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One who destroys; a radical reformer; a destructionist.

The quality of destroying or ruining. Prynne.

A destroyer. [R.] Fire, the destructive and the artificial death of things. Boyle.

To destroy. [Obs.] Chaucer.

ften, a scheme to deceive; a stratagem; an artifice. His device in against Babylon, to destroy it. Jer. li. 11. Their recent device of demanding benevolences. Hallam. He disappointeth the devices of the crafty. Job v. 12.

To seize upon and destroy or appropriate greedily, selfishly, or wantonly; to consume; to swallow up; to use up; to waste; to annihilate. Famine and pestilence shall devour him. Ezek. vii. 15. I waste my life and do my days devour. Spenser.

To bring into a condition of decay or partial ruin, by misuse or through neglect; to destroy the fairness and good condition of; -- said of a building. If the bishop, parson, or vicar, etc., dilapidates the buildings, or cuts down the timber of the patrimony. Blackstone.

To render unable or incapable; to destroy the force, vigor, or power of action of; to deprive of competent physical or intellectual power; to incapacitate; to disqualify; to make incompetent or unfit for service; to impair. A Christian's life is a perpetual exercise, a wrestling and warfare, for which sensual pleasure…

To destroy the force of habit in; to wean from a custom. Johnson.

To destroy the aggregation of; to separate into component parts, as an aggregate mass.

To destroy or disturb the comfort of; to deprive oas, a smoky chimney discomforts a family.

To throw into disorder; to ruffle; to destroy the composure or equanimity; to agitate. Opposition . . . discomposeth the mind's serenity. Glanvill.

To deprive of credibility; to destroy confidence or trust in; to cause disbelief in the accuracy or authority of. An occasion might be given to the . . . papists of discrediting our common English Bible. Strype.

To free from infectious or contagious matter; to destroy putrefaction; to purify; to make innocuous. When the infectious matter and the infectious matter and the odoriferous matter are one . . . then to deodorize is to disinfect. Ure.

To destroy the organic structure or regular system of (a government, a society, a party, etc.); to break up (what is organized); to throw into utter disorder; to disarrange. Lyford . . . attempted to disorganize the church. Eliot (1809).

To destroy by wasteful extravagance or lavish use; to squander. The vast wealth . . . was in three years dissipated. Bp. Burnet.

bring to an end by separating the parts, sundering a relation, etc.; to terminate; to destroy; to deprive of force; as, to dissolve a partnership; to dissolve Parliament. Lest his ungoverned rage dissolve the life. Shak.

To separate; to sunder; to destroy. [R.] Chapman.

To destroy the union of; to divide; to part; to sever; to disjoin; to sunder; to separate; as, to disunite particles of matter.

To cut off, bar, or destroy; as, to dock an entail.