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Coldness or insensibility; severity or rigidity of character. [R.] It was of those moments of intense feeling when the frost of the Scottish people melts like a snow wreath. Sir W. Scott. Black frost, cold so intense as to freeze vegetation and cause it to turn black, without the formation of hoarfrost. -- Frost beare…

To contract the brow in displeasure, severity, or sternness; to scowl; to put on a stern, grim, or surly look. The frowning wrinkle of her brow. Shak.

ring, as in the cold fit which precedes a fever; in old medical writings, a chill of less severity than a rigor, and more marked than an algor.

To criticise with unjust severity; to criticise captiously.

Excessive criticism, or unjust severity or rigor of criticism; zoilism.

The quality or state of being imperious; arrogance; haughtiness. Imperiousness and severity is but an ill way of treating men who have reason of their own to guide them. Locke.

quality of being inclement; want of clemency; want of mildness of temper; unmercifulness; severity. The inclemency of the late pope. Bp. Hall.

aughs to shame all follies and insinuates virtue, rather by familiar examples than by the severity of precepts. Dryden.

Severity of weather; inclemency. Boyle. By unseasonable weather, by intemperateness of the air or meteors. Sir M. Hale.

To scold; to berate; to satirize; to censure with severity; as, to lash vice.

er or disposition; gentleness of treatment; softness; tenderness; clemency; -- opposed to severity and rigor. His exceeding lenity disposes us to be somewhat too severe. Macaulay.

nful, harsh, severe, afflictive, or calamitous; as, the mitigation of pain, grief, rigor, severity, punishment, or penalty.

The quality of being mordacious; biting severity, or sarcastic quality. Bacon.

That which oppresses; a hardship or injustice; cruelty; severity; tyranny. "The multitude of oppressions." Job xxxv. 9.

mposes unjust burdens on others; one who harasses others with unjust laws or unreasonable severity. The orphan pines while the oppressor feeds. Shak. To relieve the oppressed and to punish the oppressor. Swift.

t upon; to commit; to execute; to do. "Aught but Talbot's shadow whereon to practice your severity." Shak. As this advice ye practice or neglect. Pope.

Increased severity of a disease after temporary remission. Dunglison.

To abate in severity; to become less rigorous. In others she relaxed again, And governed with a looser rein. Prior.

owed by an infinitive, or by to and a noun, formerly sometimes by against. "Tempering the severity of his looks with a reluctance to the action." Dryden. He had some reluctance to obey the summons. Sir W. Scott. Bear witness, Heaven, with what reluctancy Her helpless innocence I doom to die. Dryden.…

e; to grow less intense; to become moderated; to abate; to relax; as, a fever remits; the severity of the weather remits.