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sumed, or presupposed, as prior to experience, in order to make experience rational or possible. A priori, that is, form these necessities of the mind or forms of thinking, which, though first revealed to us by experience, must yet have preëxisted in order to make experience possible. Coleridge.

To diminish the sensibility of; to debilitate.

One who believes that it is possible to realize a cognition or concept of the absolute. Sir. W. Hamilton.

To set free, or release, as from some obligation, debt, or responsibility, or from the consequences of guilt or such ties as it would be sin or guilt to violate; to pronounce free; as, to absolve a subject from his allegiance; to absolve an offender, which amounts to an acquittal and remission of his punishment. Halifa…

Incomprehensibility of things; the doctrine held by the ancient Skeptic philosophers, that human knowledge never amounts to certainty, but only to probability.

Incapable of being comprehended; incomprehensible.

A coming to, or near approach; admittance; admission; accessibility; as, to gain access to a prince. I did repel his letters, and denied His access to me. Shak.

gn to their proper harmony. -- Accidental colors (Opt.), colors depending on the hypersensibility of the retina of the eye for complementary colors. They are purely subjective sensations of color which often result from the contemplation of actually colored bodies. -- Accidental point (Persp.), the point in which a r…

in the tissues of man and the lower animals; -- so called from the absence of a head or visible organs on the vesicle. These cysts are the immature stages of certain tapeworms. Also applied to similar cysts of different origin.

To discharge, as a claim or debt; to clear off; to pay off; to requite. A responsibility that can never be absolutely acquitted. I. Taylor.

A state of reality or real existence as opposed to a possibility or possible existence. [Obs.] The seeds of plants are not at first in act, but in possibility, what they afterward grow to be. Hooker.

ing in act or reality; really acted or acting; in fact; real; -- opposed to potential, possible, virtual, speculative, coceivable, theoretical, or nominal; as, the actual cost of goods; the actual case under discussion.

Having nice or quick sensibility; susceptible to slight impressions; acting keenly on the senses; sharp; keen; intense; as, a man of acute eyesight, hearing, or feeling; acute pain or pleasure.

To equal. [Obs.] It [is] an impossibility for any creature to adequate God in his eternity. Shelford.

To concede as true; to acknowledge or assent to, as an allegation which it is impossible to deny; to own or confess; as, the argument or fact is admitted; he admitted his guilt.

Admissible. Sir T. Browne.

Admissibility. [Obs.] Shak.

sentation of; to outline; to shadow forth. Both in the vastness and the richness of the visible universe the invisible God is adumbrated. L. Taylor.

ate the cause of thy client. Bp. Sanderson (1624). This is the only thing distinct and sensible, that has been advocated. Burke. Eminent orators were engaged to advocate his cause. Mitford.

the skin can be distinguished, and thus to determine whether the condition of tactile sensibility is normal or altered.