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To wear away by degrees; to impair gradually; to diminish by constant loss; to use up; to consume; to spend; to wear out. Until your carcasses be wasted in the wilderness. Num. xiv. 33. O, were I able To waste it all myself, and leave ye none! Milton. Here condemned To waste eternal days in woe and pain. Milton. Wasted…

ng. "Wean them from themselves." Shak. The troubles of age were intended . . . to wean us gradually from our fondness of life. Swift.

waste, or diminish, by continual attrition, scraping, percussion, on the like; to consume gradually; to cause to lower or disappear; to spend. That wicked wight his days doth wear. Spenser. The waters wear the stones. Job xiv. 19.

undertaking in humiliation or penitence. -- Weeping rock, a porous rock from which water gradually issues. -- Weeping sinew, a ganglion. See Ganglion, n., 2. [Colloq.] -- Weeping spring, a spring that discharges water slowly. -- Weeping willow (Bot.), a species of willow (Salix Babylonica) whose branches grow very l…

. "While I have time and space." Chaucer. Use your memory; you will sensibly experience a gradual improvement, while you take care not to overload it. I. Watts.

To produce by slow degrees, or as if laboriously; to bring gradually into any state by action or motion. "Sidelong he works his way." Milton. So the pure, limpid stream, when foul with stains Of rushing torrents and descending rains, Works itself clear, and as it runs, refines, Till by degrees the floating mirror shine…

To work slowly, gradually, and secretly. When debates and fretting jealousy Did worm and work within you more and more, Your color faded. Herbert.