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from the proper office or officer, or from the proper authority; made or communicated by virtue of authority; as, an official statement or report.

By the proper officer; by virtue of the proper authority; in pursuance of the special powers vested in an officer or office; as, accounts or reports officially vertified or rendered; letters officially communicated; persons officially notified.

; hence, one who is omnipotent; the Deity. Will Omnipotence neglect to save The suffering virtue of the wise and brave Pope.

By virtue of; with the pledge of; -- denoting a pledge or engagement, and put before the thing pledged; as, he affirmed or promised on his word, or on his honor.

To act or produce effect on the mind; to exert moral power or influence. The virtues of private persons operate but on a few. Atterbury. A plain, convincing reason operates on the mind both of a learned and ignorant hearer as long as they live. Swift.

That which is opposed or contrary; as, sweetness and its opposite. The virtuous man meets with more opposites and opponents than any other. Landor.

check, restrain, or defeat; resistance. The counterpoise of so great an opposition. Shak. Virtue which breaks through all opposition. Milton.

tate of being ordained, appointed, etc. The holy and wise ordination of God. Jer. Taylor. Virtue and vice have a natural ordination to the happiness and misery of life respectively. Norris.

To domineer over by virtue of office. [Obs.] Shak.

Open to view; public; apparent; manifest. Overt and apparent virtues bring forth praise. Bacon.

ash, in opinion; to think conceitedly; to presume. They that overween, And at thy growing virtues fret their spleen. Milton.

y small portion or part; the smallest portion; as, he has not a particle of patriotism or virtue. The houses had not given their commissioners authority in the least particle to recede. Clarendon.

; patient; not opposing; unresisting; as, passive obedience; passive submission. The best virtue, passive fortitude. Massinger.

Love of country; devotion to the welfare of one's country; the virtues and actions of a patriot; the passion which inspires one to serve one's country. Berkley.

iously. [R.] That pedetentous pace and pedetentous mind in which it behooves the wise and virtuous improver to walk. Sydney Smith.

icult. And to each in ward part, With gentle penetration, though unseen, Shoots invisible virtue even to the deep. Milton. A penetration into the difficulties of algebra. Watts.

or filtering; filtration; straining. Specifically (Pharm.), the process of exhausting the virtues of a powdered drug by letting a liquid filter slowly through it.

count it. Hooker. My firm persuasion is, at least sometimes, That Heaven will weigh man's virtues and his crimes With nice attention. Cowper.

The quality or state of being perverse. "Virtue hath some perverseness." Donne.

een a piece of a logician before I came to him." Sir P. Sidney. Thy mother was a piece of virtue. Shak. His own spirit is as unsettled a piece as there is in all the world. Coleridge. a piece of cake, a task easily accomplished. a piece of work, a disparaging term for a person considered to have an excess of some undes…