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The act or operation of meliorating, or the state of being meliorated; improvement. Bacon.

The doctrine that there is a tendency throughout nature toward improvement. J. Sully.

To make mellow. Shak. If the Weather prove frosty to mellow it [the ground], they do not plow it again till April. Mortimer. The fervor of early feeling is tempered and mellowed by the ripeness of age. J. C. Shairp.

To grow better; to advance to a better state; to become improved. Shak.

Of or pertaining to mental culture; serving to improve or strengthen the mind. [R.]

Unwilling to give pain; compassionate. A merciful man will be merciful to his beast. Old Proverb.

or token of excellence or approbation; as, his teacher gave him ten merits. Those laurel groves, the merits of thy youth. Prior.

all his mind. Prov. xxix. 11. Being so hard to me that brought your mind, I fear she'll prove as hard to you in telling her mind. Shak.

To dislike; to disapprove of; to have aversion to; as, to mislike a man. Who may like or mislike what he says. I. Taylor.

With molecules; in the manner of molecules. W. R. Grove.

First a case is appointed to be mooted by certain young men, containing some doubtful controversy. Sir T. Elyot.

and feeling; the capacity to perceive what is right or wrong in moral conduct, and to approve or disapprove, independently of education or the knowledge of any positive rule or law. -- Moral theology, theology applied to morals; practical theology; casuistry.

; to explain in a moral sense; to draw a moral from. This fable is moralized in a common proverb. L'Estrange. Did he not moralize this spectacle Shak.

A small particle, as of floating dust; anything proverbially small; a speck. The little motes in the sun do ever stir, though there be no wind. Bacon. We are motes in the midst of generations. Landor.

s. The independent motions of different parts sounding together constitute counterpoint. Grove.

A drove of mules. [Southwest. U.S.]

To chew with a grinding, crunching sound, as a beast chews provender; to chew deliberately or in large mouthfuls. [Formerly written also maunch and mounch.] I could munch your good dry oats. Shak.

in. Northern muscadine (Bot.), a derivative of the northern fox grape, and scarcely an improvement upon it. -- Royal muscadine (Bot.), a European grape of great value. Its berries are large, round, and of a pale amber color. Called also golden chasselas.

part of religious duty to maintain a vigorous condition of the body, and who therefore approve of athletic sports and exercises as conductive to good health, good morals, and right feelings in religious matters. T. Hughes. (b) An active, robust, and cheerful Christian life, as opposed to a meditative and gloomy one. C.…

first flesh-colored, but gradually become brown. The plant grows in rich pastures and is proverbial for rapidity of growth and shortness of duration. It has a pleasant smell, and is largely used as food. It is also cultivated from spawn.