GLOSSARY

Page 4

Good offices: acts of good, voluntarily tendered.

Touched with contempt: affected by another’s undervaluing or scorn.

Pungent: piercing, sharp.

Sensibility: quickness of perception; a disposition to being easily or strongly affected; delicacy.

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Nobler arts: the liberal arts or sciences. “Arts that respect the mind were ever reputed nobler than those that serve the body”—Ben Jonson (quoted in Samuel Johnson’s
Dictionary, under “Art”).

Relish: taste; delight in; power of perceiving excellence.

Incommodious: inconvenient; vexatious.

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Melancholy: pensiveness; quietly serious thoughtfulness, sadness, or longing.

Nice: accurate in judgment to minute exactness; superfluously exact.

Vacancy: emptiness; sense of longing.

Want: need; deficiency.

Sensibly: quickly; keenly.

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Bottle companion: drinking friend.

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Mean: lacking dignity; spiritless; low in worth or power.

Pusillanimous: mean-spirited; cowardly.

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Entertain jealousy: regard with suspicious fear, vigilance, or caution.

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Want: absence.

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Licentiousness: boundless liberty; contempt of just restraint.

Rouzed: aroused; excited to thought or action.

Animated: encouraged; incited.

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Levity: inconstancy or changeableness; unsteadiness; trifling gaiety.

Artifice: trickery; fraud; stratagem.

Faction: tumult, discord, or dissention, especially as arising from disputes among civil or religious parties.

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Humours: general turn or temper of mind; present disposition.

Affected popularity: tried to please the crowd.

Licentious: unrestrained by law or morality.

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Fiefs: estates.

Doge: title of the chief magistrate of the republic of Venice.

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Factions: contending parties in a state.

Elevation: exaltation; dignity.

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Proscription: a sentence of death and confiscation of one’s property.

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Païs conquis: conquered lands.

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Meanness: want of dignity; low rank.

Desert: degree of merit or demerit.

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Enow: the plural of
enough.

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Panegyric: a eulogy or encomium; high praise.

Religious: exact; strict.

Fain: to wish; to desire fondly.

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A woman from the stews: a prostitute.

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Pro aris & focis: in defense of our altars and our fires.

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Soldan: sultan; the supreme ruler of one or another of the great Mohammedan powers or countries of the Middle Ages.

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Mamalukes: members of the military body, originally composed of Caucasian slaves, that seized the throne of Egypt in 1254 and continued to form the ruling class in that country during the eighteenth century.

Prætorian bands: the bodyguards of the emperors of ancient Rome.

Prodigal: lavish; wasteful.

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In no stead: to no advantage.

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Palliate: to cover with excuse; to extenuate or soften by favorable representations.

Appellation: name or title.

Peculiar: appropriate; belonging to any one with exclusion of others.

Tyes: ties; bonds or obligations.

Factitious: made by art, in opposition to what is made by nature.

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Exclaims: cries out.

Probity: honesty; sincerity; veracity.

Ascendant: superiority; elevation.

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Refractory: obstinate; stubborn; perverse; unmanageable; rebellious.

Intestine: internal; domestic.

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Owned: acknowledged.

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Courts: jurisdictions; authorities.

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Violent: forceful.

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Temerity: great boldness; rashness.

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Ecclesiastical preferments: places of honor or profit in the church.

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Byass: bias; propensity or inclination.

Specious: plausible; beautiful.

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God’s vicegerent: God’s lieutenant; someone entrusted with power by God.

Risque: risk.

Durst I: If I dared.

Period: end or conclusion.

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In his closet: in privacy or retirement.

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Euthanasia: easy death.

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Extirpating: rooting out; eradicating.

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Aliment: nourishment; food.

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Contrariety: opposition; inconsistency; a quality or position destructive of its opposites.

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Discover: show; exhibit.

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Christendom: the collective body of Christianity; the regions in which the inhabitants profess the Christian religion.

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Generous: daring; vigorous; liberal.

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Counterpoise: counterweight; equivalence of force in the opposite side.

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Pernicious: mischievous in the highest degree; destructive.

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Unaccountable: not explicable; not to be solved by reason; not reducible to rule.

Credulity: easiness of belief; a readiness to credit.

Sublunary: earthly; of this world.

Raptures: violent seizures; violence of any pleasing passion; uncommon heat of imagination.

Transports: raptures; ecstasy.

Illapses: sudden attacks; emissions or entrances of one thing into another.

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Addresses: petitions.

Incensed: angry; enraged.

Diffident: lacking in confidence.

Egregious: eminent; remarkable; extraordinary.

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Votaries: those devoted, as by a vow, to any particular service, worship, study, or state of life.

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Remissness: carelessness; negligence; lack of ardor; inattention.

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The Romish church: the Roman Catholic church.

Sectaries: persons who divide from public establishment and join with those distinguished by some particular whims; followers of a particular sect.

Regular: methodical; strict; orderly.

Infirmity: weakness; failing; disease or malady.

Abject: mean; worthless; base; groveling.

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Prerogative: exclusive or peculiar privilege or right; preeminence; superiority.

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Divines: ministers or priests; theologians.

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Splenetic: fretful; peevish.

Odious: hateful; detestable.

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Subjoin: to add afterward.

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Tincture: color or taste superadded by something.

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Just: exact; accurate; orderly.

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Head: topic of discourse.

Internal police: the regulation and government of a city or country, so far as regards the inhabitants.

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Beggars: impoverishes.

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Canvassed: examined; debated or discussed.

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The pathetic: that which moves the passions.

Sublime: grand or lofty in style.

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Chaste: pure; uncorrupt.

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Adulterate: corrupted with some foreign mixture.

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Taper: a candle.

Meridian sun: the noonday sun.

Resolution: settled thought; determination of a cause.

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Give a propriety to: to justify.

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Nicety: minute accuracy of thought; exact discrimination; subtlety.

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Chimæra: a vain and wild fancy, as remote from reality as the existence of the poetical Chimera, a monster feigned to have the head of a lion, the belly of a goat, and the tail of a dragon.

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Bashaws: form of the Turkish title
Pasha, meaning head or chief.

Cadis: town or village judges among the Turks or other peoples.

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Stop: obstruction; hindrance; check.

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Ere: before.

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Rant: high-sounding language unsupported by dignity of thought.

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Foppery: foolish ostentation; idle affectation; impertinence.

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Muscovites: Russians.

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Garniture: ornament.

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Mortification: humiliation; subjection of the passions.

Under-workman: an inferior or subordinate laborer.

Drapery: the dress of the figures in a painting.

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Enthusiasm: heat of imagination; elevation of fancy.

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Impetuosity: force.

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Odoriferous: fragrant; sweetly scented.

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Bowers: a sheltered place covered with green trees, twined and bent.

Chearful: cheerful.

The schools: systems of doctrine as delivered by particular teachers.

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Debauch: fit of intemperance; excess.

Wanton: frolicsome; gay; sportive; airy.

Calumny: slander; false charges; groundless accusations.

Ravished: enraptured; ecstatic; overcome by a pleasing violence.

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Transported: put in ecstasy; ravished with pleasure.

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Fabulous: feigned; the product of fables or invented tales.

Loose: liberty; freedom from restraint.

Jollity: in a disposition to noisy mirth.

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Emergence: an emergency; any sudden occasion or pressing necessity.

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Timorous: fearful.

Sloth: laziness; sluggishness; idleness.

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Aurora: The goddess who opens the gates of the day; poetically, the morning.

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Lassitude: weariness; fatigue.

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Pile: an edifice; a building.


At adventures: by chance; without any rational scheme.

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Scholastic: adherent of a school; one who is needlessly subtle.

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Palpable: perceptible by the touch; plain; easily perceptible.

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Mortify: to subdue.

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Nerves: the organs of sensation passing from the brain to all parts of the body.

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Dropsy: a collection of water in the body, from too lax a tone in the solids, whereby digestion is weakened and all the parts stuffed.

Puerile: childish; boyish.

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Voluptuous: given to excess of pleasure.

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Phthisis: a consumption, or wasting of the body, arising from any one of several causes, such as an ulcerated state of the lungs.

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Imbecility: weakness; feebleness.

Phlegm: sluggishness; dullness.

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Municipal laws: the civil or positive laws of a state, as distinguished from laws of nature and laws of nations.

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Condition: superior rank.

Seraglio: a palace or residence of a sultan; a harem; a house or part of a house allotted to women in a Muslim household and designed for maximum seclusion.

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Humour: temper of mind; disposition.

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Doom: destruction.

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Establishment: standing; income.

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Waterman: a ferryman; a boatman.

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La belle nature: nature as beautified or adorned by art.

Epistolary: suitable to letters.

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Copious: not confined; diffuse.

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Toilettes: the receptions of visitors by a lady during the concluding stages of her process of dressing; very fashionable in the eighteenth century.

Arcadia: a mountainous district in the southern peninsula of Greece, taken in literature as an ideal region of rural contentment.

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Conceit: pleasant fancy; gaity of imagination; acuteness; pleasant thought.

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Vulgar: those with common or untrained minds, as distinguished here from “men of sense.”

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Complexion: quality or character.

Ingenious: noble or liberal.

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Similitude: likeness; resemblance.

Knot: any bond of association or union; a confederacy; a small band.

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Rusticity: qualities of one who lives in the country; simplicity; artlessness; rudeness; savageness.

Phlegmatic: dull; cold; frigid.

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The Franks: from the third century &ad; onward, a generic name for the Germanic tribes that established themselves in western Europe; a western European.

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Muscovite: Russian.

Effeminate: soft; voluptuous; feminine.

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Vulgar: commonplace.

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Coxcomb: a superficial pretender to knowledge or accomplishments; a fop.

Subtilize: to make less gross or coarse; to refine.

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Numbers: verses; poetry.

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Dolce peccante: sweet sinning.

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Wrought: produced; worked.

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Remark: to observe; to distinguish; to point out.

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Scruples: doubts; hesitates.

Fustian: a high swelling kind of writing made up of heterogeneous parts, or of words and ideas ill associated; bombast.

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Habitudes: states with regard to something else; relations.

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Florid: embellished; brilliant with decorations.

Palls: makes insipid or vapid.

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Specious: pleasing to the view; plausible.

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Pathetic: affecting the passions; moving.

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Victuals: provision of food; stores for the support of life.

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Ruffs: puckered linen ornaments, formerly worn about the neck.

Fardingales: farthingales; hoops or padded rolls once worn about the hips to spread the petticoat to a wide circumference.

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Complaisance: the act of yielding to the desire or demand of another; submission.

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Entrench on: encroach or trespass upon.

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Circumstantial: detailed.

Burthens: burdens.

Amor patriæ: love of country.

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On a sudden: sooner than was expected; without the natural or commonly accustomed preparations.

Retrench: to cut off; to live with less magnificence or expense.

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Abatement: lessening; diminution.

Wonted: accustomed; usual.

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Engrossed: seized; appropriated.

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Sorry: worthless.

Fallow: unplowed; uncultivated.

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Grasiers: those who feed cattle.

Police: order; regulation; administration.

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Porter: a kind of beer, dark brown in color and bitter in taste, which originally was drunk chiefly by porters and the lower class of laborers.

Subject: that which can be drawn upon or utilized; means of doing something.

Expense: expenditures.

Libertine: licentious.

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Recruits: resupplies; replenishes.

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Fund: stock that can be drawn upon; supply.

Apace: speedily.

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Billet-doux: a love letter.

Discovered: revealed; divulged.

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Bias: regular course; inclination.

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Inveterate: obstinate by long continuance.

Tragical: calamitous; dreadful.

Undaunted: unsubdued by fear; bold; intrepid.

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Ortolans: small birds accounted very delicious.

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Dearness: high price.

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Specie: coined money.

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Overplus: surplus.

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Numerary: of or pertaining to a number or numbers.

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Tell out: count out.

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For futurity: for time to come.

Occupation: employment; business.

Somewhat: something.

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Offer: price bid.

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Repletion: the state of being over full.

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Recruits: new supplies.

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Absentees: proprietors who live elsewhere.

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Plate: silverware.

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Finds surety: gives a pledge, bond, guarantee, or security for the fulfillment of an undertaking.

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Repine: to be vexed or discontented by something.

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Factors: agents for another; those who transact business for another in mercantile affairs.

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Romance: a fable or tale, as distinguished from an authentic history.

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Jealousy of: zeal in guarding.

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Barred: Hume’s meaning is “would have barred.”

Page 340

Funding: converting into a more or less permanent debt bearing regular interest.

Supine: negligent; thoughtless; inattentive.

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Downfal: downfall.

Page 353

Scritoire: a type of large cabinet with drawers and the convenience of a table to write upon; a bureau.

Page 357

Boxes: a box under the driver’s seat on a coach; hence, in general, the seat on which the driver sits.

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Adieu: farewell.

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Projectors: those who form visionary or impracticable schemes or designs.

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Cudgel-playing: a fighting or sporting contest with short heavy sticks or clubs.

Faith: trust in the nation’s credit-worthiness.

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Exchequer: the court to which are brought all the revenues belonging to the crown.

Trepan: to catch; to ensnare.

Bugbear: a frightful object; a walking specter, imagined to be seen—generally used in the eighteenth century for a false terror to frighten babes.

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Irrefragable: not to be refuted; superior to argumental opposition.

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Pupillage: state of being still like a pupil.

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Straitened: reduced to hardship or privation.

Page 412

Raree-shows: (formed in imitation of the foreign way of pronouncing
rare shows): shows carried in boxes.

Page 463

Paralogism: a false argument.

Page 474

They had: they would have.

Page 494

Repine: fret; vex oneself; be discontented.

Page 500

Event: the consequence of an action; the conclusion; the upshot.

Page 503

Prepossessions: preoccupations; preconceived opinions or prejudices.

Page 505

Wrested: distorted.

Page 506

Bottom: foundation; groundwork.

Of a piece: consistent; in harmony or agreement.

Page 507

Poise: weight.

Essay: attempt; endeavor; trial.

Page 508

Antiquated: obsolete; out of date.

Page 510

Sacerdotal: priestly; here, the papal office.

Page 517

Casting: deciding; decisive.

Page 519

Session: the right to sit or occupy a seat.

Page 521

Break: to dismiss; to deprive of a commission or rank.

Page 522

Aphorisms: principles or precepts expressed in a few words.

Page 534

Belles Lettres: polite, refined, or elegant literature.

Page 537

Affect: to be fond of or pleased with.

Page 543

Parterre: the part of the floor of a theater behind the orchestra.

Phisiognomy: physiognomy; the face or countenance, especially viewed as an index to the mind and character.

Put a Violence upon: to apply severe or undue constraint to some natural process or habit so as to prevent its free development or exercise.

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Subscribing: attesting by writing one’s name.

Page 554

Arrant: bad in a high degree; notorious; complete; manifest.

Page 557

Satyr: satire.

Backwardness: reluctance; disinclination; unwillingness.

Page 565

Complexion: bodily constitution.

Essays: the first tentative efforts in learning or practice.

Page 567

Brings: leads by degrees; makes liable to anything.

Page 572

Fairly: completely; plainly; suitably.

Page 579

Sophisticated: adulterated; corrupted with something spurious; not genuine.