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notion; a quant fancy; an unnatural or affected conception; a witty thought or turn of expression; a fanciful device; a whim; a quip. On his way to the gibbet, a freak took him in the head to go off with a conceit. L'Estrange. Some to conceit alone their works confine, And glittering thoughts struck out at every line.…

nception consists in a conscious act of the understanding, bringing any given object or impression into the same class with any number of other objects or impression, by means of some character or characters common to them all. Coleridge.

Having elevations or depressions in form like one half of a bivalve shell; -- applied principally to a surface produced by fracture.

Of or pertaining to shells; resembling a shell; as, conchyliaceous impressions. Kirwan.

Expressing much in a few words; condensed; brief and compacted; -- used of style in writing or speaking. The concise style, which expresseth not enough, but leaves somewhat to be understood. B. Jonson. Where the author is . . . too brief and concise, amplify a little. I. Watts.

viduals are concrete, those of classes abstract. J. S. Mill. Concrete terms, while they express the quality, do also express, or imply, or refer to, some subject to which it belongs. I. Watts. Concrete number, a number associated with, or applied to, a particular object, as three men, five days, etc., as distinguished…

The act or process of reducing, by depression of temperature or increase of pressure, etc., to another and denser form, as gas to the condition of a liquid or steam to water.

To make more close, compact, or dense; to compress or concentrate into a smaller compass; to consolidate; to abridge; to epitomize. In what shape they choose, Dilated or condensed, bright or obscure. Milton. The secret course pursued at Brussels and at Madrid may be condensed into the usual formula, dissimulation, proc…

on which it is proposed to sell property by auction; also, the instrument containing or expressing these terms.

Expressing a condition or supposition; as, a conditional word, mode, or tense. A conditional proposition is one which asserts the dependence of one categorical proposition on another. Whately. The words hypothetical and conditional may be . . . used synonymously. J. S. Mill.

Expressing condolence. Smart.

To express sympathetic sorrow; to grieve in sympathy; -- followed by with. Your friends would have cause to rejoice, rather than condole with you. Sir W. Temple.

Expression of sympathy with another in sorrow or grief. Their congratulations and their condolences. Steele. A special mission of condolence. Macaulay.

Forgiveness, either express or implied, by a husband of his wife or by a wife of her husband, for a breach of marital duty, as adultery, with an implied condition that the offense shall not be repeated. Bouvier. Wharton.

The fruit or strobile of the Coniferæ, as of the pine, fir, cedar, and cypress. It is composed of woody scales, each one of which has one or two seeds at its base.

s made sure and not voliable, or by which a particular estate is increased; a contract, express or implied, by which a person makes that firm and binding which was before voidable.

To address with expressions of sympathetic pleasure on account of some happy event affecting the person addressed; to wish joy to. It is the king's most sweet pleasure and affection to congratulate the princess at her pavilion. Shak. To congratulate one's self, to rejoice; to feel satisfaction; to consider one's self h…

The act of congratulating; an expression of sympathetic pleasure. With infinite congratulations for our safe arrival. Dr. J. Scott.

Expressive of sympathetic joy; as, a congratulatory letter.

A tree or shrub bearing cones; one of the order Coniferae, which includes the pine, cypress, and (according to some) the yew.