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began to give promise; to begin to appear or to expand. "In dawning youth." Dryden. When life awakes, and dawns at every line. Pope. Dawn on our darkness and lend us thine aid. Heber,

Deprived of life; -- opposed to alive and living; reduced to that state of a being in which the organs of motion and life have irrevocably ceased to perform their functions; as, a dead tree; a dead man. "The queen, my lord, is dead." Shak. The crew, all except himself, were dead of hunger. Arbuthnot. Seek him with cand…

Somewhat dead, dull, or lifeless; deathlike. The lips put on a deadish paleness. A. Stafford.

The state of being destitute of life, vigor, spirit, activity, etc.; dullness; inertness; languor; coldness; vapidness; indifference; as, the deadness of a limb, a body, or a tree; the deadness of an eye; deadness of the affections; the deadness of beer or cider; deadness to the world, and the like.…

ued; greatly beloved; cherished; precious. "Hear me, dear lady." Shak. Neither count I my life dear unto myself. Acts xx. 24. And the last joy was dearer than the rest. Pope. Dear as remember'd kisses after death. Tennyson.

Manner of dying; act or state of passing from life. A death that I abhor. Shak. Let me die the death of the righteous. Num. xxiii. 10.

The bed in which a person dies; hence, the closing hours of life of one who dies by sickness or the like; the last sickness. That often-quoted passage from Lord Hervey in which the Queen's deathbed is described. Thackeray.

w as to debar them, not only from the comforts but from the common decencies of civilized life. Buckle.

-- often followed by on or upon. He presents that great soul debating upon the subject of life and death with his intimate friends. Tatler.

Departure, especially departure from this life; death. His decease, which he should accomplish at Jerusalem. Luke ix. 31. And I, the whilst you mourn for his decease, Will with my mourning plaints your plaint increase. Spenser.

: With reference to the end of the year and to the winter season; as, the December of his life.

A period of ten years. "The present decennium." Hallam. "The last decennium of Chaucer's life." A. W. Ward.

iod when a thing is tending toward extinction or a less perfect state; as, the decline of life; the decline of strength; the decline of virtue and religion. Their fathers lived in the decline of literature. Swift.

The quantity by which a variable is diminished. Equal decrement of life. (a) The decrease of life in a group of persons in which the assumed law of mortality is such that of a given large number of persons, all being now of the same age, an equal number shall die each consecutive year. (b) The decrease of life in a gro…

Full of deeds or exploits; active; stirring. [R.] "A deedful life." Tennyson.

ject or plot. Speculations high or deep. Milton. A question deep almost as the mystery of life. De Quincey. O Lord, . . . thy thought are very deep. Ps. xcii. 5.

To undo; to disfigure; to destroy. [Obs.] His unkindness may defeat my life. Shak.

To injure; to damage. "None can my life defect." [R.] Troubles of Q. Elizabeth (1639).

interpret; as, to define a word, a phrase, or a scientific term. They define virtue to be life ordered according to nature. Robynson (More's Utopia).

Having finished the course of life; dead; deceased. "Defunct organs." Shak. The boar, defunct, lay tripped up, near. Byron.