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The act of pardoning; forgiveness, as of an offender, or of an offense; release from penalty; remission of punishment; absolution. Pardon, my lord, for me and for my tidings. Shak. But infinite in pardon was my judge. Milton. Used in expressing courteous denial or contradiction; as, I crave your pardon; or in indicatin…

-- Forgiveness, Pardon. Forgiveness is Anglo-Saxon, and pardon Norman French, both implying a giving back. The word pardon, being early used in our Bible, has, in religious matters, the same sense as forgiveness; but in the language of common life there is a difference between them, such as we often find between corres…

Admitting of pardon; not requiring the excution of penalty; venial; excusable; -- applied to the offense or to the offender; as, a pardonable fault, or culprit.

The quality or state of being pardonable; as, the pardonableness of sin. Bp. Hall.

In a manner admitting of pardon; excusably. Dryden.

One who pardons. Shak.

Relating to pardon; having or exercising the right to pardon; willing to pardon; merciful; as, the pardoning power; a pardoning God.

Unpardonable. [Obs.] South.

Not admitting of pardon or forgiveness; inexcusable.

To free from a penalty; to pardon; to remit (a sin); -- said of the sin or guilt. In his name I absolve your perjury. Gibbon.

could not guard. -- Act of grace, an expression often used to designate an act declaring pardon or amnesty to numerous offenders, as at the beginning of a new reign. -- Act of indemnity, a statute passed for the protection of those who have committed some illegal act subjecting them to penalties. Abbott. -- Act in p…

being led into court with a rope about his neck, and a lighted torch in his hand, begged pardon of his God, the court, etc. In popular language, the phrase now denotes a public apology or recantation, and reparation to an injured party, for improper language or treatment.

An act of the sovereign power granting oblivion, or a general pardon, for a past offense, as to subjects concerned in an insurrection.

Capable of apprehending, or quick to do so; apt; discerning. It may be pardonable to imagine that a friend, a kind and apprehensive . . . friend, is listening to our talk. Hawthorne.

ccusation of his accomplish and a giving evidence against them in order to obtain his own pardon. The term is no longer in use; it corresponded to what is now known as turning king's (or queen's) evidence in England, and state's evidence in the United States. Burrill. Bouvier.

s of food, texture, manners, or language. "The coarseness of the sackcloth." Dr. H. More. Pardon the coarseness of the illustration. L'Estrange. A coarseness and vulgarity in all the proceedings. Burke.

The change of a penalty or punishment by the pardoning power of the State; as, the commutation of a sentence of death to banishment or imprisonment. Suits are allowable in the spiritual courts for money agreed to be given as a commutation for penance. Blackstone.

, reputation, etc., of, by some act which can not be recalled; to expose to suspicion. To pardon all who had been compromised in the late disturbances. Motley.

The act of condoning or pardoning.

To pardon; to forgive. A fraud which he had either concocted or condoned. W. Black. It would have been magnanimous in the men then in power to have overlooked all these things, and, condoning the politics, to have rewarded the poetry of Burns. J. C. Shairp.