allow vs direct

allow

verb
  • To acknowledge; to accept as true; to concede; to accede to an opinion. 

  • To not bar or obstruct. 

  • To render physically possible. 

  • To grant, give, admit, accord, afford, or yield; to let one have. 

  • To grant license to; to permit; to consent to. 

  • To grant (something) as a deduction or an addition; especially to abate or deduct. 

  • To take into account by making an allowance. 

  • To decide (a request) in favour of the party who raised it; to grant victory to a party regarding (a request). 

direct

verb
  • To point out to with authority; to instruct as a superior; to order. 

  • To manage, control, steer. 

  • To aim (something) at (something else). 

  • To point out to or show (somebody) the right course or way; to guide, as by pointing out the way. 

adv
  • Directly. 

adj
  • having a single flight number. 

  • Straight; not crooked, oblique, or circuitous; leading by the short or shortest way to a point or end. 

  • Pertaining to, or effected immediately by, action of the people through their votes instead of through one or more representatives or delegates. 

  • Immediate; express; plain; unambiguous. 

  • Proceeding without deviation or interruption. 

  • Straightforward; sincere. 

  • In the line of descent; not collateral. 

  • In the direction of the general planetary motion, or from west to east; in the order of the signs; not retrograde; said of the motion of a celestial body. 

How often have the words allow and direct occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )