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superior force or influence; efficacious; persuasive. Shak. Saints shall assist thee with prevailing prayers. Rowe.

So as to prevail.

According to the fashion or prevailing mode. "Alamode beef shops." Macaulay.

Prevailing style or taste; rage; fashion. [Obs.] She stained her hair yellow, which was then the beauty. Jer. Taylor. Beauty spot, a patch or spot placed on the face with intent to heighten beauty by contrast.

d. -- Delhi boil (Med.), a peculiar affection of the skin, probably parasitic in origin, prevailing in India (as among the British troops) and especially at Delhi.

The act of prevailing over another by arts, address, or fraud; deception; fraud; imposture; delusion. A school in which he learns sly circumvention. Cowper.

To make darker or more intense; to darken; as, the event deepened the prevailing gloom. You must deepen your colors. Peacham.

Natural or prevailing spirit, or temperament of mind, especially as shown in intercourse with one's fellow-men; temper of mind. "A man of turbulent disposition." Hallam. "He is of a very melancholy disposition." Shak. His disposition led him to do things agreeable to his quality and condition wherein God had placed him…

Ruling; governing; prevailing; controlling; predominant; as, the dominant party, church, spirit, power. The member of a dominant race is, in his dealings with the subject race, seldom indeed fraudulent, . . . but imperious, insolent, and cruel. Macaulay. Dominant estate or tenement (Law), the estate to which a servitud…

ow hill of drifting sand usually formed on the coats, but often carried far inland by the prevailing winds. [Written also dun.] Three great rivers, the Rhine, the Meuse, and the Scheldt, had deposited their slime for ages among the dunes or sand banks heaved up by the ocean around their mouths. Motley.…

Spreading widely, or generally prevailing; affecting great numbers, as an epidemic does; as, epidemic rage; an epidemic evil. It was the epidemical sin of the nation. Bp. Burnet.

Having one's mental imagery prevailingly of the visual type; having one's thoughts and memories mainly in the form of visual images. -- Eye"-mind`ed*ness, n.

y; as, to fabricate a lie or story. Our books were not fabricated with an accomodation to prevailing usages. Paley.

The prevailing mode or style, especially of dress; custom or conventional usage in respect of dress, behavior, etiquette, etc.; particularly, the mode or style usual among persons of good breeding; as, to dress, dance, sing, ride, etc., in the fashion. The innocent diversions in fashion. Locke. As now existing, fashion…

Conforming to the fashion or established mode; according with the prevailing form or style; as, a fashionable dress.

eciably deflected by a magnetic or electric field, emitted by radioactive substances. The prevailing view is that they are non-periodic ether pulses differing from Röntgen rays only in being more penetrating.

A dry, hot wind, prevailing on the Atlantic coast of Africa, in December, January, and February, blowing from the interior or Sahara. It is usually accompanied by a haze which obscures the sun.

ho holds to a heresy; one who believes some doctrine contrary to the established faith or prevailing religion. A man that is an heretic, after the first and second admonition, reject. Titus iii. 10.

being infected; contamination by morbific particles; the result of infecting influence; a prevailing disease; epidemic. The danger was really very great, the infection being so very violent in London. De Foe.

One who does not believe in the prevailing religious faith; especially, one who does not believe in the divine origin and authority of Christianity; a Mohammedan; a heathen; a freethinker.