Noah Webster’s 1828 Dictionary

MONOPHTHONGAL — MORALLY

MONOPHTHONGAL, a. Consisting of a simple vowel-sound.

MONOPHYLLOUS, a. [Gr. sole, and leaf.] Having one leaf only.

MONOPHYSITE, n. [Gr. only, and nature.] One who maintains that Jesus Christ had but one nature, or that the human and divine nature were so united as to form one nature only.

MONOPOLIST, MONOPOLIZER, n. One that monopolizes; a person who engrosses a commodity by purchasing the whole of that article in market for the purpose of selling it at an advanced price; or one who has a license or privilege granted by authority, for the sole buying or selling of any commodity. The man who retains in his hands his own produce or manufacture, is not a monopolist within the meaning of the laws for preventing monopolies.

MONOPOLIZE, v.t. [Gr. sole, and to sell.]

1. To purchase or obtain possession of the whole of any commodity or goods in market with the view of selling them at advanced prices, and of having the power of commanding the prices; as, to monopolize sugar or tea.

2. To engross or obtain by any means the exclusive right of trading to any place, and the sole power of vending any commodity or goods in a particular place or country; as, to monopolize the India or Levant trade.

3. To obtain the whole; as, to monopolize advantages.

MONOPOLY, n. [L. monopolium.] The sole power of vending any species of goods, obtained either by engrossing the articles in market by purchase, or by a license from the government confirming this privilege. Thus the East India Company in Great Britain has a monopoly of the trade to the East Indies, granted to them by charter. Monopolies by individuals obtained by engrossing, are an offense prohibited by law. But a man has by natural right the exclusive power of vending his own produce or manufactures, and to retain that exclusive right is not a monopoly within the meaning of law.

MONOPTOTE, n. [Gr. only, and case.] A noun having only one oblique case.

MONOSPERMOUS, a. [Gr. only, and seed.] Having one seed only.

MONOSTICH, n. [Gr. only, and verse.] A composition consisting of one verse only.

MONOSTROPHIC, a. [Gr. having one strophe.] Having one strophe only; not varied in measure; written in unvaried measure.

MONOSYLLABIC, a. [See Monosyllable.]

1. Consisting of one syllable; as a monosyllabic word.

2. Consisting of words of one syllable; as a monosyllabic verse.

MONOSYLLABLE, n. [Gr. only, and a syllable.]

A word of one syllable.

MONOSYLLABLED, a. Formed into one syllable.

MONOTHEISM, n. [Gr. only, and God.] The doctrine or belief of the existence of one God only.

MONOTHELITE, n. [Gr. one, and will.] One who holds that Christ had but one will.

MONOTONE, n. [See Monotony.] In rhetoric, a sameness of sound, or the utterance of successive syllables on one unvaried key, without inflection or cadence.

MONOTONIC, a. Monotonous. [Little used.]

MONOTONOUS, a. Continued in the same tone without inflection or cadence; unvaried in tone.

MONOTONOUSLY, adv. With one uniform tone; without inflection of voice.

MONOTONY, n. [Gr. sole, and sound.]

1. Uniformity of tone or sound; want of inflections of voice in speaking; want of cadence or modulation.

2. Uniformity; sameness.

At sea, every thing that breaks the monotony of the surrounding expanse attracts attention.

MONSIEUR, n. Sir; Mr.

MONSOON, n. A periodical wind, blowing six months from the same quarter or point of the compass, then changing and blowing the same time from the opposite quarter. The monsoons prevail in the East Indies, and are called also trade winds. But we usually give the denomination of trade winds to those which blow the whole year from the same point, as the winds within the tropics on the Atlantic.

MONSTER, n. [L. monstrum, from monstro, to show. So we say in English, a sight. See Muster.]

1. An animal produced with a shape or with parts that are not natural, as when the body is ill formed or distorted, or the limbs too few or too many, or when any part is extravagantly out of proportion, either through defect or excess.

2. Any unnatural production; something greatly deformed. Monsters are common in the vegetable kingdom.

3. A person so wicked as to appear horrible; one unnaturally wicked or mischievous. So a parricide is called a monster.

MONSTER, v.t. To make monstrous. [Not used.]

MONSTER-TAMING, a. Taming monsters.

MONSTROSITY, n. The state of being monstrous, or out of the common order of nature.

We often read of monstrous births; but we see a greater monstrosity in education, when a father begets a son and trains him up into a beast.

1. An unnatural production; that which is monstrous.

Fabri arranges distortions, gibbosities, tumors, etc. in the class of morbific monstrosities.

A monstrosity never changes the name or affects the immutability of a species.

MONSTROUS, a. [L. monstrosus.] Unnatural in form; out of the common course of nature; as a monstrous birth or production.

1. Strange; very wonderful; generally expressive of dislike.

2. Enormous; huge; extraordinary; as a monstrous highth; a monstrous tree or mountain.

3. Shocking to the sight or other senses; hateful.

MONSTROUS, adv. Exceedingly; very much; as monstrous hard; monstrous thick.

And will be monstrous witty on the poor.

[This use is colloquial and vulgar.]

MONSTROUSLY, adv. In a manner out of the common order of nature; hence, shockingly; terribly; hideously; horribly; as a man monstrously wicked.

1. To a great degree; enormously; extravagantly.

Who with his wife is monstrously in love.

MONSTROUSNESS, n. The state of being monstrous.

1. Enormity; irregular nature or behavior.

MONTANIC, a. [L. montanus, from mons, mountain.] Pertaining to mountains; consisting in mountains.

MONTANISM, n. The tenets of Montanus.

MONTANIST, n. A follower of the heresiarch Montanus, a Phrygian by birth, who pretended he was inspired by the Holy Spirit and instructed in several points not revealed to the apostles. His sect sprung up in the second century.

MONTANISTIC, a. Pertaining to the heresy of Montanus.

MONTANIZE, v.i. To follow the opinions of Montanus.

MONTANT, n. A term in fencing.

MONTERO, n. A horseman’s cap.

MONTETH, n. A vessel in which glasses are washed; so called from the name of the inventor.

MONTH, n. [L. mensis; Gr. a month, from the moon.] A space or period of time constituting a division of the year. Month originally signified the time of one revolution of the moon, a lunation, or the period from one change or conjunction of the moon with the sun to another, a period of 27 days, 7 hours, 43 minutes and 5 seconds. This is the periodical month, or as we generally call it, the lunar month. In this sense we still use the word month. But we also apply the term to the space of time in which the sun passes through one sign, or a twelfth part of the zodiac. This period contains 30 days, 10 hours, 29 minutes, 5 seconds, and it called a solar month. In the year, there are twelve solar months, and thirteen lunar months.

In popular language, four weeks are called a month, being nearly the length of the lunar month. A calendar month differs in some degree from a solar month; consisting of twenty eight, twenty nine, thirty or thirty one days, as the months stand in calendars or almanacs.

MONTHLY, a. Continued a month or performed in a month; as the monthly revolution of the moon.

1. Done or happening once a month, or every month; as the monthly concert of prayer; a monthly visit.

MONTHLY, adv. Once a month; in every month. The moon changes monthly.

1. As if under the influence of the moon; in the manner of a lunatic. [Not used.]

MONTH’S-MIND, n. Earnest desire; strong inclination.

MONTMARTRITE, n. A mineral of a yellowish color, occurring massive, and found at Montmartre, near Paris. It is soft, but resists the weather. It is a compound of the sulphate and carbonate of lime.

MONTOIR, n. In horsemanship, a stone used for aiding to mount a horse.

MONUMENT, n. [L. monumentum, from moneo, to admonish or remind.]

1. Any thing by which the memory of a person or an event is preserved or perpetuated; a building, stone or other thing placed or erected to remind men of the person who raised it, or of a person deceased, or of any remarkable event; as a mausoleum, a pillar, a pyramid, a triumphal arch, a tombstone and the like. A pillar of 200 feet in highth, composed of Portland stone, was erected in London as a monument to preserve the memory of the great conflagration in 1666. A monument is erected on Bunker Hill to commemorate the battle of June 17, 1775.

2. A stone or a heap of stones or other durable thing, intended to mark the bounds of states, towns or distinct possessions, and preserve the memory of divisional lines.

3. A thing that reminds or gives notice.

MONUMENTAL, a. Pertaining to a monument; as a monumental inscription.

1. Serving as a monument; memorial; preserving memory.

Of pine or monumental oak.

A work outlasting monumental brass.

2. Belonging to a tomb; as a monumental rest.

MONUMENTALLY, adv. By way of memorial.

MOOD, n. [L. modus. See Mode.]

1. The form of an argument; the regular determination of propositions according to their quantity, as universal or particular, and their quality, as affirmative or negative.

2. Style of music.

3. The variation of a verb to express manner of action or being. [See Mode.]

In the foregoing senses, and in all cases, this word when derived from the Latin modus, ought to be written mode, it being a distinct word from the following.

MOOD, n. [L. animus.]

1. Temper of mind; temporary state of the mind in regard to passion or feeling; humor; as a melancholy mood; an angry mood; a suppliant mood.

2. Anger; heat of temper.

[In this sense little used, unless qualified by an adjective.]

MOODILY, adv. [from moody.] Sadly.

MOODINESS, n. Anger; peevishness.

MOODY, a. Angry; peevish; fretful; out of humor.

Every peevish moody malcontent.

1. Mental; intellectual; as moody food.

2. Sad; pensive.

3. Violent; furious.

MOON, n.

1. The heavenly orb which revolves round the earth; a secondary planet or satellite of the earth, whose borrowed light is reflected to the earth and serves to dispel the darkness of night. Its mean distance from the earth is 60 1/2 semidiameters of the earth, or 240,000 miles. Its revolution round the earth in 27 days, 7 hours, 43 minutes, constitutes the lunar month.

2. A month. This is the sense in which rude nations use the name of the moon; as seven moons.

Half-moon, in fortification, a figure resembling a crescent.

MOON-BEAM, n. A ray of light from the moon.

MOON-CALF, n. A monster; a false conception.

1. A mole or mass of fleshy matter generated in the uterus.

2. A dolt; a stupid fellow.

MOONED, a. Taken for the moon.

MOONET, n. A little moon.

MOON-EYE, n. An eye affected by the moon.

MOON-EYED, a. Having eyes affected by the revolutions of the moon.

1. Dim-eyed; purblind.

MOON-FISH, n. A fish whose tail is shaped like a half-moon.

MOONISH, a. Like the moon; variable.

MOONLESS, a. Not favored with moonlight.

MOONLIGHT, n. The light afforded by the moon.

MOONLIGHT, a. Illuminated by the moon; as moonlight revels.

MOONLING, n. A simpleton.

MOONLOVED, a. Loved when the moon shines.

MOON-SAD, n. A plant of the genus Menispermum, having a rosaceous flower.

MOONSHINE, n. The light of the moon.

1. In burlesque, a month.

A matter of moonshine, a matter of no consequence or of indifference.

MOONSHINE, MOONSHINY, a. Illuminated by the moon; as a fair moonshine night.

I went to see them in a moonshiny night.

MOONSTONE, n. A variety of adularia, of a white color, or a yellowish or greenish white, somewhat iridescent, found in blunt amorphous masses, or crystallized in truncated rhomboidal prisms, or in rectangular tables, or in hexahedral prisms beveled at both ends. The surface is often sulcated.

MOONSTRUCK, a. Affected by the influence of the moon; lunatic; as moonstruck madness.

MOON-TREFOIL, n. A plant of the genus Medicago.

MOON-WORT, n. A plant of the genus Lunaria; satin-flower; honesty.

MOONY, a. Lunated; having a crescent for a standard; in resemblance of the moon; as the moony troops or moony host of the sultans of Turkey.

MOOR, n.

1. A tract of land overrun with heath.

2. A marsh; a fen; a tract of wet low ground, or ground covered with stagnant water.

MOOR, n. [Gr. dark, obscure.] A native of the northern coast of Africa, called by the Romans from the color of the people, Mauritania, the country of dark-complexioned people. The same country is now called Morocco, Tunis, Algiers, etc.

MOOR, v.t. [L. moror.] To confine or secure a ship in a particular station, as by cables and anchors or by chains. A ship is never said to be moored, when she rides by a single anchor.

MOOR, v.i. To be confined by cables or chains.

On oozy ground his galleys moor.

MOORCOCK, MOORFOWL, MOORHEN, n. A fowl of the genus Tetrao, found in moors; red-game; gor-cock.

MOORED, pp. Made fast in a station by cables or chains.

MOORING, ppr. Confining to a station by cables or chains.

MOORING, n. In seamen’s language, moorings are the anchors, chains and bridles laid athwart the bottom of a river or harbor to confine a ship.

MOORISH, a. Marshy; fenny; watery.

Along the moorish fens.

1. Pertaining to the Moors in Africa.

MOORLAND, n. A marsh or tract of low water ground.

1. Land rising into moderate hills, foul, cold and full of bogs, as in Staffordshire, England.

MOORSTONE, n. A species of granite.

MOORY, a. Marshy; fenny; boggy; watery.

As when thick mists arise from moory vales.

MOOSE, n. moos. [a native Indian name.]

An animal of the genus Cervus, and the largest of the deer kind, growing sometimes to the highth of 17 hands, and weighing 1200 pounds. This animal has palmated horns, with a short thick neck, and an upright mane of a light brown color. The eyes are small, the ears a foot long, very broad and slouching; the upper lip is square, hangs over the lower one, and has a deep sulcus in the middle so as to appear bifid. This animal inhabits cold northern climates, being found in the American forests of Canada and New England, and in the corresponding latitudes of Europe and Asia. It is the elk of Europe.

MOOT, v.t. [L. contra.] To debate; to discuss; to argue for and against. The word is applied chiefly to the disputes of students in law, who state a question and discuss it by way of exercise to qualify themselves for arguing causes in court.

MOOT, v.i. To argue or plead on a supposed cause.

MOOT, MOOT-CASE, MOOT-POINT, n. A point, case or question to be mooted or debated; a disputable case; an unsettled question.

In this moot-case your judgment to refuse.

MOOTED, pp. Debated; disputed; controverted.

MOOTER, n. A disputer of a mooted case.

MOOT-HALL, MOOT-HOUSE, n. A town hall; hall of judgment.

MOOTING, ppr. Disputing; debating for exercise.

MOOTING, n. The exercise of disputing.

MOP, n. [L. mappa.] A piece of cloth, or a collection of thrums or coarse yarn fastened to a handle and used for cleaning floors.

1. A wry mouth. [Not used.]

MOP, v.t. To rub or wipe with a mop.

MOP, v.i. To make a wry mouth. [Not used.]

MOPE, v.i. [I have not found this word, unless in the D. moppen, to pout.]

To be very stupid; to be very dull; to drowse; to be spiritless or gloomy.

Demoniac phrensy, moping melancholy.

--Or but a sickly part of one true sense

Could not so mope.

MOPE, v.t. To make stupid or spiritless.

MOPE, n. A stupid or low spirited person; a drone.

MOPED, pp. Made stupid.

A young, low spirited, moped creature.

MOPE-EYED, a. Short-sighted; purblind.

MOPING, ppr. Affected with dullness; spiritless; gloomy.

MOPISH, a. Dull; spiritless; stupid; dejected.

MOPISHNESS, n. Dejection; dullness; stupidity.

MOPPET, MOPSEY, n. [from mop; L. mappa.] A rag-baby; a puppet made of cloth; a fondling name of a little girl.

MOPUS, n. A mope; a drone.

MORAL, a. [L. moralis, from mos, moris, manner.]

1. Relating to the practice, manners or conduct of men as social beings in relation to each other, and with reference to right and wrong. The word moral is applicable to actions that are good or evil, virtuous or vicious, and has reference to the law of God as the standard by which their character is to be determined. The word however may be applied to actions which affect only, or primarily and principally, a person’s own happiness.

Keep at the least within the compass of moral actions, which have in them vice or virtue.

Mankind is broken loose from moral bands.

2. Subject to the moral law and capable of moral actions; bound to perform social duties; as a moral agent or being.

3. Supported by the evidence of reason or probability; founded on experience of the ordinary course of things; as moral certainty, distinguished from physical or mathematical certainty or demonstration.

Physical and mathematical certainty may be stiled infallible, and moral certainty may be properly stiled indubitable.

Things of a moral nature may be proved by moral arguments.

4. Conformed to rules of right, or to the divine law respecting social duties; virtuous; just; as when we say, a particular action is not moral.

5. Conformed to law and right in exterior deportment; as, he leads a good moral life.

6. Reasoning or instructing with regard to vice and virtue.

While thou, a moral fool, sitt’st still and cri’st.

7. In general, moral denotes something which respects the conduct of men and their relations as social beings whose actions have a bearing on each others’s rights and happiness, and are therefore right or wrong, virtuous or vicious; as moral character; moral views; moral knowledge; moral sentiments; moral maxims; moral approbation; moral doubts; moral justice; moral virtue; moral obligations, etc. Or moral denotes something which respects the intellectual powers of man, as distinct form his physical powers. Thus we speak of moral evidence, moral arguments, moral persuasion, moral certainty, moral force; which operate on the mind.

Moral law, the law of God which prescribes the moral or social duties, and prohibits the transgression of them.

Moral sense, an innate or natural sense of right and wrong; an instinctive perception of what is right or wrong in moral conduct, which approves some actions and disapproves others, independent of education or the knowledge of any positive rule or law. But the existence of any such moral sense is very much doubted.

Moral philosophy, the science of manners and duty; the science which treats of the nature and condition of man as a social being, of the duties which result form his social relations, and the reasons on which they are founded.

MORAL, n. Morality; the doctrine or practice of the duties of life. [Not much used.]

1. The doctrine inculcated by a fiction; the accommodation of a fable to form the morals.

The moral is the first business of the poet.

MORAL, v.i. To moralize. [Not in use.]

MORALER, n. A moralizer. [Not in use.]

MORALIST, n.

1. One who teaches the duties of life, or a writer of essays intended to correct vice and inculcate moral duties.

2. One who practices moral duties; a mere moral person.

MORALITY, n. The doctrine or system of moral duties, or the duties of men in their social character; ethics.

The system of morality to be gathered from the writings of ancient sages, falls very short of that delivered in the gospel.

1. The practice of the moral duties; virtue. We often admire the politeness of men whose morality we question.

2. The quality of an action which renders it good; the conformity of an act to the divine law, or to the principles of rectitude. This conformity implies that the act must be performed by a free agent, and from a motive of obedience to the divine will. This is the strict theological and scriptural sense of morality. But we often apply the word to actions which accord with justice and human laws, without reference to the motives form which they proceed.

MORALIZATION, n. Moral reflections, or the act of making moral reflections.

1. Explanation in a moral sense.

MORALIZE, v.t.

1. To apply to a moral purpose, or to explain in a moral sense.

This fable is moralized in a common proverb.

Did he not moralize this spectacle?

2. To furnish with manners or examples.

3. To render moral or virtuous; to correct the morals of.

It had a large share in moralizing the poor white people of the country.

[This sense, though the most strictly etymological, is rare, or to make moral reflections.]

MORALIZE, v.i. To speak or write on moral subjects, or to make moral reflections.

MORALIZED, pp. Applied to a moral purpose, or explained in a moral sense.

1. Rendered moral or less corrupt.

MORALIZER, n. One who moralizes.

MORALIZING, ppr. Applying to a moral purpose, or explaining in a moral sense.

1. Making moral reflections in words or writing.

MORALIZING, n. The application of facts to a moral purpose, or the making of moral reflections.

His moralizings are always pleasant, and he does not spare, where he thinks it useful to moralize.

MORALLY, adv. In a moral or ethical sense; according to the rules of morality.

By good, morally so called, bonum honestum ought chiefly to be understood.

1. Virtuously; honestly; according to moral rules in external department. He resolves to live morally.

2. According to the rules of the divine law. An action is not in strictness morally good, which does not proceed from good motives, or a principle of love and obedience to the divine law and to the lawgiver. Charity bestowed to gratify pride, or justice done by compulsion, cannot be morally good in the sight of God.

3. According to the evidence of human reason or of probabilities, founded on facts or experience; according to the usual course of things and human judgment.

It is morally impossible for a hypocrite to keep himself long on his guard.

From the nature of things, I am morally certain that a mind free from passion and prejudice is more fit to pass a true judgment than one biased by affection and interest.