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Shortened or reduced; -- said of the distance of a planet from the sun or earth, as measured in the plane of the ecliptic, or the distance from the sun or earth to that point where a perpendicular, let fall from the planet upon the plane of the ecliptic, meets the ecliptic. Curtate cycloid. (Math.) See Cycloid.…

y leaving out passages, to adapt it for the stage. -- To cut rates (Railroads, etc.), to reduce the charges for transportation below the rates established between competing lines. -- To cut short, to arrest or check abruptly; to bring to a sudden termination. "Achilles cut him short, and thus replied." Dryden. -- To…

To throw in or on in a rapid, careless manner; to mix, reduce, or adulterate, by throwing in something of an inferior quality; to overspread partially; to bespatter; to touch here and there; as, to dash wine with water; to dash paint upon a picture. I take care to dash the character with such particular circumstance as…

Deprived of life; -- opposed to alive and living; reduced to that state of a being in which the organs of motion and life have irrevocably ceased to perform their functions; as, a dead tree; a dead man. "The queen, my lord, is dead." Shak. The crew, all except himself, were dead of hunger. Arbuthnot. Seek him with cand…

e driving mechanism and the hammer head, or helve, to lessen the recoil of the hammer and reduce the shock upon the mechanism.

To reduce from a higher to a lower state or grade of worth, dignity, purity, station, etc.; to degrade; to lower; to deteriorate; to abase; as, to debase the character by crime; to debase the mind by frivolity; to debase style by vulgar words. The coin which was adulterated and debased. Hale. It is a kind of taking God…

To reduce to a decimal system; as, to decimalize the currency. -- Dec`i*mal*i*za"tion, n.

To reduce from civilization to a savage state. [R.] Blackwood's Mag.

The state of being reduced into original elements.

To reduce to constituent parts; to decompose. It divides and decompounds objects into . . . parts. Hazlitt.

To reduce; to diminish. [Obs.] "Do not deduct it to days." Massinger.

To reduce from an inflated condition.

The state of being reduced in rank, character, or reputation; baseness; moral, physical, or intellectual degeneracy; disgrace; abasement; debasement. The . . . degradation of a needy man of letters. Macaulay. Deplorable is the degradation of our nature. South. Moments there frequently must be, when a sidegradation of h…

To reduce from a higher to a lower rank or degree; to lower in rank' to deprive of office or dignity; to strip of honors; as, to degrade a nobleman, or a general officer. Prynne was sentenced by the Star Chamber Court to be degraded from the bar. Palfrey.

Reduced in rank, character, or reputation; debased; sunken; low; base. The Netherlands . . . were reduced practically to a very degraded condition. Motley.

To reduce to a lower grade, as in school.

To deprive of oxygen; to reduce from the state of an oxide.

ion to the direction or disposal of another; inability to help or provide for one's self. Reduced to a servile dependence on their mercy. Burke.

To reduce by destroying or consuming the vital powers of; to exhaust, as a country of its strength or resources, a treasury of money, etc. Saturday Review.

To deprive of polarity; to reduce to an unpolarized condition.