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ting or subverting morals. Especially: The act of corrupting or subverting discipline, courage, hope, etc., or the state of being corrupted or subverted in discipline, courage, etc.; as, the demoralization of an army or navy.

f moral principles on; to render corrupt or untrustworthy in morals, in discipline, in courage, spirit, etc.; to weaken in spirit or efficiency. The demoralizing example of profligate power and prosperous crime. Walsh. The vices of the nobility had demoralized the army. Bancroft.

To deny. [Obs.] That with great rage he stoutly doth denay. Spenser.

To lessen; to detract from; to disparage; to depreciate; -- said of a person or thing. [R.] Anything . . . that should derogate, minish, or hurt his glory and his name. Sir T. More.

The act of derogating, partly repealing, or lessening in value; disparagement; detraction; depreciation; -- followed by of, from, or to. I hope it is no derogation to the Christian religion. Locke. He counted it no derogation of his manhood to be seen to weep. F. W. Robertson.

In a derogatory manner; disparagingly. Aubrey.

thine iniquity deserveth. Job xi. 6. John Gay deserved to be a favorite. Thackeray. Encouragement is not held out to things that deserve reprehension. Burke.

late isle; a desolate wilderness; a desolate house. I will make Jerusalem . . . a den of dragons, and I will make the cities of Judah desolate, without an inhabitant. Jer. ix. 11. And the silvery marish flowers that throng The desolate creeks and pools among. Tennyson.

Extreme, in a bad sense; outrageous; -- used to mark the extreme predominance of a bad quality. A desperate offendress against nature. Shak. The most desperate of reprobates. Macaulay.

To give up, the will, courage, or spirit; to be thoroughly disheartened; to lose all courage; to become dispirited or depressed; to take an unhopeful view. I should despair, or at least despond. Scott's Letters. Others depress their own minds, [and] despond at the first difficulty. Locke. We wish that . . . desponding…

The state of desponding; loss of hope and cessation of effort; discouragement; depression or dejection of the mind. The unhappy prince seemed, during some days, to be sunk in despondency. Macaulay.

s inevitably and invincibly determined by motives. Its superior suitability to produce courage, as contrasted with scientific physical determinism, is obvious. F. P. Cobbe.

Hence: Any fragments separated from the body to which they belonged; any product of disintegration. The mass of detritus of which modern languages are composed. Farrar.

A machine for tearing or cutting rags, cotton, etc. Blue devils. See under Blue. -- Cartesian devil. See under Cartesian. -- Devil bird (Zoöl.), one of two or more South African drongo shrikes (Edolius retifer, and E. remifer), believed by the natives to be connected with sorcery. -- Devil may care, reckless, defian…

A dragon fly. See Darning needle, under Darn, v. t.

iate, or appropriate to, the devil; devilish; infernal; impious; atrocious; nefarious; outrageously wicked; as, a diabolic or diabolical temper or act. "Diabolic power." Milton. "The diabolical institution." Motley. -- Di`a*bol"ic*al*ly, adv. -- Di`a*bol"ic*al*ness, n.

me played with dice. See Die, n. Dice coal, a kind of coal easily splitting into cubical fragments. Brande & C.

To sink; to faint; to pine; to languish, with weakness, discouragement, love, etc. His heart died within, and he became as a stone. 1 Sam. xxv. 37. The young men acknowledged, in love letters, that they died for Rebecca. Tatler.

Relating to differences of motion or leverage; producing effects by such differences; said of mechanism. Differential calculus. (Math.) See under Calculus. -- Differential coefficient, the limit of the ratio of the increment of a function of a variable to the increment of the variable itself, when these increments are…

Same as Tetragonal. Dana.