Search the Dictionary

A person given as a pledge or security for the performance of the conditions of a treaty or stipulations of any kind, on the performance of which the person is to be released. Your hostages I have, so have you mine; And we shall talk before we fight. Shak. He that hath a wife and children hath given hostages to fortune…

One versed in knowledge of human nature.

In a human manner; after the manner of men; according to the knowledge or wisdom of men; as, the present prospects, humanly speaking, promise a happy issue. Sir W. Raleigh.

A knowledge of hymns; a treatise on hymns.

ability for a debt or engagement without delivery of possession or transfer of title; to pledge without delivery of possession; to mortgage, as ships, or other personal property; to make a contract by bottomry. See Hypothecation, Bottomry. He had found the treasury empty and the pay of the navy in arrear. He had no pow…

our law, where an hypothecation, in the strict sense of the Roman law, exists; that is a pledge without possession by the pledgee. Story.

One who hypothecates or pledges anything as security for the repayment of money borrowed.

Existing in idea or thought; conceptional; intellectual; mental; as, ideal knowledge.

Lack of knowledge or mental capacity; idiocy; foolishness. Worse than mere ignorance or idiotism. Shaftesbury. The running that adventure is the greatist idiotism. Hammond.

A stupid, ignorant person; a vain pretender to knowledge; a dunce. An ignoramus in place and power. South.

The condition of being ignorant; the want of knowledge in general, or in relation to a particular subject; the state of being uneducated or uninformed. Ignorance is the curse of God, Knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to heaven. Shak.

Destitute of knowledge; uninstructed or uninformed; untaught; unenlightened. He that doth not know those things which are of use for him to know, is but an ignorant man, whatever he may know besides. Tillotson.

One opposed to the diffusion of knowledge; an obscuriantist.

In a ignorant manner; without knowledge; inadvertently. Whom therefoer ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you. Acts xvii. 23.

The state of being illiterate, or uneducated; want of learning, or knowledge; ignorance; specifically, inability to read and write; as, the illiteracy shown by the last census.

To make plain or clear; to dispel the obscurity to by knowledge or reason; to explain; to elucidate; as, to illuminate a text, a problem, or a duty.

h illuminates or gives light; brightness; splendor; especially, intellectual light or knowledge. The illumination which a bright genius giveth to his work. Felton.

ency; acting, perceived, or produced, directly; as, an immediate cause. The immediate knowledge of the past is therefore impossible. Sir. W. Hamilton. Immediate amputation (Surg.), an amputation performed within the first few hours after an injury, and before the the effects of the shock have passed away.…

To communicate the knowledge of; to make known; to show by words or tokens; to tell; to disclose. Gentle lady, When I did first impart my love to you. Shak.

To put in pawn; to pledge. Shak.