together; whence discomfit primarily signifies to unfasten; then to disintegrate, or break up a mass into the parts of which it is composed; and as applied to an army, to break up, disperse. Thrice hath this Hotspur, Mars in swathling clothes, Shakespeare, I Hen. IV. III. 2. Hannibal's army, by such a panick fear, was discomfited at the walls of Rome. Burton, Anat. of Mel. Pt. 1. Sec. 2. Mem. 4. Subs. 3. Discomfiture, sb. (1 Sam. xiv. 20). From the preceding. Rout, defeat. The pilours diden businesse and cure Chaucer, The Knight's Tale, 1010. Discover, v. t. (Ps. xxix. 9; Is. xxii. 8; Mic. i. 6). To uncover, lay bare; from dis- negative and cover, Fr. couvrir, It. coprire, Lat. cooperire. The voice of the Lord discovereth the forests,' i. e. strippeth off their leaves. Whether any man hath pulled down or discovered any church, chancel, or chapel, or any part of them. Grindal, Art. of Enquiry, 1576, No. 50. And Shakespeare (Mer. of Ven. II. 7): Go, draw aside the curtains and discover In this passage the word appears to have a sense intermediate between that in which it is now used and its original meaning. Dispensation, sb. (1 Cor. ix. 17; Eph. i. 10; iii. 2; Col. i. 25). Lat. dispensatio, from penso, to weigh. Literally, the act, or office of weighing out or distributing as a steward dispenses or weighs out to each dependent his proper allowance. The Greek word (oikovoμía) used in the above passages is that from which economy is derived, and for which Dean Alford confesses himself unable to find an exact English equivalent. Emong thynges of most high perfeccion, deuout praier hath the first place: the nexte place hath the special choosyng out of theim, to whō the dispensacion and stewardyng of goddes woorde is to bee committed. Udal's Erasmus, Luke, fol. 62 b. Disposition, sb. (Acts vii. 53). Appointment, arrangement, ordinance. Wiclif's, Tyndale's, and the Geneva versions give the last mentioned word. The Great Bible of 1539 has 'mynistracyon.' Our translators followed the Rheims version. Aprochen gan the fatall destine, Chaucer, Tr. and Cr. v. 2. Dissolve, v. t. (Dan. v. 16). To solve. 'Resolve' is used frequently in the same sense in Shakespeare. I am on the rack: Dissolve this doubtful riddle. Massinger, The Duke of Milan, IV. 3. A riddle, And with more difficulty to be dissolved, Than that the monster Sphinx from the steep rock Id. The Roman Actor, III. 2. Distaff, sb. (Prov. xxxi. 19). A.-S. distof, the staff on which the flax or tow was rolled in spinning. The instrument is obsolete, though the word is still well understood. The Hebrew conveys the idea of roundness, and is again used in 2 Sam. iii. 29 for a (round) staff, and three times by Nehemiah (iii. 12, 14, 15) for the circuit or region round about Jerusalem. Chaucer has embodied in verse a common proverb of his time: For he hadde more tow on his distaf. And in Shakespeare (Twelfth Night, 1. 3), Sir Toby compares Sir Andrew Aguecheek's hair to 'flax on a distaff' Divers, Diverse, adj. (Deut. xxv. 13; Ez. xvi. 16; Dan. vii. 3, 7, &c.). From Lat. diversus, literally, turned different ways; hence different, various. These senses are illustrated by the following examples: Wherfore he sent to the quene beynge in sanctuarie, diuerse and often messengers. Hall, Rich. III. fol. 24 a. Therefore doth heaven divide Shakespeare, Hen. V. 1. 2. Myself and divers gentlemen beside Every sect of them, hath a divers posture, or cringe by themselves. Bacon, Ess. 111. p. 9. Divert, v.t. literally means to turn aside, but is now, with its substantive 'diversion,' almost exclusively used in the figurative sense of turning aside a man's thoughts from grave or laborious occupation. Trench moralizes upon it to the effect that the world, by the uses of this and similar words for amusement and pleasure, confesses that all which it proposes is, not to make us happy, but a little to prevent us from remembering that we are unhappy, to pass away our time, to divert us from ourselves (Study of Words, p. 9). The word is used in its original sense when we speak of diverting' the course of a stream, and in the heading of 2 Kings xvi., Ahaz diverteth the brazen altar to his own devotion. As knots, by the conflux of meeting sap, Divide unto, v.t. (Num. xi. c.; Luke xv. 12). To divide among. Divination, sb. (Num. xxii. 7; Jer. xiv. 14). Lat. divinatio. Diuination, or Southsaying, & telling things by coniecture. Mantice...πрoμάvтeνμa. Baret, Alvearie, s. v. Meton, whether it was for the feare of the successe of the iourney he had by reason, or that he knew by diuination of his arte what would follow, he counterfeited the mad man. North's Plutarch, Alcibiades, p. 219. Diviner, sb. (Deut. xviii. 14; 1 Sam. vi. 2). One who by divination predicts future events; Lat. divinare, to foretell, predict. We have naturalized the word by adding a Saxon termination. Among the Romanes a Poet was called Vates, which is as much as a Diuiner, foreseer, or Prophet. Sidney, Defence of Poesie, p. 493, 1. 20. Olenus Calenus, who was reputed the most famous diuinor and prophet of all the Tuscanes. Holland's Pliny, XXVIII. 2. Divorcement, sb. (Deut. xxiv. 1). Divorce. Though he do shake me off To beggarly divorcement. Shakespeare, Oth. IV. 2. Do, vt. To cause or make, as in the phrase, 'to do to wit, i.e. to make to know, like the A.-S. don to witanne. Thus Gower (Conf. Am. 1. 46): Now doth me pleinly live or die. He dothe us somdele for to wite The cause of thilke prelacie. Id. Prol. p. 13. For sche, that doth me al this wo endure, Chaucer, The Knight's Tale, 2398. And do to morn that I have the victorie. Ibid. 2408. Doctor, sb. (Luke ii. 46, v. 17; Acts v. 34), in its primary sense is a teacher' (Lat. docere, doctus). It need hardly be said that it applies to one skilled in any branch of science or philosophy, but it is so commonly used by members of the medical profession only that the places in Scripture where the word occurs are liable to be misunderstood by uneducated persons. The author of the Thornton Romances' calls Austyn, Gregory, Jerome, and Ambrose the foure doctorus' (Sir Degrevant, 1447). So also Piers Ploughman terms the Evangelists: Of this matere I myghte Make a long tale, And fynde fele witnesses Among the foure doctours; And that I lye noght of that I lere thee, Luc bereth witnesse. Vision, 5305. You may imagine, what kinde of faith theirs was, when the chiefe doctors, and fathers of their church, were the poets. Bacon, Ess. III. p. 8. Doctrine, sb. Literally 'teaching,' usually means the substance of what is taught, but in some passages (e.g. Mark iv. 2) it means 'act of teaching,' and in others (Matt. vii. 28, &c.) 'manner of teaching.' Terfore thapostle saith all that is wreton is wreton for our doctryne. Caxton, Recuyell of Troy, Epil. to B. III. Domination, sb., is used once in the Prayer-Book version of Ps. xlix. 14, where the Auth. Vers. has the more |