5. Difference regarded; preference or Maids, women, wives, without distinction fall; 6. Separation of complex notions. This fierce abridgment Dryden. Hath to it circumstantial branches, which 7. Division into different parts.. The distinction of tragedy into acts was not known; or, if it were, it is yet so darkly delivered to us, that we cannot make it out. 8. Notation of difference between things Dryden on Dramatick Poesy. seemingly the same; discrimination." The mixture of those things by speech, which by nature are divided, is the mother of all error: to take away therefore that error, which contusion breedeth, distinction is requisite. Lawfulness cannot be handled without limitaHooker. ons and distinctions. This will puzzle all your logick and distinctions Bacon's Holy War. From this distinction of real and apparent good, Denham's Sophy. some distinguish happiness into two sorts, real and imaginary. to answer it. Norris. 9. Discernment; judgment. DISTINCTIVE. adj. [from distinct.] 1. That marks distinction or difference. For from the natal hour, distinctive names, One common right, the great and lowly claims. 2. Having the power to distinguish and Pope's Odyssey. discern; judicious. Credulous and vulgar auditors readily believe it, and the more judicious and distinctive heads do not reject it. DISTINCTIVELY.adv. [from distinctive.] Particularly; not confusedly. Brown. I did all my pilgrimage dilate, Whereof by parcels she had something heard, But not distinctively, DISTINCTLY, adv. [from distinct.] Shakspeare's Othello. 1. Not confusedly; without the confusion of one part with another. To make an echo that will report three, or four, or five words distinctly, it is requisite that the body percusssing be a good distance off. 2. but on its ends very confusedly and indistinctly. Rightly to distinguish is, by conceit of the mind, to sever things different in nature, and to To separate from others by some mark discern wherein they differ. Hooker. of honour or preference. They distinguish my poems from those of other men, and have made me their peculiar care. Dryden. Let us revolve that roll with strictest eye, Where, safe from time, distinguish'd actions lie. Priv 3. To divide by proper notes of diversity. 1. Plainly; clearly. The object I could first distinctly view, Was tall straight trees, which on the waters flew. After the light of the sun was a little worn off my eyes, I could see all the parts of it distinctly Dryden. by a glimmering reflection that played upon them from the surface of the water. Addison. DISTINCTNESS. n. s. [from distinct.] 1. Nice observation of the difference between different things. So long As he could make me, with his eye or ear, Shakspeare. By our reason we are enabled to distinguish good from evil, as well as truth from falschood. Watts. 5. To discern critically; to judge. The membranes and humours of the eye are perfectly pellucid, and void of colour, for the clearness, and for the distinctness, of vision. 2. Such discrimination of things as makes Ray on the Creation. them easy to be observed. Sweet prince, th' untainted virtue of your years Hath not yet div'd into the world's deceit ; Nor more can you distinguish of a man, Than of his outward shew! 6. To constitute difference; to specificate; Bhakspeare. to make different from another. St. Paul's Epistles contain nothing but points of christian instruction, amongst which he seldom fails to enlarge on the great and distinguishing doctrines of our holy religion. Locke. 7. To make known or eminent. The readers must learn by all means to dis- Impenitent, they left a race behind Like to themselves, distinguishable scarce From gentiles, but by circumcision vain. Milton. The acting of the soul, as it relates to perception and decision, to choice and pursuit, or aversion, is distinguishable to us. Hale. I shall distribute duty into its principal and eminent parts, distinguishable as they relate to God, our neighbour, and ourselves. Government of the Tongue Being dissolved in aqueous juices, it is by the eye distinguishable from the solvent body. Boyle. A simple idea, being in itself uncompounded, contains nothing but one uniform appearance, or conception in the mind, and is not distinguishable into different ideas. 2. Worthy of note; worthy of regard. Locke. I would endeavour that my betters should .F 2 seek me by the merit of something distinguish able, instead of my seeking them. Swift. DISTINGUISHED. participial adj. [from distinguish.] Eminent; transcendent; extraordinary. For sins committed with many aggravations of guilt, the furnace of wrath will be seven times hotter, and burn with a distinguished fury. Rogers. Never on man did heavenly favour shine, With rays so strong, distinguish'd, and divine. Pope. DISTINGUISHER. n. s. [from distinguish.] 1. A judicious observer; one that accurately discerns one thing from another. If writers be just to the memory of Charles II. they cannot deny him to have been an exact knower of mankind, and a perfect distinguisher of their talents. Dryden. 2. He that separates one thing from another by proper marks of diversity. Let us admire the wisdom of God in this distinguisher of times, and visible deity, the sun. Brown's Vulgar Errours. DISTINGUISHINGLY. adv. from distinguishing.] With distinction; with some mark of eminent preference. to me. Some call me a Tory, because the heads of that party have been distinguishingly favourable Pope. DISTINGUISHMENT. n. s. [from distinguish.] Distinction; observation of difference. To make corrections upon the searchers reForts, I considered whether any credit at all were to be given to their distinguishments. Graunt's Bills of Mortality. To DISTO'RT. v. a. [distortus, Latin.] 1. To writhe; to twist; to deform by irregular motions. I see her taste each nauseous draught, I bless the hand from whence they came, Smith. 2. To put out of the true direction or posture. With fear and pain Distorted, all my nether shape thus grew Transform'd. Milton. Wrath and malice, envy and revenge, do darken and distort the understandings of men. Tillotson. 3. To wrest from the true meaning. Something must be distorted beside the intent of the divine inditer. Peacham on Poetry. DISTORTION. n. s. [distortio, Lat.] Irregular motion by which the face is writhed, or the parts disordered. Ey his distortions he reveals his pains; He by his tears and by his sighs complains. Prior. In England we see people lulled asleep with solid and elaborate discourses of piety, who would be warmed and transported out of themselves by the bellowings and distortions of enthusiasm. Addison's Spectator. To DISTRACT. v.a. part. pass. distracted; anciently distraught; and sometimes distract. [distractus, Latin.] 1. To pull different ways at once. The needle endeavours to conform unto the meridian; but, being distracted, driveth that way where the greater and powerfuller part of the earth is placed. Brown's Vulgar Errours. 2. To separate; to divide. By sea, by sea. Most worthy sir, you therein throw away The absolute soldiership you have by land; Distract your army, which doth most consist Of war-mark'd footmen. Shakspeare. 3. To turn from a single direction toward various points. If he cannot wholly avoid the eye of the observer, he hopes to distract it by a multiplicity of the object. South, 4. To fill the mind with contrary considerations; to perplex; to confound; to harass. While I suffer thy terrors I am distracted. Murder thy breath in middle of a word, Shakspeare's Richard T. It would burst forth; but I recover breath, And sense distract to know well what I utter. Milton's Agonistes. He possesses a quiet and cheerful mind, not af flicted with violent passions, or distracted with immoderate cares. Raz. If our sense of hearing were a thousand times quicker than it is, how would a perpetual noise distract us! We should, in the quietest retirement, be less able to sleep or meditate than in the middle of a sea-fight. Locke 5. To make mad: properly, by an unsettled and vagrant fancy; but, popu larly, to make mad in whatever mode. Wherefore throng you hither?To fetch my poor distracted husband hence: Let us come in, that we may bind him fast, And bear him home for his recovery. Better I were distract, Shaks. So should my thoughts be sever'd from my griefs, Shaki. She was unable in strength of mind to bear the grief of his disease, and fell distracted of het Bacon. wits. You shall find a distracted man fancy himself a king, and with a right inference require suitable attendance, respect, and obedience. Lock DISTRACTEDLY. adv. [from distract.] Madly; frantickly. Methought her eyes had cross'd her tongue; For she did speak in starts distractedly. Shake DISTRACTEDNESS. n. s. [from distract] The state of being distracted; mad DISTRACTIVE. adj. [from distract.] Oft grown unmindful through distractive cares, wares. To DISTRA IN. v. a. [from distringo, Latin.] 1. To seize; to lay hold on as an indemnification for a debt. To DISTRESS. v. a. [from the noun.] Here's Beauford, that regards not God nor king, Hath here distrain'd the Tower to his use. 2. To rend; to tear. Not in use. Shakspeare. To DISTRA IN. v. n. To make seizure. Spens. The earl answered, I will not lend money to my superior, upon whom I cannot distrain for the debt, Camden's Remains. Blood, his rent to have regain'd, Upon the British diadem distrain'd. Marvel. DISTRAINER. 2.s. [from distrain.] He that seizes. DISTRA INT. 2. Seizure. Distress not the Moabites, neither contend with them in battle. Deuteronomy. I am distressed for thee, my brother Jonathan. 2 Sam. DISTRESSFUL. adj. [distress and full.] I often did beguile her of her tears, Distressful and desolating events, which have attended the mistakes of politicians, should be present in their minds. Watts. 2. Attended with poverty. He, with a body fill'd, and vacant mind, bread. To DISTRIBUTE. v. a. [distribuo, Lat.] To divide among more than two; to deal out; to dispensate. The king sent over a great store of gentlemen and warlike people, amongst whom he distributed the land. Spenser. The spoil got on the Antiates" Was not distributed. Shakspeare's Coriolanus. She did distribute her goods to all them that were nearest of kindred. Judith. DISTRIBUTER. n. s.' [from distribute.] One who deals out any thing; a dis penser. There were judges and distributers of justice appointed for the several parts of his dominions. Addison on Italy. Of that peculiar matter out of which the bodies of vegetables and of animals are formed, water is the common vehicle and distributer to the parts of those bodies. Woodward. DISTRIBUTION. n. s. [distributio, Lat.] S. [from distrain.] 1. The act of distributing or dealing out Dict. DISTRAUGHT. part. adj. [from distract.] Distracted. He had been a good military man in his days, but was then distraught of his wits. DISTRESS. n. s. [destresse, French.]. Camden. 1. The act of making a legal seizure. He would first demand his debt;. and, if he were not paid, he would straight go and take a distress of goods and cattle, where he could find them, to the value. Spenser. Quoth she, some say the soul's secure Against distress and forfeiture. 2. A compulsion in real actions, by which Hudibras. assured to appear in court, or to pay a debt or duty which he refused. Corvell. a man 3. The thing seized by law. There can I sit alone, unseen of any, 2. Act of giving in charity. Let us govern our charitable distributions by this pattern of nature, and maintain a mutual circulation of benefits and returns. Atterbury. 3. [In logic.] As an integral whole is distinguished into its several parts by division; so the word distribution is most properly used, when we distinguish a universal whole into its several kinds of species. Watts. DISTRIBUTIVE. adj. [from distribute.] 1. That is employed in assigning to others their portions: as, distributive justice, that which allots to each his sentence or claim.. If justice will take all, and nothing give, Justice methinks is not distributive. Dryden. Observe the distributive justice of the authors, which is constantly applied to the punishment of virtue, and the reward of vice, directly opposite to the rules of their best criticks, Swift. 2. That assigns the various species of a general term. DISTRIBUTIVELY. adv. [from distributive.] 1. By distribution. 2. Singly; particularly. Although we cannot be free from all sin collectively, in such sort that no part thereof shall be found inherent in us; yet, distributively at the least, all great and grievous actual offences, as they offer themselves one by one, both may and ought to be by all means avoided. Hooker. 3. In a manner that expresses singly all the particulars included in a general term; not collectively. An universal term is sometimes taken collec tively for all its particular ideas united together; and sometimes distributively, meaning each of them single and alone. Watts' Legick. DISTRICT. n.s. [districtus, Latin.] 1. The circuit or territory within which a man may be compelled to appearance. Cowell. 2. Circuit of authority; province. His governors, who formed themselves upon the example of their grand monarque, practised all the arts of despotick government in their respective districts. Addison. With stern distaste avow'd, 3. Region; country; territory. A smile plays with a surprising agreeableness in the eye, breaks out with the brightest distric tion, and sits like a glory upon the countenance. Collier on the Aspect. To DISTRUST. v. a. [dis and trust.] TO regard with diffidence; to diffide in; not to trust. He sheweth himself unto such as do not distrust him. Wisdom. DISTRUST. n. s. [from the verb.] 1. Discredit; loss of credit; loss of confidence. To me reproach Rather belongs, distrust, and all dispraise. Milton. 2. Suspicion; want of faith; want of confidence in another. You doubt not me; nor have I spent my blood, To have my faith no better understood: Your soul's above the baseness of distrust; Nothing but love could make you so unjust. DISTRUSTFUL. adj. [distrust and full.] Dryden. 1. Apt to distrust; suspicious, Generals often harbour distrustful thoughts in their breasts. 2. Not confident; diffident. The great corrupters of discourse have not been so distrustful of themselves. Gov. of the Tongue. Pope 3. Diffident of himself; modest; timorous. Distrustful sense with modest caution speaks; But rattling nonsense in full vollies breaks. DISTRUSTFULLY. adv. [from distrustful.] In a distrustful manner. DISTRUSTFULNESS. n.. [from distrustful.] The state of being distrustful; want of confidence. To DÍSTU ́RB. v. a. [disturbo, low Lat.] 1 To perplex; to disquiet; to deprive of tranquillity. He that has his own troubles, and the happiness of his neighbours, to disturb him, has work enough. Collier on Envy. His youth with wants and hardships must tion.] Disgrace; diminution of repu. tation. What can be more to the disvaluation of the Bacon. Shakspeare's Meas. for Meas. The very same pride which prompts a man to vaunt and overvalue what he is, does as forcibly incline him to contemn and disvalue what he has. Gov. of the Tongue. TO DISVELOP. v. a. [developer, French.] Dict. To uncover. DISUNION. n. s. [dis and union.] 1. Separation; disjunction. Rest is most opposite to motion, the immediate cause of disunion. Glanville's Scepsis. Disunion of the corporeal principles, and the vital, causeth death. Grew's Cosmologia Sacra. Let not peace be made before the disunion of France and Spain. Addison's State of the War. The strength of it will join itself to France, and grow the closer to it by its disunion from the Addison on the War. 1 rest. 2. Breach of concord. To Disvo ́UCH. v. a. [dis and vouch.] The beast they then divide, and disunite 2. To part friends or allies. While every particular member of the publick provides solely for itself, the several joints of the body politic do separate and disunite, and so become unable to support the whole. South. DISUNITY. n.s. [dis and unity.] A state of actual separation. More. ther. She ran away alone; Which when they heard, there was not one DIT. n. s. [dicht, Dutch.] A ditty; a Dirunity is the natural property of matter, which is nothing else but an infinite congeries of physical monads. Disu SAGE. n. s. [dis and usage.] The gradual cessation of use or custom. No bird but did her shrill notes sweetly sing; No song but did contain a lovely dit. F. Queen, DITATION. n. s. [ditatus, Latin.] The act of enriching. Those eastern worshippers intended rather homage than ditation; the blessed virgin comes DITCH. n. s. [dic, Saxon; duk, Erse.] in the form of poverty. Hall's Contemplations. 1. A trench cut in the ground, usually between fields. They cut off presently such things as might be extinguished without danger, leaving the rest to be abolished by disusage through tract of Hooker. time. DISU'SE. n. s. [dis and use.] 1. Cessation of use; desuetude; want of practice. The disuse of the tongue is the only effectual remedy against these. Addison's Guardian. 2. Cessation of custom. Some asked for manors, others for acres that lay convenient for them; that he would pull down his fences, and level his ditches. Arbuthnot. Sudden the ditches swell, the meadows swim. Thomson. 2. Any long narrow receptacle of water: used sometimes of a small river in contempt. That obligation upon the lands did not prescribe, or come into disuse, but by fifty consecu Arbuthnot. tive years. To Disu'se, v. a. [dis and use.] 1. To cease to make use of. Tis law, though custom now diverts the course: In the great plagues there were seen, in divers ditches and low grounds about London, many toads that had tails three inches long. Bacon. 3. The moat with which a fortress surrounded. The ditches, such as they were, were altoge ther dry, and easy to be passed over. Knolles. 4. Ditch is used, in composition, of any thing worthless, or thrown away into ditches. As nature's institute is yet in force, B. To disaccustom: with from or to; more properly from. Disuse me from the queasy pain Of being belov'd and loving. Donne. He shall his troops for fighting fields prepare, Dius'd to toils and triumphs of the war. Dryden. Poor Tom, when the foul fiend rages, eats cowdung for sallets, swallows the old rat, and the ditch dog. Shakspearer To DITCH. v. n. [from the noun.] To make a ditch. I have employed my time, besides ditching, in finishing my travels. DITCH-DELIVERED. Swift. adj. [ditch and deliver.] Brought forth in a ditch. Finger of birth-strangled babe,, Ditch-deliver'd by a drab. Shaks, Macbeth. DITCHER. n. s. [from ditch.] One who digs ditches. DITHYRAMBICK. You merit new employments daily, Latin.] Savift. n. s. [dithyrambus, 1. A song in honour of Bacchus; in which anciently, and now among the Italians, the distraction of ebriety is imitated. 2. Any poem written with wildness and enthusiasm. DITHYRAMBICK. adj. Wild; enthu Pindar does new words and figures roll DITTANY. . s. [dictamnus.] A plant. Dittany hath beca renowned, for many ages, |