a. [ L. absolvens, p. pr. of absolvere. ] Absolving. [ R. ] Carlyle. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. An absolver. [ R. ] Hobbes. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ L. adventus, fr. advenire, adventum: cf. F. avent. See Advene. ] 1. (Eccl.) The period including the four Sundays before Christmas. [ 1913 Webster ]

Advent Sunday (Eccl.), the first Sunday in the season of Advent, being always the nearest Sunday to the feast of St. Andrew (Now. 30). Shipley. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. The first or the expected second coming of Christ. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. Coming; any important arrival; approach. [ 1913 Webster ]

Death's dreadful advent. Young. [ 1913 Webster ]

Expecting still his advent home. Tennyson. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. 1 any Christian religion that believes the second coming of Christ is imminent.
Syn. -- Second Adventism [ WordNet 1.5 ]

n. One of a religious body, embracing several branches, who look for the proximate personal coming of Christ; -- called also Second Adventists. Schaff-Herzog Encyc. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. the membranous outer covering of an organ or blood vessel. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

adj. 1. of or pertaining to adventitia. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

a. [ L. adventitius. ] 1. Added extrinsically; not essentially inherent.
Syn. -- accidental; casual; incidental; additional; supervenient; foreign. [ 1913 Webster + PJC ]

To things of great dimensions, if we annex an adventitious idea of terror, they become without comparison greater. Burke. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. (Nat. Hist.) Out of the proper or usual place; as, adventitious buds or roots. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. (Bot.) Accidentally or sparingly spontaneous in a country or district; not fully naturalized; adventive; -- applied to foreign plants. [ 1913 Webster ]

4. (Med.) Acquired, as diseases; not hereditary. AS [ 1913 Webster ]

5. (Med.) Occurring in an unusual place or arising from an external source. Stedman 25 [ PC ]

-- Ad`ven*ti"tious*ly, adv. -- Ad`ven*ti"tious*ness, n. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. 1. Accidental. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. (Bot.) Adventitious. Gray. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. A thing or person coming from without; an immigrant. [ R. ] Bacon. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Relating to the season of advent. Sanderson. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ OE. aventure, aunter, anter, F. aventure, fr. LL. adventura, fr. L. advenire, adventum, to arrive, which in the Romance languages took the sense of “to happen, befall.” See Advene. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

1. That which happens without design; chance; hazard; hap; hence, chance of danger or loss. [ 1913 Webster ]

Nay, a far less good to man it will be found, if she must, at all adventures, be fastened upon him individually. Milton. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. Risk; danger; peril. [ Obs. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

He was in great adventure of his life. Berners. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. The encountering of risks; hazardous and striking enterprise; a bold undertaking, in which hazards are to be encountered, and the issue is staked upon unforeseen events; a daring feat. [ 1913 Webster ]

He loved excitement and adventure. Macaulay. [ 1913 Webster ]

4. A remarkable occurrence; a striking event; a stirring incident; as, the adventures of one's life. Bacon. [ 1913 Webster ]

5. A mercantile or speculative enterprise of hazard; a venture; a shipment by a merchant on his own account. [ 1913 Webster ]

A bill of adventure (Com.), a writing setting forth that the goods shipped are at the owner's risk. [ 1913 Webster ]

Syn. -- Undertaking; enterprise; venture; event. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. t. [ imp. & p. p. Adventured p. pr. & vb. n. Adventuring ] [ OE. aventuren, auntren, F. aventurer, fr. aventure. See Adventure, n. ] 1. To risk, or hazard; jeopard; to venture. [ 1913 Webster ]

He would not adventure himself into the theater. Acts xix. 31. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. To venture upon; to run the risk of; to dare. [ 1913 Webster ]

Yet they adventured to go back. Bunyan, [ 1913 Webster ]

Discriminations might be adventured. J. Taylor. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. i. To try the chance; to take the risk. [ 1913 Webster ]

I would adventure for such merchandise. Shak. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Given to adventure. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ Cf. F. aventurier. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

1. One who adventures; as, the merchant adventurers; one who seeks his fortune in new and hazardous or perilous enterprises. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. A social pretender on the lookout for advancement. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Full of risk; adventurous; venturesome. -- Ad*ven"ture*some*ness, n. [1913 Webster]

n. A female adventurer; a woman who tries to gain position by equivocal means. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. recklessness in politics or foreign affairs. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

adj. 1. of or pertaining to adventurism. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

a. [ OE. aventurous, aunterous, OF. aventuros, F. aventureux, fr. aventure. See Adventure, n. ] 1. Inclined to adventure; willing to incur hazard; prone to embark in hazardous enterprise; rashly daring; -- applied to persons. [ 1913 Webster ]

Bold deed thou hast presumed, adventurous Eve. Milton. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. Full of hazard; attended with risk; exposing to danger; requiring courage; rash; -- applied to acts; as, an adventurous undertaking, deed, song. [ 1913 Webster ]

Syn. -- Rash; foolhardy; presumptuous; enterprising; daring; hazardous; venturesome. See Rash. [ 1913 Webster ]

adv. In an adventurous manner; venturesomely; boldly; daringly. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. The quality or state of being adventurous; daring; venturesomeness. [ 1913 Webster ]

adj. 1. 1 relating to or affecting the atria and ventricles of the heart. atrioventricular disease
Syn. -- auriculoventricular. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

adj. (Med.) relating to or affecting the atria and ventricles of the heart.
Syn. -- atrioventricular. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

n. [ OF. esventail. Cf. Ventail. ] The movable front to a helmet; the ventail. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Pertaining to Mons Aventinus, one of the seven hills on which Rome stood. Bryant. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. A post of security or defense. [ Poetic ] [ 1913 Webster ]

Into the castle's tower,
The only Aventine that now is left him. Beau. & Fl. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. t. To thrust forward (at a venture), as a spear. [ Obs. ] Spenser. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ See Adventure, n. ] 1. Accident; chance; adventure. [ Obs. ] Chaucer. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. (Old Law) A mischance causing a person's death without felony, as by drowning, or falling into the fire. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ F. aventurine: cf. It. avventurino. ] 1. A kind of glass, containing gold-colored spangles. It was produced in the first place by the accidental (par aventure) dropping of some brass filings into a pot of melted glass. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. (Min.) A variety of translucent quartz, spangled throughout with scales of yellow mica. [ 1913 Webster ]

Aventurine feldspar, a variety of oligoclase with internal firelike reflections due to the presence of minute crystals, probably of hematite; sunstone. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ Pref. bi- + ventral. ] (Anat.) Having two bellies or protuberances; as, a biventral, or digastric, muscle, or the biventral lobe of the cerebellum. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. A variant of Chieftain. [ Obs. ] Chaucer. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. t. [ imp. & p. p. Circumvented; p. pr. & vb. n. Circumventing. ] [ L. circumventis, p. p. of circumvenire, to come around, encompass, deceive; circum + venire to come, akin to E. come. ] To gain advantage over by arts, stratagem, or deception; to decieve; to delude; to get around. [ 1913 Webster ]

I circumvented whom I could not gain. Dryden. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ L. circumventio. ] The act of prevailing over another by arts, address, or fraud; deception; fraud; imposture; delusion. [ 1913 Webster ]

A school in which he learns sly circumvention. Cowper. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Tending to circumvent; deceiving by artifices; deluding. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ L. ] One who circumvents; one who gains his purpose by cunning. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. An adventure in which two or more persons are partakers. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. i. To share in a venture. Howell. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. A fellow adventurer. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ L. connivens, p. pr. ] 1. Forbearing to see; designedly inattentive; as, connivent justice. [ R. ] Milton. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. (Biol.) Brought close together; arched inward so that the points meet; converging; in close contact; as, the connivent petals of a flower, wings of an insect, or folds of membrane in the human system, etc. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ Cf. F. contravention. ] The act of contravening; opposition; obstruction; transgression; violation. [ 1913 Webster ]

Warrants in contravention of the acts of Parliament. Macaulay. [ 1913 Webster ]

In contravention of all his marriage stipulations. Motley. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ L. conventus a meeting, LL. also, a convent. See Convene, v. i. ] 1. A coming together; a meeting. [ Obs. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

A usual ceremony at their [ the witches ] convents or meetings. B. Jonson. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. An association or community of recluses devoted to a religious life; a body of monks or nuns. [ 1913 Webster ]

One of our convent, and his [ the duke's ] confessor. Shak. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. A house occupied by a community of religious recluses; a monastery or nunnery. [ 1913 Webster ]

One seldom finds in Italy a spot of ground more agreeable than ordinary that is not covered with a convent. Addison.

Syn. -- Nunnery; monastery; abbey. See Cloister. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. i. [ L. conventus, p. p. of convenire. See Convene, v. i. ] 1. To meet together; to concur. [ obs. ] Beau. & Fl. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. To be convenient; to serve. [ Obs. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

When that is known and golden time convents. Shak. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. t. To call before a judge or judicature; to summon; to convene. [ Obs. ] Shak. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Of or from, or pertaining to, a convent. “Conventical wages.” Sterne. [ 1913 Webster ]

Conventical prior. See Prior. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ L. conventiculum, dim. of conventus: cf. F. conventicule. See Convent, n. ] 1. A small assembly or gathering; esp., a secret assembly. [ 1913 Webster ]

They are commanded to abstain from all conventicles of men whatsoever. Ayliffe. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. An assembly for religious worship; esp., such an assembly held privately, as in times of persecution, by Nonconformists or Dissenters in England, or by Covenanters in Scotland; -- often used opprobriously, as if those assembled were heretics or schismatics. [ 1913 Webster ]

The first Christians could never have had recourse to nocturnal or clandestine conventicles till driven to them by the violence of persecution. Hammond. [ 1913 Webster ]

A sort of men who . . . attend its [ the curch of England's ] service in the morning, and go with their wives to a conventicle in the afternoon. Swift. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. One who supports or frequents conventicles. Dryden. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Belonging or going to, or resembling, a conventicle. [ Obs. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

Conventicling schools . . . set up and taught secretly by fanatics. South. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ L. conventio: cf. F. convention. See Convene, v. i. ] 1. The act of coming together; the state of being together; union; coalition. [ 1913 Webster ]

The conventions or associations of several particles of matter into bodies of any certain denomination. Boyle. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. General agreement or concurrence; arbitrary custom; usage; conventionality. [ 1913 Webster ]

There are thousands now
Such women, but convention beats them down. Tennyson. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. A meeting or an assembly of persons, esp. of delegates or representatives, to accomplish some specific object, -- civil, social, political, or ecclesiastical. [ 1913 Webster ]

He set himself to the making of good laws in a grand convention of his nobles. Sir R. Baker. [ 1913 Webster ]

A convention of delegates from all the States, to meet in Philadelphia, for the sole and express purpose of reserving the federal system, and correcting its defects. W. Irving. [ 1913 Webster ]

4. (Eng. Hist) An extraordinary assembly of the parkiament or estates of the realm, held without the king's writ, -- as the assembly which restored Charles II. to the throne, and that which declared the throne to be abdicated by James II. [ 1913 Webster ]

Our gratitude is due . . . to the Long Parliament, to the Convention, and to William of Orange. Macaulay. [ 1913 Webster ]

5. An agreement or contract less formal than, or preliminary to, a treaty; an informal compact, as between commanders of armies in respect to suspension of hostilities, or between states; also, a formal agreement between governments or sovereign powers; as, a postal convention between two governments. [ 1913 Webster ]

This convention, I think from my soul, is nothing but a stipulation for national ignominy; a truce without a suspension of hostilities. Ld. Chatham. [ 1913 Webster ]

The convention with the State of Georgia has been ratified by their Legislature. T. Jefferson. [ 1913 Webster ]