Search the Dictionary

To trick, cheat, or impose on; to deceive. "Tricks to cully fools." Pomfret.

Encumbrance. [Obs.] Extol not riches then, the toil of fools, The wise man's cumbrance, if not snare. Milton.

To act foolishly; to be foolish or sportive; to toy. [Scot.] Jamieson.

To waste time in effeminate or voluptuous pleasures, or in idleness; to fool away time; to delay unnecessarily; to tarry; to trifle. We have trifled too long already; it is madness to dally any longer. Calamy. We have put off God, and dallied with his grace. Barrow.

cted loss of value; detriment; hurt; mischief. He that sendeth a message by the hand of a fool cutteth off the feet and drinketh damage. Prov. xxvi. 6. Great errors and absurdities many commit for want of a friend to tell them of them, to the great damage both of their fame and fortune. Bacon.

as if a child; to fondle; to toy with; to pet. They have put me in a silk gown and gaudy fool's cap; I as ashamed to be dandled thus. Addison. The book, thus dandled into popularity by bishops and good ladies, contained many pieces of nursery eloquence. Jeffrey.

etermining; -- applied to persons; as, a deliberate judge or counselor. "These deliberate fools." Shak.

extreme satisfaction; joy. Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not. Shak. A fool hath no delight in understanding. Prov. xviii. 2.

to error; to mislead the mind or judgment of to beguile; to impose on; to dupe; to make a fool of. To delude the nation by an airy phantom. Burke.

To act beneath one-s rank, place, birth, or character; to degenerate. [R.] You are a fool granted; therefore your issues, being foolish, do not derogate. Shak. Would Charles X. derogate from his ancestors Would he be the degenerate scion of that royal line Hazlitt.

Foolish; silly; trifling. [R.]

empt; to contemn; to scorn; to disdain; to have a low opinion or contemptuous dislike of. Fools despise wisdom and instruction. Prov. i. 7. Men naturally despise those who court them, but respect those who do not give way to them. Jowett (Thucyd. ).

To plan or scheme for; to purpose to obtain. For wisdom is most riches; fools therefore They are which fortunes do by vows devise. Spenser.

A stupid person; a fool; a blockhead. Some will say, our curate is naught, an ass-head, a dodipoll. Latimer.

A kind of woolen stuff. [Obs.] "Some doily petticoats." Dryden. A fool and a doily stuff, would now and then find days of grace, and be worn for variety. Congreve.

To behave foolishly. [Obs.]

ase in cookery; applied figuratively to one who has been thoroughly deceived, cheated, or fooled. [Colloq.] -- Done for, tired out; used up; collapsed; destroyed; dead; killed. [Colloq.] -- Done up. (a) Wrapped up. (b) Worn out; exhausted. [Colloq.]

A trick, joke, or deception. Beau. & Fl. To give one the dor, to make a fool of him. [Archaic] P. Fletcher.

Foolish utterance; drivel. The sapless dotages of old Paris and Salamanca. Milton.

Foolish; weak. Dr. H. More.