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Infancy. [R.]

Of or pertaining to infancy, or to an infant; similar to, or characteristic of, an infant; childish; as, infantile behavior.

imited space; immensity; infinity. "I am who fill infinitude." Milton. As pleasing to the fancy, as speculations of eternity or infinitude are to the understanding. Addison.

state of being insane; unsoundness or derangement of mind; madness; lunacy. All power of fancy overreason is a degree of insanity. Johnson. Without grace The heart's insanity admits no cure. Cowper.

ay and the afterpiece, to relieve the tedium of waiting. Dreams are but interludes, which fancy makes When monarch reason sleeps. Dryden.

A fancy pigeon, in which the feathers of the neck form a hood, -- whence the name. The wings and tail are long, and the beak moderately short.

A fancy dish; a titbit; a delicacy. Some pigeons, . . . a joint of mutton, and any pretty little tiny kickshaws. Shak. Cressy was lost by kickshaws and soup-maigre. Fenton.

are supported when beginning to walk. -- To be in leading strings, to be in a state of infancy or dependence, or under the guidance of others. -- Leading wheel, a wheel situated before the driving wheels of a locomotive engine.

Animation; spirit; vivacity; vigor; energy. No notion of life and fire in fancy and in words. Felton. That gives thy gestures grace and life. Wordsworth.

(Zoöl.), the puma or cougar. -- Lion ant (Zoöl.), the ant-lion. -- Lion dog (Zoöl.), a fancy dog with a flowing mane, usually clipped to resemble a lion's mane. -- Lion lizard (Zoöl.), the basilisk. -- Lion's share, all, or nearly all; the best or largest part; -- from Æsop's fable of the lion hunting in company w…

he collective body of literary productions, embracing the entire results of knowledge and fancy preserved in writing; also, the whole body of literary productions or writings upon a given subject, or in reference to a particular science or branch of knowledge, or of a given country or period; as, the literature of Bibl…

A whim; an odd fancy. Hudibras. Tennyson.

tleth on her perch. Spenser. Or tend his sparhawk mantling in her mew. Bp. Hall. My frail fancy fed with full delight. Doth bathe in bliss, and mantleth most at ease. Spenser.

A wild fancy; a confused notion. [Obs.] Chaucer.

A fancy; a whim; a freak; a humor; esp., in the plural, lowness of spirits. These are his megrims, firks, and melancholies. Ford.

ported and dealt in small articles of a miscellaneous kind, especially such as please the fancy of women. [Obs.] No milliner can so fit his customers with gloves. Shak.

Imitative; mimetic. Oft, in her absence, mimic fancy wakes To imitate her. Milton. Man is, of all creatures, the most mimical. W. Wotton.

A picture representing or symbolizing the early infancy of Christ. The simplest form is the babe in a rude cradle, and the heads of an ox and an ass to express the stable in which he was born.

be hours for necessities, Not for delights. Shak. What was once to me Mere matter of the fancy, now has grown The vast necessity of heart and life. Tennyson.

he sun. Rev. xxi. 23. I have no need to beg. Shak. Be governed by your needs, not by your fancy. Jer. Taylor.