Search the Dictionary

Not liable to sin; exempt from the possibility of doing wrong. -- n.

An impossibility. [Obs.] "Madam," quoth he, "this were an impossible!" Chaucer.

In possibility; possible, although not yet in existence or come to pass; -- contradistinguished from in esse.

showing that any other supposition involves an absurdity (reductio ad absurdum), or an impossibility; thus, one quantity may be proved equal to another by showing that it can be neither greater nor less. -- Indirect discourse. (Gram.) See Direct discourse, under Direct. -- Indirect evidence, evidence or testimony wh…

Impossibility to be avoided or shunned; inevitableness. Shelford.

Without possibility of escape or evasion; unavoidably; certainly. Inevitably thou shalt die. Milton. How inevitably does immoderate laughter end in a sigh! South.

in Flanders, in the 17th century, who taught certain doctrines denying free will and the possibility of resisting divine grace.

ve all that has been said of the sea serpent or kraken, would be credulity; to reject the possibility of their existence, would be presumption. Goldsmith. Like a kraken huge and black. Longfellow.

ry verb qualifyng the meaning of another verb, by expressing: (a) Ability, competency, or possibility; -- now oftener expressed by can. How may a man, said he, with idle speech, Be won to spoil the castle of his health ! Spenser. For what he [the king] may do is of two kinds; what he may do as just, and what he may do…

Possibility; uncertainty. [R.] What they offer is mere maybe and shift. Creech.

nal error of conduct. Infallibility is an absolute security of the understanding from all possibility of mistake. Tillotson.

d by a sense of extreme uneasiness or discomfort (as of weight on the chest or stomach, impossibility of motion or speech, etc.), or by frightful or oppressive dreams, from which one wakes after extreme anxiety, in a troubled state of mind; incubus. Dunglison.

A proposition affirming the possibility of finding such conditions as will render a certain determinate problem indeterminate or capable of innumerable solutions. Playfair.

Existing in possibility, not in actuality. "A potential hero." Carlyle. Potential existence means merely that the thing may be at ome time; actual existence, that it now is. Sir W. Hamilton. Potential cautery. See under Cautery. -- Potential energy. (Mech.) See the Note under Energy. -- Potential mood, or mode (Gram.…

The quality or state of being potential; possibility, not actuality; inherent capability or disposition, not actually exhibited.

Possibility of admission; ability to admit; opportunity to act; fit occasion; as, to leave room for hope. There was no prince in the empire who had room for such an alliance. Addison. Room and space (Shipbuilding), the distance from one side of a rib to the corresponding side of the next rib; space being the distance b…

eems to be; obvious; simple; mere; downright; as, sheer folly; sheer nonsense. "A sheer impossibility." De Quincey. It is not a sheer advantage to have several strings to one's bow. M. Arnold.

make haste; to move with celerity. I have speeded hither with the very extremest inch of possibility. Shak.

Occurring without the possibility or the fact of an attendant consciousness; -- said of states of the soul.

llow closely, or so as to overtake; to pursue. [Obs.] To follow and detain him, if by any possibility he could be subsecuted and overtaken. E. Hall.