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ublic show; a display of works of art, or of feats of skill, or of oratorical or dramatic ability; as, an exhibition of animals; an exhibition of pictures, statues, etc.; an industrial exhibition.

effect a purpose intended; adaptedness to self- interest; desirableness; advantage; advisability; -- sometimes contradistinguished from moral rectitude. Divine wisdom discovers no expediency in vice. Cogan. To determine concerning the expedience of action. Sharp. Much declamation may be heard in the present day agains…

Easiness of access; complaisance; affability. Offers himself to the visits of a friend with facility. South.

Ability to act or perform, whether inborn or cultivated; capacity for any natural function; especially, an original mental power or capacity for any of the well-known classes of mental activity; psychical or soul capacity; capacity for any of the leading kinds of soul activity, as knowledge, feeling, volition; intellec…

The state of being fallible; liability to deceive or to be deceived; as, the fallibity of an argument or of an adviser.

The quality of being false; coutrariety or want of conformity to truth. Probability does not make any alteration, either in the truth or falsity of things. South.

The quality of being feasible; practicability; also, that which is feasible; as, before we adopt a plan, let us consider its feasibility. Men often swallow falsities for truths, dubiosities for certainties, possibilities for feasibilities. Sir T. Browne.

The quality of being fickle; instability; inconsonancy. Shak.

The quality of being fiery; heat; acrimony; irritability; as, a fieriness of temper. Addison.

irelike reflections. -- Fire ordeal, an ancient mode of trial, in which the test was the ability of the accused to handle or tread upon red-hot irons. Abbot. -- Fire pan, a pan for holding or conveying fire, especially the receptacle for the priming of a gun. -- Fire plug, a plug or hydrant for drawing water from th…

Strength; stability. [Obs.] Bp. Hall.

Strength; firmness; stability. [Obs.] Chillingworth.

dy of contemporary poetry is the German. M. Arnold. Hermocrates . . . a man of first-rate ability. Jowett (Thucyd).

The state or quality of being fixed; stability; steadfastness.

The state or quality of being flexible; flexibleness; pliancy; pliability; as, the flexibility of strips of hemlock, hickory, whalebone or metal, or of rays of light. Sir I. Newton. All the flexibility of a veteran courtier. Macaulay.

Liability to error and sin; frailty. [Obs.] The fragility and youthful folly of Qu. Fabius. Holland.

Uncertainty; instability. Johnson.

The quality or condition of being fugitive; evanescence; volatility; fugacity; instability.

To measure the capacity, character, or ability of; to estimate; to judge of. You shall not gauge me By what we do to-night. Shak.

cial sense, to be depended on for the discharge of obligations incurred; having pecuniary ability; of unimpaired credit. My reasons are both good and weighty. Shak. My meaning in saying he is a good man is . . . that he is sufficient . . . I think I may take his bond. Shak.