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Obliquely; athwart; amiss; awry. [Obs.] The squint-eyed Pharisees look across at all the actions of Christ. Bp. Hall.

he principal divisions of a play or dramatic work in which a certain definite part of the action is completed.

An apparatus for the production of sound by the action of the actinic, or ultraviolet, rays.

Having the power or quality of acting; causing change; communicating action or motion; acting; -- opposed to Ant: passive, that receives; as, certain active principles; the powers of the mind.

In an active manner; nimbly; briskly; energetically; also, by one's own action; voluntarily, not passively.

The state or quality of being active; nimbleness; agility; vigorous action or operation; energy; active force; as, an increasing variety of human activities. "The activity of toil." Palfrey.

Without action or spirit. [R.]

Involving or comprising action; active. [Obs.] Her walking and other actual performances. Shak. Let your holy and pious intention be actual; that is . . . by a special prayer or action, . . . given to God. Jer. Taylor.

To make actual; to realize in action. [R.] Coleridge.

To put into action or motion; to move or incite to action; to influence actively; to move as motives do; -- more commonly used of persons. Wings, which others were contriving to actuate by the perpetual motion. Johnson. Men of the greatest abilities are most fired with ambition; and, on the contrary, mean and narrow mi…

A bringing into action; movement. Bp. Pearson.

One who actuates, or puts into action. [R.] Melville.

Action. [Obs.] Shak.

Tendency or impulse to act. [R.] Acturience, or desire of action, in one form or another, whether as restlessness, ennui, dissatisfaction, or the imagination of something desirable. J. Grote.

The act of adding two or more things together; -- opposed to subtraction or diminution. "This endless addition or addibility of numbers." Locke.

The action by which the parts of the body are drawn towards its axis]; -- opposed to abduction. Dunglison.

The action of sticking; the state of being attached; intimate union; as the adhesion of glue, or of parts united by growth, cement, or the like.

Apt or tending to adhere; clinging. Thomson. Adhesive attraction. (Physics) See Attraction. -- Adhesive inflammation (Surg.), that kind of inflammation which terminates in the reunion of divided parts without suppuration. -- Adhesive plaster, a sticking; a plaster containing resin, wax, litharge, and olive oil.…

ved from, fatty or oily substances; -- applied to certain acids obtained from fats by the action of nitric acid.

Hydrolyzing fats; converting neutral fats into glycerin and free fatty acids, esp. by the action of an enzyme; as, adipolytic action.