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A

DICTIONARY

OF THE

ENGLISH LANGUAGE.

A

THE first letter of the European

A, alphabets, has, in the English lan

guage, three different sounds, which may be termed the broad, open, and slender.

The broad sound, resembling that of the German a, is found in many of our monosyllables, as all, wall, malt, salt, in which a is pronounced as au in cause, or aw in law. Many of these words were anciently written with au, as sault, waulk; which happens to be still retained in fault. This was probably the ancient sound of the Saxons, since it is almost uniformly preserved in the rustic pronunciation, and the northern dialects, as maun for man, haund for hand. A open, not unlike the a of the Italians, is found in father, rather, and more obscurely in fancy, fast, &c.

A slender or close, is the peculiar a of the English language, resembling the sound of the French e masculine, or diphthong ai in païs, or perhaps a middle sound between them, or between the a and e; to this the Arabic a is said nearly to approach. Of this sound we have examples in the words place, face, waste; and all those that terminate in ation, as relation, nation, generation.

A is short, as glass, grass; or long, as glaze, graze: it is marked long, generally by an e final, plane, or by an i added, as plain. The short a is open, the long a close.

1. A, an article set before nouns of the singular number; a man, a tree; denoting the number one, as, a man is coming; that is, no more than one; or an indefinite indication, as, a man may come this way, that is, any man. This article has no plural signification. Before a word beginning with a vowel, it VOL. I.

A

is written an, as, an ox, an egg, of which a is the contraction.

2. A, taken materially, or for itself, is a noun; as, a great A, a little a. 3. A is placed before a participle, or participial noun; and is considered by Wallis as a contraction of at, when it is put before a word denoting some action not yet finished; as, I am a walking. It also seems to be anciently contracted from at, when placed before local surnames; as, Thomas a Becket. In other cases it seems to signify to, like the French à.

4.

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Dryden.

May peace still slumber by these purling fountains!

Which we may every year

Find when we come a fishing here. Wotton. Now the men fell a rubbing of armour, which Wotton. a great while had lain oiled. He will knap the spears a pieces with his teeth. Mores Antid. Athm. Another falls a ringing a Pescennius Niger, and judiciously distinguishes the sound of it to be modern. Addison on Medals.

A has a peculiar signification, denoting the proportion of one thing to another. Thus we say, The landlord hath a hundred a year; The ship's crew gained a thousand pounds a man.

The river Inn passes through a wide open country, during all its course through Bavaria; which is a voyage of two days, after the rate of twenty leagues a day. Addison on Italy. 5. A is used in burlesque poetry, to lengthen out a syllable, without adding to the

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times the power of the French à in、
these phrases, à droit, à gauche, &c.;
and sometimes to be contracted from
at, as, aside, aslope, afoot, asleep, athirst,

aware.

I gin to be a-weary of the sun;
And wish the state of th' world were now un-
done.
Shakspeare's Macbeth.

And now a breeze from shore Began to blow:
The sailors ship their oars, and cease to row;
Then hoist their yards a-trip, and all their sails
Let fall, to court the wind and catch the gales.
Dryden's Ceyx and Alcyone.

A little house with trees a-row, And, like its master, very low. Pope's Horace. 8. A is sometimes redundant; as, arise, arouse, awake; the same with rise, rouse, wake.

9. A, in abbreviation, stands for artium, or arts; as, A. B. bachelor of arts, artium baccalaureus; A. M. master of arts, artium magister: or, anno; as, A. D. anno domini.

AB, at the beginning of the names of
places, generally shows that they have
some relation to an abbey, as Abingdon.
Gibson.
ABACK. adv. [from back.] Backward.
Obsolete.

But when they came where thou thy skill
didst show,

They drew abacke, as half with shame con-
found.
Spenser's Pastorals.
ABACTOR. n. s. [Latin.] One who
drives away or steals cattle in herds, or
great numbers at once, in distinction
from those that steal only a sheep or
Blount.

two.

A'BACUS. n. s. [Latin.]

1. A counting-table, anciently used in cal. culations.

2. [In architecture.] The uppermost member of a column, which serves as a sort of crowning both to the capital and column. Dict. ABA'FT. adv. [of abartan, Sax. behind.] From the forepart of the ship, toward the stern. Dict. ABAI'SANCE. n. s. [from the French abaisser, to depress, to bring down.] An act of reverence; a bow. Obeysance is considered by Skinner as a corruption of abaisance, but is now universally used. To ABA'LIENATE. v. a. [from abalieno, Lat.] To make that another's which was our own before. A term of the civil law, not much used in common speech. ABALIENATION. n. s. [abalienatio, Lat.] The act of giving up one's right to another person; or a making over an estate, goods, or chattels, by sale, or due course of law. Dict. To ABA'ND. V. a. [A word contracted from abandon, but not now in use. See ABANDON.] To forsake.

They stronger are

Than they which sought at first their helping hand,

And Vortiger enforced the kingdom to aband. Spenser's Fairy Queen, T. ABANDON. v. a. [abandonner, Fr.

Derived, according to Menage, from the Italian abandonare, which signifies to forsake his colours; bandum [vexillum] deserere. Pasquier thinks it a coalition of à ban donner, to give up to a proscription; in which sense we, at this day, mention the ban of the empire. Ban, in our own old dialect, signifies a curse; and to abandon, if considered as compounded between French and Saxon, is exactly equivalent to diris devovere.]

1. To give up, resign, or quit : often fol-
lowed by the particle to.

If she be so abandon'd to her sorrow
As it is spoke, she never will admit me.

Shaksp. Twelfth Night.
The passive gods behold the Greeks defile
Their temples, and abandon to the spoil
Their own abodes; we, feeble few, conspire
To save a sinking town, involv'd in fire.

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Dryden's Eneid. Who is he so abandoned to sottish cruelty, as to think, that a clod of earth in a sack may ever, by eternal shaking, receive the fabric of man's body? Bentley's Sermons. Must he, whose altars on the Phrygian shore With frequent rites, and pure, avow'd thy

pow'r,

Be doom'd the worst of human ills to prove, Unbless'd, abandon'd to the wrath of Jove? Pope's Odyssey., 2. To desert; to forsake: in an ill sense. The princes using the passions of fearing evil, and desiring to escape, only to serve the rule of virtue, not to abandon one's self, leapt to a rib of the ship. Sidney.

3.

Seeing the hurt stag alone,
Left and dbandon'd of his velvet friends:
'Tis right, quoth he; thus misery doth part
The flux of company. Shaksp. is you like it.
What fate a wretched fugitive attends!
Scorn'd by my foes, abandon'd by my friends.

Dryden.

But to the parting goddess thus she pray'd:
Propitious still be present to my aid,
Nor quite abandon your once favour'd maid!
Dryden's Fables.

To forsake; to leave.

He boldly spake, Sir knight, if knight thou be, Abandon this forestalled place at erst,

For fear of further harm, I counsel thee.

Spenser's Fairy Queen.
To ABANDON OVER. v. a. [a form of
writing not usual, perhaps not exact.]
To give up to; to resign.

Look on me as a man abandon'd o'er
To an eternal lethargy of love;

To pull, and pinch, and wound me, cannot cure,
And but disturb the quiet of my death. Dryden.
ABANDONED. particip. adj. Corrupted
in the highest degree; as, an abandoned
swretch. In this sense, it is a contraction
of a longer form; abandoned [given up]
to wickedness.
ABANDONING. [a verbal noun, from
abandon.] Desertion; forsaking.
He hoped his past meritorious actions might
outweigh his present abandoning the thought of
future action.
Clarendon
ABANDONMENT. n. s. [abandonnement,
French.]

1. The act of abandoning.

ABANNI'TION. 7. s. [Lat. abannitio.] A 2. The state of being abandoned. Dict.

АВА

banishment for one or two years, for Dict. manslaughter. Obsolete.

To ABARE. v. a. [abaɲian, Sax.] To make bare, uncover, or disclose. Dict. ABARTICULATION. n. s. [from ab, from, and articulus, a joint, Lat.] A good and apt construction of the bones, by which they move strongly and easily; or that species of articulation that has manifest Dict. motion. To ABA'SE. v. a. [Fr. abaisser, from the Lat. basis, or bassus, a barbarous word, signifying low, base.]

1. To depress; to lower.

It is a point of cunning to wait upon him with whom you speak with your eye; yet with a deBacon. mure abasing of it sometimes.

2. To cast down; to depress; to bring low: in a figurative and personal sense, which is the common use.

Happy shepherd! to the gods be thankful, that to thy advancement their wisdoms have thee abased.

Sidney.

Behold every one that is proud, and abase him

Job.
With unresisted might the monarch reigns;
He levels mountains, and he raises plains;
And, not regarding diff'rence of degree,
Abar'd your daughter, and exalted me. Dryden.

If the mind be curbed and humbled too much
in children; if their spirits be abased and broken
much by too strict an hand over them; they lose
Locke on Educ.
all their vigour and industry.
ABA'SED. adj. [with heralds.] A term
used of the wings of eagles, when the
top looks downward toward the point
of the shield; or when the wings are
shut; the natural way of bearing them
being spread, with the top pointing.
to the chief of the angle.

Bailey. Chambers. ABA'SEMENT. n. s. The state of being brought low; the act of bringing low; depression.

There is an abasement because of glory; and there is that lifteth up his head from a low estate. Ecclus. To ABA'SH. v. a. [See BASHFUL. Perhaps from abaisser, French.]

1. To put into confusion; to make asham-
ed. It generally implies a sudden im-
pression of shame.

They heard, and were abash'd. Milt. Par. Lost.
This heard, th' imperious queen sat mute with

fear;
Nor further durst incense the gloomy thunderer.
Silence was in the court at this rebuke:
Nor could the gods, abash'd, sustain their sove-
Dryden's Fables.
reign's look.

2. The passive admits the particle at,
sometimes of, before the causal noun.
In no wise speak against the truth, but be
Ecclus.
abasbed of the error of thy ignorance.

I said unto her, from whence is this kid? is
it not stolen? But she replied upon me, it was
given for a gift, more than the wages: however,
I did not believe her, and I was abashed at her.
Tobit.

In the admiration only of weak minds,
Led captive: cease to admire, and all her plumes
Fall flat, and sink into a trivial toy,
At every sudden slighting quite abasht.
Milton's Paradise Lost.

The little Cupids hov'ring round,
As pictures prove) with garlands crown'd,
Abash'd at what they saw and heard,
Flew off, nor ever more appear'd.

Swift's Miscellanies.
To ABATE. v. a. [from the French
abattre, to beat down.]

I. To lessen; to diminish.

Who can tell whether the divine wisdom, to
abate the glory of those kings, did not reserve
this work to be done by a queen, that it might
appear to be his own immediate work?

Sir John Davies on Ireland.
If you did know to whom I gave the ring,
And how unwillingly I left the ring,
You would abate the strength of your displeasure.
Shakspeare.

Here we see the hopes of great benefit and
light from expositors and commentators, are in
a great part abated; and those who have most
need of their help, can receive but little from
them. Locke's Essay on St. Paul's Epistles.
2. To deject or depress the mind.
This iron world

Brings down the stoutest hearts to lowest state:
For misery doth bravest minds abate.

Spenser's Hubberd's Tale.

Have the power still
To banish your defenders; till at length
Your ignorance deliver you,

As most abated captives, to some nation
That won you without blows!

Shakspeare.

Time, that changes all, yet changes us in vain;
The body, not the mind; nor can controul
Th' immortal vigour, or abate the soul.

Dryden's Eneid. 3. In commerce, to let down the price in selling, sometimes to beat down the price in buying.

To ABATE. V. n.

1. To grow less as, his passion abates; the storm abates. It is used sometimes with the particle of before the thing lessened.

Our physicians have observed, that in process of time, some diseases have abated of their viru lence, and have, in a manner, worn out their malignity, so as to be no longer mortal. Dryden's Hind and Panther.

2. In common law.

It is in law used both actively and neuterly; as, to abate a castle, to beat it down. To abate a writ, is, by some exception, to defeat or overthrow it. A stranger abateth, that is, entereth upon a house or land void by the death of him that last possessed it, before the heir take his possession, and so keepeth him out Wherefore, as he that putteth out him in possesion, is said to disseise; so he that steppeth in between the former possessor and his heir, is said to abate. In the neuter signification thus: The writ of the demandment shall abate, that is, shall be disabled, frustrated, or overthrown. The appeal abateth. by covin, that is, that the accusation is defeated Corvell. by deceit. [In horsemanship.] A horse is said to abate or take down his curvets; when working upon curvets, he puts his two hind legs to the ground both at once, and observes the same exactness in all Dict. the times. ABATEMENT. n. s. [abatement, Fr.] 1. The act of abating or lessening.

3.

Xenophon tells us, that the city contained about ten thousand houses; and allowing one man to every house, who could have any share

in the government (the rest consisting of women, children, and servants), and making other obvious abatements, these tyrants, if they had been careful to adhere together, might have been a majority even of the people collective

Swift on the Contests in Athens and Rome. 2. The state of being abated.

Coffee has, in common with all nuts, an oil strongly combined and entangled with earthy particles. The most noxicus part of oil exhales in roasting, to the abatement of near one quarter of its weight. Arbuthnot on Aliments.

3. The sum or quantity taken away by the act of abating.

The law of works is that law, which requires perfect obedience, without remission or abatement; so that, by that law, a man cannot be just, or justified, without an exact performance Locke. of every tittle.

4. The cause of abating; extenuation.

As our advantages towards practising and promoting piety and virtue were greater than those of other men, so will our excuse be less, if we neglect to make use of them. We cannot plead in abatement of our guilt, that we were ignorant of our duty, under the prepossession of ill habits, and the bias of a wrong education. Atterbury. 5. [In law.] The act of the abator; as, the abatement of the heir into the land before he hath agreed with the lord. The affection or passion of the thing abated; as,abatement of the writ. Cowell. 6. [With heralds.] An accidental mark, which being added to a coat of arms, the dignity of it is abased, by reason of some stain or dishonourable quality of Dict. the bearer. ABATER. 2. S. The agent or cause by which an abatement is procured; that by which any thing is lessened.

other nuts.

Abaters of acrimóny or sharpness, are expressed oils of ripe vegetables, and all preparations of such; as of almonds, pistachoes, and Arbuthnot an Diet. ABATOR. n. s. [a law term.] One who intrudes into houses or land, void by the death of the former possessor, and yet not entered upon or taken up by his heir. Dict. A'BATUDE. 7. s. [old records.] Any thing diminished. Bailey. A'BATURE. n. 5. [from abattre, French.] Those sprigs of grass which are thrown down by a stag in his passing by. Dict. ABB. n. s. The yarn on a weaver's warp: Chambers. a term among clothiers. ABBA. n. s. [Heb. N] A Syriac word, which signifies father. A'BBACY. n. 5. [Lat. abbatia.] The rights or privileges of an abbot. See ABBEY. According to Felinus, an abbacy is the dignity itself; since an abbot is a term or word of dignity, and not of office; and, therefore, even a secular person, who has the care of souls, is sometimes, in the canon law, also stiled an abbot. Ayliffe's Par. Juris Canonici. A'BBESS. 7. 3. [Lat. abbatissa, from whence the Saxon abudirre, then probably abbatess, and by contraction The abbesse in Fr. and abbess, Eng.] superiour or governess of a nunnery or monastery of women.

They fled

Into this abbey, whither we pursued them;

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I have a sister, abbess in Terceras, Who lost her lover on her bridal day. Dryden. Constantia, as soon as the solemnities of her reception were over, retired with the abbess into her own apartment. Addison.

A'BBEY, or ABBY. n. s. [Lat. abbatia ; from whence probably first ABBACY, which see.] A monastery of religious persons, whether men or women; distinguished from religious houses of other denominations by larger privileges. See Аввот.

With easy roads he came to Leicester; Lodg'd in the abbey, where the reverend abbot, With all his convent, honourably receiv'd him. Shakspeare. A'BBEY-LUBBER. n. s. [See LUBBER.] A slothful loiterer in a religious house, under pretence of retirement and austerity.

This is no father Dominic, no huge overgrown abbey-lubber; this is but a diminutive sucking friar. Dryden's Spanish Friar. ABBOT. n. s. [in the lower Latin abbas, from 2, father, which sense was still implied; so that the abbots were called patres and abbesses matres monasterii. Thus Fortunatus to the abbot Paternus: Nominis officium jure, Paterne, geris.] The chief of a convent, or fellowship of canons. Of these, some in England were mitred, some not: those that were mitred, were exempted from the jurisdiction of the diocesan, having in themselves episcopal authority within their precincts, and being also lords of parliament. The other sort were subject to the diocesan in all spiritual government. Cowell,

The state or priviDict.

See ABBEY. A'BBOTSHIP. n. s. lege of an abbot. To ABBREVIATE. v. a. [Lat. ab breviare.]

1. To shorten by contraction of parts, without loss of the main substance; to abridge.

It is one thing to abbreviate by contracting, another by cutting off. Bacon's Essays.

The only invention of late years, which hath contributed towards politeness in discourse, is that of abbreviating or reducing words of many syllables into one, by lopping off the rest. Swift. 2. To shorten; to cut short.

Set the length of their days before the flood; which were abbreviated after, and contracted into hundreds and threescores.

Brown's Vulgar Erreurs. ABBREVIATION. z 22. S. 1. The act of abbreviating. 2. The means used to abbreviate, as characters signifying whole words; words

contracted.

Such is the propriety and energy in them all, that they never can be changed, but to disadvantage, except in the circumstance of using abbreviations. Swift. ABBREVIATOR. n. s. [abbreviateur, Fr.] One who abbreviates, or abridges. ABBREVIATURE. 7. s. [abbreviatura, Latin.]

1. A mark used for the sake of shortening. 2. A compendium or abridgment.

He is a good man, who grieves rather for him that injures him, than for his own suffering; who prays for him that wrongs him, forgiving all his faults; who sooner shews mercy than anger; who offers violence to his appetite, in all things endeavouring to subdue the flesh to the spirit. This is an excellent abbreviature of the whole duty of a christian. Taylor's Guide to Devotion. ABBREUVOIR. [French, a watering place. Ital. abberverato, dal verbo bevere. Lat. bibere. Abbeverari i cavalli. This word is derived by Menage, not much acquainted with the Teutonick dialects, from adbibare for adbibere; but more probably it comes from the same root with brew. See BREW.] Among masons, the joint or juncture of two stones, or the interstice between two stones to be filled up with mortar. A'BBY. See ABBEY. A, B, C.

Dict.

1. The alphabet; as, he has not learned his a, b, c.

2. The little book by which the elements of reading are taught.

Then comes question like an a, b, c, book. Shakspeare. To A'BDICATE. v. [Lat. abdico.] To give up right; to resign; to lay down an office.

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a.

Addison.

Old Saturn here, with upcast eyes, Beheld his abdicated skies. ABDICATION, n. s. [abdicatio, Latin.] The act of abdicating; resignation; quitting an office by one's own proper act before the usual or stated expiration. Neither doth it appear how a prince's abdication can make any other sort of vacancy in the throne, than would be caused by his death; since he cannot abdicate for his children, other wise than by his own consent in form to a bill from the two houses. Swift's Cb. of Eng. Man. ABDICATIVE. adj. That causes or implies an abdication. Dict. ABDITIVE. adj. [from abdo, to hide.] That has the power or quality of hiding. Dict. ABDO'MEN. n. s. [Lat. from abdo, to hide.] A cavity commonly called the lower venter or belly: it contains the stomach, guts, liver, spleen, bladder, and is within lined with a membrane called the peritonæum. The lower part is called the hypogastrium; the foremost part is divided into the epigastrium, the right and left hypocondria, and the navel; 't is bounded above by the cartilago ensiformis and the diaphragm, sideways by the short or lower ribs, and behind by the vertebræ of the loins, the bones of the coxendix, that of the pubes, and os sacrum. It is covered with several muscles, from whose alternate relaxations and contractions, in respiration, digestion is forwarded, and the due motion of all the parts therein contained promoted, both for secretion and ex. pulsion.

Quincy.

The abdomen consists of parts containing and Contained. Wiseman's Surgery.

ABDOMINAL adj. Relating to the
ABDO'MINOUS. S abdomen.

To ABDU'CE. v. a. [Lat. abduco.] To
draw to a different part; to withdraw
one part from another: a word chiefly
used in physick or science.

If we abduce the eye into either corner, the object will not duplicate; for, in that position, the axes of the cones remain in the same plane, as is demonstrated in the optics delivered by Galen. Brown's Vulgar Erreurs, ABDU'CENT. adj. Muscles abducent, are those which serve to open or pull back divers parts of the body; their opposites being called adducent. Dict ABDUCTION. n. s. [abductio, Latin.] 1. The act of drawing apart, or withdraw. ing one part from another.

2. A particular form of argument. ABDUCTOR. n. s. [abductor, Lat.] The name given by anatomists to the muscles which serve to draw back the several members.

He supposed the constrictors of the eyelids must be strengthened in the supercilious; the abductors in drunkards, and contemplative men, who have the same steady and grave motion of the eye. Arbuthnot and Pope's Martinus Scriblerus. ABECEDA'RIAN, n. s. [from the names of a, b, c, the three first letters of the alphabet.] He that teaches or learns the alphabet, or first rudiments of literature.

This word is used by Wood in his Athena Oxonienses; where, mentioning Farnaby the critic, he relates that, in some part of his life, he was reduced to follow the trade of an abecedarian by his misfortunes.

A'BECEDARY. adj. [See ABECEDA-
RIAN.]

1. Belonging to the alphabet.
2. Inscribed with the alphabet.

This is pretended from the sympathy of two
needles touched with the leadstone, and placed
in the center of two abecedary circles, or rings
of letters, described round about them; one
friend keeping one, and another the other, and
agreeing upon an hour wherein they will com-
municate.
Brown's Vulgar Errours.
ABE'D, adv. [from a, for at, and bed.]

In bed.

It was a shame for them to mar their complexions, yea and conditions too, with long lying abed: when she was of their age, she would have made a handkerchief by that time o' day.

Sidney. Dryden.

She has not been abed, but in her chapel All night devoutly watch'd. ABE'RRANCE. n. s. [from aberro, Lat. ABE'RRANCY. to wander from the right way.] A deviation from the right way; an errour; a mistake; a false opinion.

They do not only swarm with errours, but vices depending thereon. Thus they commonly affect no man any farther than he deserts his reason, or complies with their aberrancies.

Brown's Vulgar Errours. Could a man be composed to such an advan tage of constitution, that it should not at all adulterate the images of his mind; yet this second nature would alter the crasis of his under

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