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or showing, spite; having a desire to vex, annoy, or injure; malignant; malicious; as, a spiteful person or act. Shak. -- Spite"ful*ly, adv. Spite"ful*ness, n.

ous hate; malicious. -- De*spite"ful*ly, adv. -- De*spite"ful*ness, n. Haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters. Rom. i. 30. Pray for them which despitefully use you. Matt. v. 44. Let us examine him with despitefulness and fortune. Book of Wisdom ii. 19.

To wound by clandestine detraction; to censure meanly or spitefully (as absent person); to slander or speak evil of (one absent). Spenser.

Fretfully; spitefully.

In a contemptuous manner; with scorn or disdain; despitefully. The apostles and most eminent Christians were poor, and used contemptuously. Jer. Taylor.

Rudeness compounded of haughtiness and contempt; scornful insolence; despiteful treatment; disdain; contemptuousness in act or speech; disgrace. The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely. Shak. Nothing aggravates tyranny so much as contumely. Burke.

Despitefully. [Obs.]

Full of despite; cruel; spiteful; pitiless. Spenser. -- Dis*pit"e*ous*ly, adv. [Obs.]

Malignant; mischievous; spiteful. [Obs.] Each envious brier his weary legs doth scratch. Shak.

hawk fly, robber fly. -- To stir up a hornet's nest, to provoke the attack of a swarm of spiteful enemies or spirited critics. [Colloq.]

Dictated by, or indicating, ill nature; spiteful. "The ill-natured task refuse." Addison.

Malignity; spitefulness; virulency. The rancor of pamphlets, the inveteracy of epigrams, an the mortification of lampoons. Guardian.

Malignant; virulent; spiteful. H. Brooke.

aving an evil disposition toward others; harboring violent enmity; malevolent; malicious; spiteful; -- opposed to benign. Witchcraft may be by operation of malign spirits. Bacon.

igious creed or mode of worship. Do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you. Matt. v. 44.

Full of rancor; evincing, or caused by, rancor; deeply malignant; implacably spiteful or malicious; intensely virulent. So flamed his eyes with rage and rancorous ire. Spenser.

To inflict injury for, in a spiteful, wrong, or malignant spirit; to wreak vengeance for maliciously.

Having spite; spiteful. [Obs.]

Spitefully. [Obs.] Chaucer.

Affected with spleen; malicious; spiteful; peevish; fretful. "Splenetic guffaw." G. Eliot. You humor me when I am sick; Why not when I am splenetic Pope.