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It is not only important, but, in a degree necessary, that the people of this country, should have an American Dictionary of the English language; for, although the body of the language is the same as in England, and it is desirable to perpetuate that sameness, yet some differences must exist. Language is the expression of ideas; and if the people of one country cannot preserve an identity of ideas, they cannot retain an identity of language. |
AB'DICATE, v.t. [L. abdica; ab and dico, to dedicate, to bestow, but the literal primary sense of dico is to send or thrust.]
AB'DICATE, v.i. To renounce; to abandon; to cast off; to relinquish, as a right, power, or trust.
To surrender or relinquish, as
sovereign power; to withdraw definitely from filling or exercising, as a
high office, station, dignity; as, to abdicate the throne, the
crown, the papacy.
* The word abdicate was held to mean, in the case of James II., to abandon without a formal surrender. The cross-bearers abdicated their service. To renounce; to relinquish; -- said of
authority, a trust, duty, right, etc.
He abdicates all right to be his own governor. The understanding abdicates its functions. To reject; to cast off.
[Obs.] Bp.
Hall. To disclaim and expel from
the family, as a father his child; to disown; to disinherit.
Syn. -- To give up; quit; vacate; relinquish; forsake; abandon; resign; renounce; desert. -- To Abdicate, Resign. Abdicate commonly expresses the act of a monarch in voluntary and formally yielding up sovereign authority; as, to abdicate the government. Resign is applied to the act of any person, high or low, who gives back an office or trust into the hands of him who conferred it. Thus, a minister resigns, a military officer resigns, a clerk resigns. The expression, "The king resigned his crown," sometimes occurs in our later literature, implying that he held it from his people. -- There are other senses of resign which are not here brought into view. To relinquish or
renounce a throne, or other high office or dignity.
Though a king may abdicate for his own person, he
cannot abdicate for the monarchy. | ||||||||