Search the Dictionary

tate of being made bright; enlightenment; brightening, as of the mental powers. [R.] Ball lightning, a rare form of lightning sometimes seen as a globe of fire moving from the clouds to the earth. -- Chain lightning, lightning in angular, zigzag, or forked flashes. -- Heat lightning, more or less vivid and extensive…

To cause imperfection of vision in; to dim; to darken. Her eyes are blurred with the lightning's glare. J. R. Drake.

Lightning; a thunderbolt.

An instrument or apparatus employed in the ancient mysteries to imitate thunder and lightning. T. Moore.

medium for the transmission of certain forces, esp. heat or electricity; specifically, a lightning rod.

Having short bends, turns, or wrinkles; wrinkled; wavy; zigzag. "The crinkled lightning." Lowell.

To dissolve or melt. [R.] Swords by the lightning's subtle force distilled. Addison.

c cat. See Torpedo, and Gymnotus. -- Electric fluid, the supposed matter of electricity; lightning. -- Electrical image (Elec.), a collection of electrical points regarded as forming, by an analogy with optical phenomena, an image of certain other electrical points, and used in the solution of electrical problems. Si…

Mixed with, or emitting, lightning. [Obs.] "With foul enfouldred smoke." Spenser.

To supply with light; to illuminate; as, the sun enlightens the earth. His lightnings enlightened the world. Ps. xcvii. 4.

eed; quickness; as to carry the mail with expedition. With winged expedition Swift as the lightning glance.

s, the apple falls; the tide falls; the mercury falls in the barometer. I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven. Luke x. 18.

d, or of a wife to her husband. He should maintain fealty to God. I. Taylor. Makes wicked lightnings of her eyes, and saps The fealty of our friends. tennyson. Swore fealty to the new government. Macaulay.

od of light instantaneously appearing and disappearing; a momentary blaze; as, a flash of lightning.

To flash, as lightning; to lighten; to gleam; to thunder. [Obs.] "Flames of fouldering heat." Spenser.

To flash as lightning. [R.]

Resembling lightning; -- used to describe intense lancinating painsaccompanying locomotor ataxy.

A vitrified sand tube produced by the striking of lightning on sand; a lightning tube; also, the portion of rock surface fused by a lightning discharge.

Lightning. [Obs.]

To shoot; to dart like lightning; to fulminate; to utter with authority or vehemence. She fulmined out her scorn of laws Salique. Tennyson.