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led May laws, or Falk laws, aiming at the regulation of the clergy. Opposition eventually compelled the government to change its policy, and from 1880 to 1887 laws virtually nullifying the May laws were enacted.

To require; to constrain; to compel; to force; to cause; to occasion; -- followed by a noun or pronoun and infinitive.

To draw anything from, as if by milking; to compel to yield profit or advantage; to plunder. Tyndale. They [the lawyers] milk an unfortunate estate as regularly as a dairyman does his stock. London Spectator. To milk the street, to squeeze the smaller operators in stocks and extract a profit from them, by alternately r…

To reduce to the necessity of; to force; to compel. The Marquis of Newcastle, being pressed on both sides, was necessitated to draw all his army into York. Clarendon.

ch is required by authority; subjection to rightful restraint or control. Government must compel the obedience of individuals. Ames.

To bind or firmly hold to an act; to compel; to constrain; to bind to any act of duty or courtesy by a formal pledge. That they may not incline or be obligated to any vile or lowly occupations. Landor.

are confined for punishment, discipline, and reformation, and in which they are generally compelled to labor.

To force; to compel. [Obs.]

To torture by compelling to stand with one foot on a pointed stake. [Obs.]

ication, or discretion; not dependent on circumstances or probabilities; not speculative; compelling assent or obedience; peremptory; indisputable; decisive; as, positive instructions; positive truth; positive proof. "'T is positive 'gainst all exceptions." Shak.

as weight; to act upon by pushing or thrusting, in distinction from pulling; to crowd or compel by a gradual and continued exertion; to bear upon; to squeeze; to compress; as, we press the ground with the feet when we walk; we press the couch on which we repose; we press substances with the hands, fingers, or arms; we…

Tending to compel; compulsory. [R.] "The pulsive strain of conscience." Marston.

To compel to remain at a distance, or in a given place, without intercourse, when suspected of having contagious disease; to put under, or in, quarantine.

To compel by a quarrel; as, to quarrel a man out of his estate or rights.

the result of a mathematical operation. If our proposals once again were heard, We should compel them to a quick result. Milton.

To require or compel to reside in the country; to banish or send away temporarily; to impose rustication on. The town is again beginning to be full, and the rusticated beauty sees an end of her banishment. Idler.

state of being rusticated; specifically, the punishment of a student for some offence, by compelling him to leave the institution for a time.

The sitting of an army around or before a fortified place for the purpose of compelling the garrison to surrender; the surrounding or investing of a place by an army, and approaching it by passages and advanced works, which cover the besiegers from the enemy's fire. See the Note under Blockade.

To compel to silence; to cause to be still; to still; to hush. Silence that dreadful bell; it frights the isle. Shak.

To impose upon; to compel to pay; sometimes, to cheat. [Slang] To stick out, to cause to project or protrude; to render prominent.