Search the Dictionary

A blunt lance head used in the joust. Congreve rocket, a powerful form of rocket for use in war, invented by Sir William Congreve. It may be used either in the field or for bombardment; in the former case, it is armed with shells or case shot; in the latter, with a combustible material inclosed in a metallic case, whic…

Of voluntary or personal action:

the foot on a floor causes the patient to spring into the air, so as to make repeated involuntary motions of hopping and jumping. J. Ross.

The compensation allowed to persons who voluntarily assist in saving a ship or her cargo from peril.

Exiled voluntarily.

n of one's acts or states without the necessitating force of motives; -- applied to the voluntary or activity.

Voluntarily taken on one's self; as, self-imposed tasks.

Motion given by inherent power, without external impulse; spontaneus or voluntary motion. Matter is not induced with self-motion. Cheyne.

One who serves, or does services, voluntarily or on compulsion; a person who is employed by another for menial offices, or for other labor, and is subject to his command; a person who labors or exerts himself for the benefit of another, his master or employer; a subordinate helper. "A yearly hired servant." Lev. xxv. 5…

The state of voluntary or compulsory subjection to a master; the condition of being bound to service; the condition of a slave; slavery; bondage; hence, a state of slavish dependence. You would have sold your king to slaughter, His princes and his peers to servitude. Shak. A splendid servitude; . . . for he that rises…

Having a very thin edge or fine point; of a nature to cut or pierce easily; not blunt or dull; keen. He dies upon my scimeter's sharp point. Shak.

To obtund or blunt, as acrimonious substances, or sharp particles. [R.] Arbuthnot. To sheathe the sword, to make peace.

The common Lepisma, or furniture bug. Blunt-nosed shiner (Zoöl.), the silver moonfish.

tely expel it; to make a deep single audible respiration, especially as the result or involuntary expression of fatigue, exhaustion, grief, sorrow, or the like.

To depart voluntarily from the path of duty prescribed by God to man; to violate the divine law in any particular, by actual transgression or by the neglect or nonobservance of its injunctions; to violate any known rule of duty; -- often followed by against. Against thee, thee only, have I sinned. Ps. li. 4. All have s…

To take rest by a suspension of the voluntary exercise of the powers of the body and mind, and an apathy of the organs of sense; to slumber. Chaucer. Watching at the head of these that sleep. Milton.

To emit air, chiefly through the nose, audibly and violently, by a kind of involuntary convulsive force, occasioned by irritation of the inner membrane of the nose. Not to be sneezed at, not to be despised or contemned; not to be treated lightly. [Colloq.] "He had to do with old women who were not to be sneezed at." Pr…

uvula and soft palate, thus giving rise to a sound more or less harsh. It is usually unvoluntary, but may be produced voluntarily.

ions approppriate to the waking state; a state of sleep in which some of the senses and voluntary powers are partially awake; noctambulism.

A closing voluntary; a postlude.