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An agent or remedy which lowers the vital powers.

A particle or atom endowed with the vital principle. The individual is nothing. He is no more than the diatom, the bit of protoplasm. Mrs. E. Lynn Linton.

lifeless state; to cease to live; to suffer a total and irreparable loss of action of the vital functions; to become dead; to expire; to perish; -- said of animals and vegetables; often with of, by, with, from, and rarely for, before the cause or occasion of death; as, to die of disease or hardships; to die by fire or…

To deprive of buds or shoots, as for training, or economizing the vital strength of a tree.

e of the body or of some of its organs, interrupting or disturbing the performance of the vital functions, and causing or threatening pain and weakness; malady; affection; illness; sickness; disorder; -- applied figuratively to the mind, to the moral character and habits, to institutions, the state, etc. Diseases despe…

To shrivel or wither; to lose vitality. And his hand, which he put forth against him, dried up, so that he could not pull it in again to him. I Kings xiii. 4.

or that which, brings forth, elicits, or extracts. Stimulus must be called an eductor of vital ether. E. Darwin.

ce which treats of the laws governing the physical or mechanical, in distinction from the vital, forces, and which comprehends the consideration and general investigation of the whole range of the forces concerned in physical phenomena. [R.]

An agent or influence which arouses vital activity, or produces increased action, in a living organism or in any of its tissues or parts; a stimulant.

To call forth or increase the vital activity of an organism, or any of its parts.

A state of aroused or increased vital activity in an organism, or any of its organs or tissues.

To live; to have life or the functions of vitality; as, men can not exist water, nor fishes on land.

(Physiol.), the force which presumably acts in the growth and repair of the tissues. -- Vital force (Physiol.), that force or power which is inherent in organization; that form of energy which is the cause of the vital phenomena of the body, as distinguished from the physical forces generally known.…

fication of the soft tissues which has not advanced so far as to produce complete loss of vitality; but now applied to mortification of the soft parts in any stage.

To originate, especially by a vital or chemical process; to produce; to cause. Whatever generates a quantity of good chyle must likewise generate milk. Arbuthnot.

Origination by some process, mathematical, chemical, or vital; production; formation; as, the generation of sounds, of gases, of curves, etc.

Power of going or doing; energy; vitality; perseverance; push; as, there is no go in him. [Colloq.]

rt of any body or system; the source of life and motion in any organization; the chief or vital portion; the center of activity, or of energetic or efficient action; as, the heart of a country, of a tree, etc. Exploits done in the heart of France. Shak. Peace subsisting at the heart Of endless agitation. Wordsworth.…

winning post. -- Home thrust, a well directed or effective thrust; one that wounds in a vital part; hence, in controversy, a personal attack.

To give form or share to; to give vital ororganizing power to; to give life to; to imbue and actuate with vitality; to animate; to mold; to figure; to fashion. "The informing Word." Coleridge. Let others better mold the running mass Of metals, and inform the breathing brass. Dryden. Breath informs this fleeting frame.…