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Before; sooner than. [Archaic or Poetic] Myself was stirring ere the break of day. Shak. Ere sails were spread new oceans to explore. Dryden. Sir, come down ere my child die. John iv. 49.

The son of Chaos and brother of Nox, who dwelt in Erebus. To the infernal deep, with Erebus and tortures vile. Shak.

or having a vertical position; not inverted; not leaning or bent; not prone; as, to stand erect. Two of far nobler shape, erect and tall. Milton. Among the Greek colonies and churches of Asia, Philadelphia is still erect -- a column of ruins. Gibbon.

Capable of being erected; as, an erectable feather. Col. G. Montagu.

An erector; one who raises or builds.

Capable of being erected; susceptible of being erected of dilated. Erectile tissue (Anat.), a tissue which is capable of being greatly dilated and made rigid by the distension of the numerous blood vessels which it contains.

The quality or state of being erectile.

The act of erecting, or raising upright; the act of constructing, as a building or a wall, or of fitting together the parts of, as a machine; the act of founding or establishing, as a commonwealth or an office; also, the act of rousing to excitement or courage.

Making erect or upright; raising; tending to erect.

In an erect manner or posture.

Uprightness of posture or form.

Having a position intermediate between erect and patent, or spreading.

One who, or that which, erects.

Before the ere long. A man, . . . following the stag, erelong slew him. Spenser. The world, erelong, a world of tears must weep. Milton.

A gradual oxidation from exposure to air and moisture, as in the decay of old trees or of dead animals.

See Hermitage.

A hermit. Thou art my heaven, and I thy eremite. Keats.

Of or pertaining to an eremite; hermitical; living in solitude. "An eremitical life in the woods." Fuller. "The eremitic instinct." Lowell.

Eremitic. Bp. Hall.

The state of a hermit; a living in seclusion from social life.