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excitement; wild enthusiasm; madness. The popular delirium [of the French Revolution] at first caught his enthusiastic mind. W. Irving. The delirium of the preceding session (of Parliament). Motley. Delirium tremens (. Etym: [L., trembling delirium] (Med.), a violent delirium induced by the excessive and prolonged use…

and still to be determined; ground of controversy or quarrel. [Obs.] To go on now with my first dependence. Beau. & Fl.

d; dependent upon friends. England, long dependent and degraded, was again a power of the first rank. Macaulay. Dependent covenant or contract (Law), one not binding until some connecting stipulation is performed. -- Dependent variable (Math.), a varying quantity whose changes are arbitrary, but are regarded as produc…

To depurate; to purify. [Obs.] He shall first be depured and cleansed before that he shall be laid up for pure gold in the treasures of God. Sir T. More.

ho descends, as offspring, however remotely; -- correlative to ancestor or ascendant. Our first parents and their descendants. Hale. The descendant of so many kings and emperors. Burke.

of a word or phrase. Finite and infinite seem . . . to be attributed primarily, in their first designation, only to those things have parts. Locke.

r at least despond. Scott's Letters. Others depress their own minds, [and] despond at the first difficulty. Locke. We wish that . . . desponding patriotism may turn its eyes hitherward, and be assured that foundations of our national power still stand strong. D. Webster.

-- Destructive sorties ( (Logic), a process of reasoning which involves the denial of the first of a series of dependent propositions as a consequence of the denial of the last; a species of reductio ad absurdum. Whately.

detect a mistake in an account. Plain good intention . . . is as easily discovered at the first view, as fraud is surely detected at last. Burke. Like following life through creatures you dissect, You lose it in the moment you detect. Pope.

A second marriage, after the death of the first husband of wife; -- in distinction from bigamy, as defined in the old canon law. See Bigamy. Goldsmith.

The shaft, or main part, of a bone, which is first ossified.

A continuous narrative arranged from the first four books of the New Testament.

Pertaining to the scale of eight tones, the eighth of which is the octave of the first. Diatonic scale (Mus.), a scale consisting of eight sounds with seven intervals, of which two are semitones and five are whole tones; a modern major or minor scale, as distinguished from the chromatic scale.

th a spade, or other sharp instrument; to pierce, open, or loosen, as if with a spade. Be first to dig the ground. Dryden.

Pertaining to a second marriage, that is, one after the death of the first wife or the first husband.

at honor and dignity hath been done to Mordecai for this Esth. vi. 3. Reuben, thou art my firstborn, . . . the excellency of dignity, and the excellency of power. Gen. xlix. 3.

act of dilating, or the state of being dilated; expansion; dilatation. Mrs. Browning. At first her eye with slow dilation rolled. Tennyson. A gigantic dilation of the hateful figure. Dickens.

y Max Müller, the creative faculty gave to each general conception as it thrilled for the first time through the brain a phonetic expression; -- jocosely so called from the analogy of the sound of a bell induced by the stroke of the clapper.

ependent on circumstances for its credibility. Wharton. -- Direct examination (Law), the first examination of a witness in the orderly course, upon the merits. Abbott. -- Direct fire (Mil.), fire, the direction of which is perpendicular to the line of troops or to the parapet aimed at. -- Direct process (Metal.), on…

ng to: director or directory; specifically, relating to the Directory of France under the first republic. See Directory, 3. Whoever goes to the directorial presence under this passport. Burke.