Search the Dictionary

ure, spiritual affection, subsisting between persons of opposite sex, unmixed with carnal desires, and regarding the mind only and its excellences; -- a species of love for which Plato was a warm advocate. -- Platonic year (Astron.), a period of time determined by the revolution of the equinoxes, or the space of time…

To have or take pleasure in; hence, to choose; to wish; to desire; to will. Whatsoever the Lord pleased, that did he. Ps. cxxxv. 6. A man doing as he wills, and doing as he pleases, are the same things in common speech. J. Edwards.

or possession of; to accomplish; to gain; to seize. How . . . to possess the purpose they desired. Spenser.

Any deficiency of elements or resources that are needed or desired, or that constitute richness; as, poverty of soil; poverty of the blood; poverty of ideas. Poverty grass (Bot.), a name given to several slender grasses (as Aristida dichotoma, and Danthonia spicata) which often spring up on old and worn-out fields.…

To make request with earnestness or zeal, as for something desired; to make entreaty or supplication; to offer prayer to a deity or divine being as a religious act; specifically, to address the Supreme Being with adoration, confession, supplication, and thanksgiving. And to his goddess pitously he preyde. Chaucer. When…

ace; superior rank; as, barons have precedence of commoners. Which of them [the different desires] has the precedency in determining the will to the next action Locke.

To cause to prefer; to incline; to decide. [Obs.] The desire to spare Christian blood preponderates him for peace. Fuller.

nstant; coincident. "A present recompense." "A present pardon." Shak. An ambassador . . . desires a present audience. Massinger.

ted; a setting forth; an offering; bestowal. Prayers are sometimes a presentation of mere desires. Hooker.

The act of anticipating another's wishes, desires, etc., in the way of favor or courtesy; hence, civility; obligingness. [Obs.] Sterne.

More or less permanent erection and rigidity of the penis, with or without sexual desire.

nsciousness of power; fullness of animal spirits; mettle; wantonness; hence, lust; sexual desire; esp., an excitement of sexual appetite in a female beast. [Obs.] Pride of India, or Pride of China. (Bot.) See Margosa. -- Pride of the desert (Zoöl.), the camel.

berty. The prisoned eagle dies for rage. Sir W. Scott. His true respect will prison false desire. Shak.

he state of being deprived or destitute of something, especially of something required or desired; destitution; need; as, to undergo severe privations.

Local, U. S. (North Carolina and Tennessee).] "To procession the lands of such persons as desire it." Burrill.

or desirable; successful progress in any business or enterprise; attainment of the object desired; good fortune; success; as, commercial prosperity; national prosperity. Now prosperity begins to mellow. Shak. Prosperities can only be enjoyed by them who fear not at all to lose the Jer. Taylor.

Excited by sexual desire; -- applied particularly to the females of some animals. Sir T. Browne.

Uneasy with desire; itching; especially, having a lascivious curiosity or propensity; lustful. -- Pru"ri*ent*ly, adv. The eye of the vain and prurient is darting from object to object of illicit attraction. I. Taylor.

The method rests upon the theory that hysteria is characteristically due to repression of desires consciously rejected but subconsciously persistent; it consists in a close analysis of the patient's mental history, stress being laid upon the dream life, and of treatment by means of suggestion. -- Psy*chan`a*lyt"ic (#),…

A cleansing from guilt or the pollution of sin; the extinction of sinful desires, appetites, and inclinations.