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The act of retiring, or the state of being retired; withdrawal; seclusion; as, the retirement of an officer. O, blest Retirement, friend of life's decline. Goldsmith. Retirement, rural quiet, friendship, books. Thomson.

Fugitive concealment; secret retirement; hiding. [R.] Phillips.

A place in obscurity or retirement, or out of sight. I fancy there was a background of grinding and waiting before Miss Torry could produce this highly finished . . . performance. Mrs. Alexander. A husband somewhere in the background. Thackeray.

An inclosure; a boundary; a limit. [Obs.] A prison is but a retirement, and opportunity of serious thoughts, to a person whose spirit . . . desires no enlargement beyond the cancels of the body. Jer. Taylor.

A monastic establishment; a place for retirement from the world for religious duties. Fitter for a cloister than a crown. Daniel. Cloister garth (Arch.), the garden or open part of a court inclosed by the cloisters.

A small room or apartment for retirement; a room for privacy. A chair-lumbered closet, just twelve feet by nine. Goldsmith. When thou prayest, enter into thy closet. Matt. vi. 6.

A dwelling in the country, used as a place of retirement from the city.

elling attention; notorious; heinous; as, a crying evil. Too much fondness for meditative retirement is not the crying sin of our modern Christianity. I. Taylor.

Concealment; seclusion; retirement. The delitescence of mental activities. Sir W. Hamilton.

A place near the fire or hearth; home; domestic life or retirement.

Out, as from a state of concealment, retirement, confinement, nondevelopment, or the like; out into notice or view; as, the plants in spring put forth leaves. When winter past, and summer scarce begun, Invites them forth to labor in the sun. Dryden.

The state of not being frequented; solitude; isolation; retirement; seclusion. [R.] The solitude and infrequency of the place. Bp. Hall.

Love of retirement; disposition to solitude. I see The mystery of your loneliness. Shak.

That which is composed by night; that which is produced by meditation in retirement; hence (loosely) any literary composition. Thy lucubrations have been perused by several of our friends. Tatler.

A house of religious retirement, or of secusion from ordinary temporal concerns, especially for monks; -- more rarely applied to such a house for females.

The state of being in retirement from the company or observation of others; seclusion.

Privacy; retirement. [Archaic] "Go off; I discard you; let me enjoy my private." Shak.

Seclusion from company or society; retirement; privacy; secrecy. Bacon.

Appropriated to retirement; private; not open to the public. " Privy chambers." Ezek. xxi. 14.

. & Obs.] His jealousy . . . attends the business, the recreations, the publications, and retirements of every man. Jer. Taylor. Publication of a libel (Law), such an exhibition of a libel as brings it to the notice of at least one person other than the person libeled. -- Publication of a will (Law), the delivery of a…