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To feel absence of trust in; not to confide in or rely upon; to deem of questionable sufficiency or reality; to doubt; to be suspicious of; to mistrust. Not distrusting my health. 2 Mac. ix. 22. To distrust the justice of your cause. Dryden. He that requireth the oath doth distrust that other. Udall. Of all afraid, Dis…

Fig.: To plunge or to go deeply into any subject, question, business, etc.; to penetrate; to explore. South.

o ascertain the votes for and against a measure; as, to divide a legislative house upon a question.

s supposed to have been first used before imperatives. It expresses entreaty or earnest request; as, do help me. In the imperative mood, but not in the indicative, it may be used with the verb to be; as, do be quiet. Do, did, and done often stand as a general substitute or representative verb, and thus save the repetit…

Fig.: To evade by craft; as, to dodge a question; to dodge responsibility. [Colloq.] S. G. Goodrich.

ress to, dogging him from place to place, till they even extort an answer to their rude requests. South.

To question or hold questionable; to withhold assent to; to hesitate to believe, or to be inclined not to believe; to withhold confidence from; to distrust; as, I have heard the story, but I doubt the truth of it. To admire superior sense, and doubt their own! Pope. I doubt not that however changed, you keep So much of…

Capable of being doubted; questionable.

Admitting of doubt; not obvious, clear, or certain; questionable; not decided; not easy to be defined, classed, or named; as, a doubtful case, hue, claim, title, species, and the like. Beauty is but a vain and doubtful good. Shak. Is it a great cruelty to expel from our abode the enemy of our peace, or even the doubtfu…

Unquestionably. Beau. & Fl.

Occasioning doubt; not clear, or obvious; equivocal; questionable; doubtful; as, a dubious answer. Wiping the dingy shirt with a still more dubious pocket handkerchief. Thackeray.

An urgent request or demand of payment; as, he sent his debtor a dun.

Apostolic Eastern Church. It became estranged from the Western, or Roman, Church over the question of papal supremacy and the doctrine of the filioque, and a separation, begun in the latter part of the 9th century, became final in 1054. The Eastern Church consists of twelve (thirteen if the Bulgarian Church be included…

onomical distress in England to prompt the enterprises of colonization. Palfrey. Economic questions, such as money, usury, taxes, lands, and the employment of the people. H. C. Baird.

tline or sketch, regarded as containing the fundamental ideas or features of the thing in question; as, the elemental of a plan.

ompasses the finger; an army encompasses a city; a voyage encompassing the world. Shak. A question may be encompassed with difficulty. C. J. Smith. The love of all thy sons encompass thee. Tennyson.

ding, or the state of being surrounded; circumvention. By this encompassment and drift of question. Shak.

ity of lasting or duration; lastingness; continuance. Slurring with an evasive answer the question concerning the endurance of his own possession. Sir W. Scott.

orce to; to strengthen; to invigorate; to urge with energy; as, to enforce arguments or requests. Enforcing sentiment of the thrust humanity. Burke.

To make an earnest petition or request. The Janizaries entreated for them as valiant men. Knolles.