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Having the power of infusion; inspiring; influencing. The infusive force of Spirit on man. Thomson.

The act of inspiring or breathing in; breath; specif. (Physiol.), the drawing of air into the lungs, accomplished in mammals by elevation of the chest walls and flattening of the diaphragm; -- the opposite of expiration.

Expressing mirth, or inspiring it; exciting mirth and gayety. And with his jolly pipe delights the groves. Prior. Their jolly notes they chanted loud and clear. Fairfax.

Gay; merry; joyous; jolly; mirth-inspiring; hilarious; characterized by mirth or jollity; as, a jovial youth; a jovial company; a jovial poem. Be bright and jovial among your guests. Shak. His odes are some of them panegyrical, others moral; the rest are jovial or bacchanalian. Dryden.

Glad; gay; merry; joyful; also, affording or inspiring joy; with of before the word or words expressing the cause of joy. Is this your joyous city Is. xxiii. 7. They all as glad as birds of joyous prime. Spenser. And joyous of our conquest early won. Dryden.

Indicating or inspiring mirth; as, a mirthful face. Mirthful, comic shows. Shak. -- Mirth"ful*ly, adv. -- Mirth"ful*ness, n.

The drink of the gods (as ambrosia was their food); hence, any delicious or inspiring beverage.

usa when she was slain. He is noted for causing, with a blow of his hoof, Hippocrene, the inspiring fountain of the Muses, to spring from Mount Helicon. On this account he is, in modern times, associated with the Muses, and with ideas of poetic inspiration. Each spurs his jaded Pegasus apace. Byron.…

Having a life-giving quality; inspiring.

Suspicious; inspiring distrust. [Obs.] Suspect [was] his face, suspect his word also. Chaucer.

any of the functions of the government which were too weak to maintain law and order, and inspiring dread in all who came within their jurisdiction. Encyc. Brit.