buoy up

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buoy up (third-person singular simple present buoys up, present participle buoying up, simple past and past participle buoyed up)

1. (idiomatic, transitive, figuratively) To uplift, hearten, inspire or raise the spirits of.
   • 1796, Edmund Burke, A letter from the Right Honourable Edmund Burke to a noble lord: on the attacks made upon him and his pension, London: J. Owen and F. & C. Rivington, p. ,

     I have supported with very great zeal, and I am told with some degree of success, those opinions, or if his Grace likes another expression better, those old prejudices, which buoy up the ponderous mass of his nobility, wealth, and title.

2. (idiomatic, transitive) To keep afloat; to provide with buoyancy.