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g power of a promise, contract, oath, or vow, or of law; that which constitutes legal or moral duty. A tender conscience is a stronger obligation than a proson. Fuller.

To constrain by physical, moral, or legal force; to put under obligation to do or forbear something. The obliging power of the law is neither founded in, nor to be measured by, the rewards and punishments annexed to it. South. Religion obliges men to the practice of those virtues which conduce to the preservation of ou…

Deviation from moral rectitude. [R.]

Deviation from ordinary rules; irregularity; deviation from moral rectitude. To disobey [God]...imports a moral obliquity. South.

ind instruments in the modern orchestra, yet of great antiquity, having a penetrating pastoral quality of tone, somewhat like the clarinet in form, but more slender, and sounded by means of a double reed; a hautboy. Oboe d'amore Etym: [It., lit., oboe of love], and Oboe di caccia Etym: [It., lit., oboe of the chase], a…

ents what is offensive to chasity or purity of mind; obscene or impure lanquage or acts; moral impurity; lewdness; obsceneness; as, the obscenity of a speech, or a picture. Mr.Cowley asserts plainly, that obscenity has no place in wit. Dryden. No pardon vile obscenity should find. Pope.

ay, or opposes; anything that hinders progress; a hindrance; an obstruction, physical or moral. If all obstacles were cut away. And that my path were even to the crown. Shak.

A genus of tropical corals, usually branched, and having a very volid texture.

A suborder of corals including many reef-building species, having round, starlike calicles.

To transgress the moral or divine law; to commit a crime; to stumble; to sin. Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. James ii. 10. If it be a sin to cevet honor, I am the most offending soul alive. Shak.

Uttered, as a consonant, with the oral passage simply narrowed without closure, as in uttering s.

To act or produce effect on the mind; to exert moral power or influence. The virtues of private persons operate but on a few. Atterbury. A plain, convincing reason operates on the mind both of a learned and ignorant hearer as long as they live. Swift.

The act or process of operating; agency; the exertion of power, physical, mechanical, or moral. The pain and sickness caused by manna are the effects of its operation on the stomach. Locke. Speculative painting, without the assistance of manual operation, can never attain to perfection. Dryden.

Having the power of acting; hence, exerting force, physical or moral; active in the production of effects; as, an operative motive. It holds in all operative principles. South.

f public speaking in an eloquent or effective manner; the exercise of rhetorical skill in oral discourse; eloquence. "The oratory of Greece and Rome." Milton. When a world of men Could not prevail with all their oratory. Shak.

Consonance to genuine Scriptural doctrines; -- said of moral doctrines and beliefs; as, the orthodoxy of a creed.

To be bound in duty or by moral obligation. We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak. Rom. xv. 1.

An artifical red nitrogenous dyestuff, called also red coralline.

Resembling a palus; as, the paliform lobes of the septa in corals.

the distal portion broad, flat, and more or less divided into lobes; -- said of certain corals, antlers, etc.