleases both sides," to "something that has been decided." Meaning "a pleading, an agreement in a suit" is attested from late 14c. Plea-bargaining is first attested 1963. Common pleas (early 13c.) originally were legal proceedings over which the Crown did not claim exclusive jurisdiction (as distinct from pleas of the Crown); later "actions brought by one subject against another."
please (v.): early 14c., "to be agreeable," from Old French plaisir "to please, give pleasure to, satisfy" (11c., Modern French plaire, the form of which is perhaps due to analogy of faire), from Latin placere "to be acceptable, be liked, be approved," related to placare "to soothe, quiet" (source of Spanish placer, Italian piacere), possibly from PIE *plak-e- "to be calm," via notion of still water, etc., from root *plak- (1) "to be flat" (see placenta).

Meaning "to delight" in English is from late 14c. Inverted use for "to be pleased" is from c. 1500, first in Scottish, and paralleling the evolution of synonymous like (v.). Intransitive sense (do as you please) first recorded c. 1500; imperative use (please do this), first recorded 1620s, was probably a shortening of if it please (you) (late 14c.). Related: Pleased; pleasing; pleasingly.

Verbs for "please" supply the stereotype polite word ("Please come in," short for may it please you to ...) in many languages (French, Italian), "But more widespread is the use of the first singular of a verb for 'ask, request' " [Buck, who cites German bitte, Polish proszę, etc.]. Spanish favor is short for hace el favor "do the favor." Danish has in this sense vær saa god, literally "be so good."
pleasure (n.): late 14c., "condition of enjoyment," from Old French plesir, also plaisir "enjoyment, delight, desire, will" (12c.), from noun use of infinitive plaisir (v.) "to please," from Latin placere "to please, give pleasure, be approved" (see please (v.)). Ending altered in English 14c. by influence of words in -ure (measure, etc.). Meaning "sensual enjoyment as the chief object of life" is attested from 1520s.