Complete Works of Samuel Johnson

by Samuel Johnson

  A drunken woman, and a gadder abroad, causeth great anger, and she will not cover her own shame. Ecclus. xxvi. 8.

  Gáddingly. adv. [from gad.] In a rambling, roving manner. Gádfly. n.s. [gad and fly; but by Skinner, who makes it the original of gad, goadfly. Supposed to be originally from goad, in Saxon ʒad, and fly.] A fly that when he stings the cattle make them gad or run madly about; the breese.

  The fly called the gadfly breedeth of somewhat that swimeth upon the top of the water, and is most about ponds. Bac.

  Light fly his slumbers, if perchance a flight

  Of angry gadflies fasten on the herd. Thomson’s Summer.

  Gaff. n.s. A harpoon or large hook. Ainsworth.

  Gáffer. n.s. [ʒefere, companion, Saxon.] A word of respect now obsolete, or applied only in contempt to a mean person.

  For gaffer Treadwell told us by the bye,

  Excessive sorrow is exceeding dry. Gay’s Pastorals.

  Gáffles. n.s. [ʒafelucas, spears, Saxon.]

  1. Artificial spurs put upon cocks when they are set to fight.

  2. A steel contrivance to bend cross-bows. Ainsworth.

  Gag. n.s. [from the verb.] Something put into the mouth to hinder speech or eating.

  Some, when the kids their dams too deeply drain,

  With gags and muzzles their soft mouths restrain. Dryden.

  Your woman would have run up stairs before me; but I have secured her below with a gag in her chaps. Dryden.

  To Gag. v.n. [from gaghel, Dutch, the palate, Minshew.] To stop the mouth with something that may allow to breathe, but hinder to speak.

  He’s out of his guard already: unless you laugh and minister occasion to him, he is gagg’d. Shakesp. Twelfth Night.

  There foam’d rebellious logick, gagg’d and bound. Pope.

  Gage. n.s. [gage, French.] A pledge; a pawn; a caution; any thing given in security.

  Who, when the shamed shield of slain Sansfoy

  He spy’d, with that same fairy champion’s page,

  He to him leapt; and that same envious gage,

  Of victor’s glory, from him snatcht away. Fairy Queen.

  There I throw my gage

  Disclaiming here the kindred of a king,

  And lay aside my high blood’s royalty. Shakesp. Richard II.

  There is my gage, the manual seal of death,

  That marks thee out for hell. Shakesp. Richard II.

  They from their mothers breasts poor orphans rend,

  Nor without gages to the needy lend. Sandys’s Paraphrase.

  I am made the cautionary pledge,

  The gage and hostage of your keeping it. Southern’s Oroonok.

  But since it was decreed, auspicious king,

  In Britain’s right that thou should’st wed the main,

  Heav’n, as a gage, would cast some previous thing,

  And therefore doom’d that Lawson should be slain. Dryden.

  In any truth, that gets not possession of our minds by self-evidence or demonstration, the arguments, that gain it assent, are the vouchers and gage of its probability. Locke.

  To Gággle. v.n. [gagen, gagelen, Dutch.] To make noise like a goose.

  Birds prune their feathers, geese gaggle, and crows seem to call upon rain; which is but the comfort they receive in the relenting of the air. Bacon’s Natural History, № 823.

  May fat geese gaggle with melodious voice,

  And ne’er want gooseberries or apple-sauce. King.

  H

  H is in English, as in other languages, a note of aspiration, sounded only by a strong emission of the breath, without any conformation of the organs of speech, and is therefore by many grammarians accounted no letter. The h in English is scarcely ever mute at the beginning of a word, or where it immediately precedes a vowel; as house, behaviour: where it is followed by a consonant it has no sound, according to the present pronunciation: but anciently, as now in Scotland, it made the syllable guttural; as right, bought.

  Ha. interject. [ha, Latin.]

  1. An expression of wonder, surprise, sudden question, or sudden exertion.

  You shall look fairer ere I give or hazard:

  What says the golden chest? ha! let me see. Shakesp.

  Ha! what art thou! thou horrid headless trunk!

  It is my Hastings! Rowe’s Jane Shore.

  2. An expression of laughter.

  He saith among the trumpets ha, ha, and he smelleth the battle afar off. Job xxxix. 25.

  Ha, ha, ’tis what so long I wish’d and vow’d;

  Our plots and delusions

  Have wrought such confusions,

  That the monarch’s a slave to the crowd. Dryd. Albion.

  Haak. n.s. A fish. Ainsworth.

  Hábeas Corpus. [Latin.] A writ, the which, a man indicted of some trespass, being laid in prison for the same, may have out of the King’s Bench, thereby to remove himself thither at this own costs, and to answer the cause there. Cowel.

  Haberdásher. n.s. [This word is ingeniously deduced by Minshew from habt ihr dass, German, have you this, the expression of a shopkeeper offering his wares to sale.] One who sells small wares; a pedlar.

  Because these cunning men are like haberdashers of small wares, it is not amiss to set forth their shop. Bacon’s Essays.

  A haberdasher, who was the oracle of the coffeehouse, declared his opinion. Addison’s Spectator, № 48.

  Háberdine. n.s. A dried salt cod. Ainsworth.

  Hábergeon. n.s. [haubergeon, French; halbergium, low Lat.] Armour to cover the neck and breast; breastplate; neckpiece; gorget.

  And halbert some, and some a haberion;

  So every one in arms was quickly dight. Fairfax, b. i.

  The shot let fly, and grazing

  Upon his shoulder, in the passing,

  Lodg’d in Magnano’s brass habergeon. Hudibras, p. i.

  Habíliment. n.s. [habilement, French.] Dress; cloaths; garment.

  He the fairest Una found,

  Strange lady, in so strange habiliment,

  Teaching the satyres. Fairy Queen, b. i. cant. 6.

  My riches are these poor habiliments,

  Of which if you should here disfurnish me,

  You take the sum and substance that I have. Shakespeare.

  The clergy should content themselves with wearing gowns and other habiliments of Irish drapery. Swift.

  To Habílitate. v.n. [habiliter, French.] To qualify; to entitle.

  Divers persons in the house of commons were attainted, and thereby not legal, nor habilitate to serve in parliament, being disabled in the highest degree. Bacon’s Henry VII.

  Habilitátion. n.s. [from habilitate.] Qualification.

  The things formerly spoken of, are but habilitations towards arms; and what is habilitation without intention and act? Bacon, Essay 30.

  Hábility. n.s. [habilite, French.] Faculty; power. Hábit. n.s. [habitus, Latin.]

  1. State of anything: as, habit of body.

  2. Dress; accoutrement.

  I shifted

  Into a madman’s rags, t’ assume a semblance

  The very dogs disdain’d; and in this habit

  Met I my father. Shakespeare’s King Lear.

  If you have any justice, any pity;

  If ye be any thing, but churchmen’s habits. Shakespeare.

  Both the poets being dressed in the same English habit, story compared with story, judgment may be made betwixt them. Dryden’s Fables, Preface.

  The scenes are old, the habits are the same

  We wore last year. Dryden’s Indian Emperor.

  There are among the statues several of Venus, in different habits. Addison on Italy.

  The clergy are the only set of men who wear a distinct habit from others. Swift.

  3. Habit is a power or ability in man of doing any thing, when it has been acquired by frequent doing the same thing. Locke.

  He hath a better bad habit of frowning than the count Palatine. Shakesp. Merchant of Venice.


  4. Custom; inveterate use.

  This is the last fatal step but one, which is, by frequent repetition of the sinful act, to continue and persist in it, ‘till at length it settles into a fixed confirmed habit of sin; which being properly that which the apostle calls the finishing of sin, ends certainly in death; death not only as to merit, but also as to actual infliction. South’s Sermons.

  No civil broils have since his death arose,

  But faction now by habit does obey;

  And wars have that respect for his repose,

  As winds for halcyons when they breed at sea. Dryden.

  The force of education is so great, that we may mould the minds and manners of the young into what shape we please, and give the impressions of such habits as shall ever afterwards remain. Atterbury’s Sermons.

  To Hábit. v.a. [from the noun.] To dress; to accoutre; to array.

  Present yourself and your fair princess

  Before Leontes:

  She shall be habited as it becomes

  The partner of your bed. Shakesp. Winter’s Tale.

  Having called to his memory Sir George Villiers, and the cloaths he used to wear, in which at that time he seemed to be habited, he thought him to be that person. Clarendon.

  They habited themselves like those rural deities, and imitated them in their rustick dances. Dryden.

  Hábitable. adj. [habitable, Fr. habitabilis, Lat.] Capable of being dwelt in; capable of sustaining human creatures.

  By means of our solitary situation, we know well most part of the habitable world, and are ourselves unknown. Bacon.

  That was her torrid and inflaming time;

  This is her habitable tropique clime. Donne.

  Look round the habitable world, how few

  Know their own good, or knowing it, pursue. Dryden.

  Hábitableness. n.s. [from habitable.] Capacity of being dwelt in.

  The cutting of the Equinoctial line decides that controversy of the habitableness of the Torrid zone. More.

  Those ancient problems of the spherical roundness of the earth, the being of antipodes, and of the habitableness of the torrid zone, are abundantly demonstrated. Ray.

  Hábitance. n.s. [habitatio, Latin.] Dwelling; abode.

  What art thou, man, if man at all thou art,

  That here in desart hast thine habitance?

  And these rich heaps of wealth do’st hide apart

  From the world’s eye, and from her right usance. Fa. Qu.

  Hábitant. n.s. [habitant, Fr. habitans, Lat.] Dweller; one that lives in any place; inhabitant.

  Not to earth are those bright luminaries

  Officious; but to the earth’s habitant:

  And for the heav’n’s wide circuit, let it speak

  The maker’s high magnificence. Milton’s Paradise Lost.

  Pow’rs celestial to each other’s view

  Stand still confest, though distant far they lie,

  Or habitants of earth, or sea, or sky. Pope’s Odyssey.

  Habitátion. n.s. [habitation, French; habitatio, Latin.]

  1. The act of dwelling; the state of a place receiving dwellers.

  Amplitude almost immense, with stars

  Numerous, and ev’ry star perhaps a world

  Of destin’d habitation. Milton’s Paradise Lost, b. vii.

  Palaces,

  For want of habitation and repair,

  Dissolve to heaps of ruins. Denham’s Sophy.

  Rocks and mountains, which in the first ages were high and craggy, and consequently then inconvenient for habitation, were by continual deterration brought to a lower pitch. Woodward’s Natural History.

  2. Place of abode; dwelling.

  Wisdom, to the end she might save many, built her house of that nature which is common unto all; she made not this or that man her habitation, but dwelt in us. Hooker, b. v.

  God oft descends to visit men

  Unseen, and through their habitations walks

  To mark their doings. Milton’s Paradise Lost, b. xii.

  Habitátor. n.s. [Latin.] Dweller; inhabitant.

  So is his presence more continued unto the northern inhabitants; and the longest day in Cancer is longer unto us than that in Capricorn unto the northern habitators. Brown.

  Habítual. adj. [habituel, from habit, French.] Customary; accustomed; inveterate; established by frequent repetition.

  Sin, there in pow’r before

  Once actual; now in body, and to dwell

  Habitual habitant. Milton’s Paradise Lost, b. x.

  Art is properly an habitual knowledge of certain rules and maxims. South.

  By length of time

  The scurf is worn away of each committed crime:

  No speck is left of their habitual stains;

  But the pure ether of the soul remains. Dryden’s Æn.

  ’Tis impossible to become an able artist, without making your art habitual to you. Dryden’s Dufresnoy.

  I

  Is in English considered both as a vowel and consonant; though, since the vowel and consonant differ in their form as well as sound, they may be more properly accounted two letters.

  I vowel has a long sound, as fine, thine, which is usually marked by an e final; and a short sound, as fin, thin. Prefixed to e it makes a diphthong of the same sound with the soft i, or double e, ee: thus field, yield, are spoken as feeld, yeeld; except friend, which is spoken frend. Subjoined to a or e it makes them long, as fail, neigh; and to o makes a mingled sound, which approaches more nearly to the true notion of a diphthong, or sound composed of the sounds of two vowels, than any other combination of vowels in the English tongue, as oil, coin. The sound of i before another i, and at the end of a word, is always expressed by y.

  J consonant has invariably the same sound with that of g in giant; as jade, jet, jilt, jolt, just.

  I. pronoun personal. [ik, Gothick; ic, Saxon; ich, Dutch.]

  I,

  gen.

  me;

  plural

  we;

  gen.

  us.

  ic,

  me,

  we,

  us.

  1. The pronoun of the first person, myself.

  I do not like these several councils, I. Shakes. Rich. III.

  There is none greater in this house than I. Gen. xxxix. 9.

  Be of good cheer, it is I; be not afraid. Mat. xiv. 27.

  What shall I do to be for ever known,

  And make the age to come my own?

  I shall like beasts or common people dye,

  Unless you write my elegy. Cowley.

  Hence, and make room for me. Cowley.

  When chance of business parts us two,

  What do our souls, I wonder, do? Cowley.

  Of that book you have given us a large earnest. Cowley.

  Thus, having pass’d the night in fruitless pain,

  I to my longing friends return again. Dryden’s &AE;n.

  2. Me is in the following passage written for I.

  There is but one man whom she can have, and that is me. Clarissa.

  3. I is more than once in Shakespeare written for ay, or yes.

  Hath Romeo slain himself? Say thou but I,

  And that bare vowel, I, shall poison more

  Than the death-darting eye of cockatrice. Shakespeare.

  Did your letters pierce the queen?

  — I, sir; she took ’em and read ’em in my presence,

  And now and then an ample tear trill’d down. Shakespeare.

  Iámbick. n.s. [iambique, French; iambicus, Latin.] Verses composed of iambick feet, or a short and long syllable alternately: used originaly in satire, therefore taken for satire.

  In thy felonious heart though venom lies,

  It does but touch thy Irish pen, and dies:

  Thy genius calls thee not to purchase fame

  In keen iambicks, but mild anagram. Dryden.

  Iatroléptick. adj. [iatraleptique, Fr. ἰατρὸς and ἀλέιφω.] Th
at which cures by anointing. Ice. n.s. [is, Saxon; eyse, Dutch.]

  1. Water or other liquor made solid by cold

  You are no surer, no,

  Than is the coal of fire upon the ice,

  Or hailstone in the sun. Shakespeare’s Coriolanus.

  Thou art all ice, thy kindness freezes. Shakesp. R. III.

  If I should ask whether ice and water were two different species of things, I doubt not but I should be answered in the affirmative. Locke.

  2. Concreted sugar.

  3. To break the Ice. To make the first opening to any attempt.

  If you break the ice, and do this feat,

  Atchieve the elder, set the younger free

  For our access, whose hap shall be to have her,

  Will not so graceless be to be ingrate. Shakespeare.

  Thus have I broken the ice to invention, for the lively representation of floods and rivers necessary for our painters and poets. Peacham on Drawing.

  After he’d a while look’d wise,

  At last broke silence and the ice. Hudibras, p. iii.

  To Ice. v.a. [from the noun.]

  1. To cover with ice; to turn to ice.

  2. To cover with concreted sugar.

  Icehouse. n.s. [ice and house.] A house in which ice is reposited against the warm months. Ichnéumon. n.s. [ἰχνέυμων.] A small animal that breaks the eggs of the crocodile. Ichneumonflý. n.s. A sort of fly.

  The generation of the ichneumonfly is in the bodies of caterpillars, and other nymphæ of insects. Derham’s Physico-Theol.

  Ichnógraphy. n.s. [ἰχνος and γράφω.] The groundplot.

  It will be more intelligible to have a draught of each front in a paper by itself, and also to have a draught of the groundplot or ichnography of every story in a paper by itself. Moxon.

  Íchor. n.s. [ἰχωρ.] A thin watery humour like serum. Quincy.

  Milk, drawn from some animals that feed only upon flesh, will be more apt to turn rancid and putrify, acquiring first a saline taste, which is a sign of putrefaction, and then it will turn into an ichor. Arbuthnot on Aliments.

  Íchorous. adj. [from ichor.] Sanious; thin; undigested.

  The lung-growth is imputed to a superficial sanious or ichorous exulceration. Harvey on Consumptions.

  The pus from an ulcer of the liver, growing thin and ichorous, corrodes the vessels. Arbuthnot on Diet.

  Ichthyólogy. n.s. [ichthyologie, Fr. ἰχθυολογία, from ἰχθὺς and λέγω.] The doctrine of the nature of fish.