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Neuter   Listen
adjective
Neuter  adj.  
1.
Neither the one thing nor the other; on neither side; impartial; neutral. (Archaic) "In all our undertakings God will be either our friend or our enemy; for Providence never stands neuter."
2.
(Gram.)
(a)
Having a form belonging more especially to words which are not appellations of males or females; expressing or designating that which is of neither sex; as, a neuter noun; a neuter termination; the neuter gender.
(b)
Intransitive; as, a neuter verb.
3.
(Biol.) Having no generative organs, or imperfectly developed ones; sexless. See Neuter, n., 3.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Neuter" Quotes from Famous Books



... language there was no neuter gender, the gods must always appear either as female or male. For apparent reasons, in all the translations, through the pronouns and adjectives used, the more important ancient deities have all been ...
— The God-Idea of the Ancients - or Sex in Religion • Eliza Burt Gamble

... the Madhyandinas read 'he who dwells in the Self,' and so make clear that what the Kanvas designate as 'knowledge' really is the knowing Self.—That the word vijnana, although denoting the knowing Self, yet has a neuter termination, is meant to denote it as something substantial. We hence conclude that he who is different from the Self consisting of knowledge, i.e. the individual Self, is the highest Self ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut

... from paaxal, a neuter form of the active verb pa, to break in pieces; it means "to go to pieces, to fall in ruins, to be depopulated or deserted." Applied to a city it is often translated "to be destroyed," but it does not convey quite so positive a meaning. Kuyan uincob, "men of God," from Ku the general ...
— The Maya Chronicles - Brinton's Library Of Aboriginal American Literature, Number 1 • Various

... an explanation of the 'battalia' of Jeremy Taylor and others? Did they, without reflecting on the matter, regard 'battalion' as a word with a Greek neuter termination? It is difficult to think they should have done so; yet more difficult to suggest any other explanation. ['Battalia' was sometimes mistaken as a plural, which indeed it was originally, the word being derived through the Italian ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench

... monosyllables, and these monosyllables seem always to have been incapable of inflection, agglutination, or change of any kind. They are in reality root-ideas, and are capable of adapting themselves to their surroundings, and of playing each one such varied parts as noun, verb (transitive, neuter, or ...
— China and the Chinese • Herbert Allen Giles

... English had -es as the genitive singular ending; but by the close of the Middle English period all feminines formed their genitive singular in -es (or-s, Modern English 's) after the analogy of the Old English masculine and neuter nouns with es-genitives. The weak preterits in -ode have all been leveled under the ed-forms, and of the three hundred strong verbs in Old English more than two ...
— Anglo-Saxon Grammar and Exercise Book - with Inflections, Syntax, Selections for Reading, and Glossary • C. Alphonso Smith

... them express themselves more correctly than the ordinary peasant, others use the Gaelic idioms continually and substitute 'he' or 'she' for 'it,' as the neuter pronoun is not found ...
— The Aran Islands • John M. Synge

... was something strange about her looks. It is difficult to describe. It was not that she was no longer a young woman, but there seemed to be something almost sexless about her. It was as though her secondary sex characteristics were no longer feminine, but—for want of a better word—neuter. ...
— The Treasure-Train • Arthur B. Reeve

... /niggard:/ supply sparingly. In Sonnets, I, 12, occurs 'niggarding'. In Elizabethan English "almost any part of speech can be used as any other part of speech. Any noun, adjective, or neuter verb can be used as an ...
— The New Hudson Shakespeare: Julius Caesar • William Shakespeare

... when I'm with you I feel like a boy with his mother, safe from all the dreadful things that might happen to a child. Sometimes you seem like a sister, so really kind and so outwardly provoking. Often you are my comrade, and we are completely congenial, neuter entities. The thing is we have a satisfaction when we are together that we never could apart. There it is, Kate, the fact we can't get around. We're happier together than ...
— The Precipice • Elia Wilkinson Peattie

... and they were all prepared to acquiesce in any cause which the British Government might adopt for the sake of order. They would rather that it should adopt that of the Begum and the boy than that of Nuseer-od Dowlah; but in either case were resolved to remain neuter, and let the representative of the British ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman

... simple expression are but three cosmogonical personifications, three powers or forces of nature, these Gods, I say, are here found, according to Indian doctrines, entirely external to the true God of India, or Brahma in the neuter gender. Brahma is alone, unchangeable in the midst of creation: all emanates from him, he comprehends all, but he remains extraneous to all: he is Being and the negation of beings. Brahma is never worshipped; the indeterminate Being is never invoked; he is inaccessible to the ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI

... that mamma is a noun of the feminine gender and singular number; men is a noun masculine and plural; table is neuter ...
— A Week of Instruction and Amusement, • Mrs. Harley

... in general the pageantry of office (inania honoris) expected of the Praetor. Observe the use of the neuter plural of the adj. for the subst., of which, especially before a gen., T. is ...
— Germania and Agricola • Caius Cornelius Tacitus

... with your common gender," screamed Sal. "My grammar don't read so. It says Masculine, Feminine Neuter and Grundy gender, to which last but one thing in the world belongs, and that is the lady below with the cast iron back ...
— The English Orphans • Mary Jane Holmes

... of her actions was evidently limited by the doctor,—for the doctor's sake alone. Nor was Mr. Hoskins inclined to exceed those limits. He looked upon her as something abnormal,—a "crank" as remarkable in her way as her patron was in his, neuter of sex and vague of race, and he simply restricted his supervision to the bringing and taking of messages. She remained sole queen of the domain. A rare straggler from the main road, penetrating this seclusion, might have scarcely distinguished her from ...
— Mr. Jack Hamlin's Mediation and Other Stories • Bret Harte

... the horizon was clear. The first on the look-out were, of course, the smugglers; they, and those on board the revenue cutter, were the only two interested parties—the yacht was neuter. ...
— Peter Simple and The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2 • Frederick Marryat

... resented the sarcasms of the Queen, he was less the dupe of Madame de Verneuil than those about him imagined; he was fascinated, but not convinced; and it is probable that had Marie de Medicis at this moment sufficiently controlled her feelings to remain neuter, she might, for a time at least, have retained her truant husband under the spell of her own attractions. Such, however, was not the case; and between his suspicion of being deceived by his mistress, and his irritation at being openly taunted by his wife, the King, who shrank with morbid ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 1 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe

... upon that matter, Mr Easy, and it appears to me that the men must be permitted to act as they please, and that we must be neuter. I, as a lieutenant in his Majesty's service, cannot of course act, neither can Mr Gascoigne. You are not in the service, but I should recommend you to do the same. That the men have a right to resist, if possible, is admitted; ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Captain Frederick Marryat

... drive a man distracted. They asked it various questions—were delighted with its replies—called its attention to the chickens—and evidently labored under the impression that it understood. They addressed the baby uniformly in the neuter gender, and requested to know whether it was not their darling. To all which the baby replied with thoughtful stares, only occasionally condescending to laugh. The feet having been examined again—there is much ...
— The Last of the Foresters • John Esten Cooke

... Conestoga. Erie. Mohawk. Neuter. Nottoway. Oneida. Onondaga. Seneca. Tionontate. ...
— Indian Linguistic Families Of America, North Of Mexico • John Wesley Powell

... father is variously Latinised in the Latin Lives. The Irish lives call him Beoit, a name analysed in the Book of Leinster, p. 349, into Beo-n-Aed, which would mean something like "Living Fire." The -n- is inserted, according to a law of Old Irish accidence, because aed, "fire," is a neuter word. Thus arises the Latin form Beonnadus. By metathesis the name further becomes transformed to Beodan or Beoan. The Latharna were the people who dwelt around the site of the modern town of Larne, which preserves their name; Mag Molt ("the plain of wethers") is probably ...
— The Latin & Irish Lives of Ciaran - Translations Of Christian Literature. Series V. Lives Of - The Celtic Saints • Anonymous

... France, in case of the worst. What an attempt! Imperial Majesty has no money; Imperial Majesty remembers recent days rather, and his own last quarrel with France (on the Polish-Election score), in which you Sea-Powers cruelly stood neuter! One comfort, and pretty much one only, is left to a nearly bankrupt Imperial heart; that France does at any rate ratify Pragmatic Sanction, and instead of enemy to that inestimable Document has become friend,—if only she be well let alone. "Let well alone," says the sad ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... as to reveal the secret, and it enabled the Protestants to raise a formidable army in defence of their religion and liberties. But the Electors of Cologne and Brandenburg, and the Elector Palatine, resolved to remain neuter. Notwithstanding this secession, the war might have been ended at once, had the confederates attacked Charles while he lay at Ratisbon with very few troops, instead of wasting time by writing a manifesto, which he answered by putting the ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 3 of 8 • Various

... half as complete; and a person not thoroughly acquainted with the qualities and parts of this wonderful apparatus will prove a tormenting executioner, not a healing physician, to the sufferer. Be patient, milady, the physician at the bed of his patient is of the neuter gender—just ...
— Dr. Dumany's Wife • Mr Jkai

... general, in ancient times, in search of glory, landed his troops on the hostile coast, and then burnt all his ships: they must conquer, or die. You have, ladies, already embarked in this design; there is no remaining neuter now; your name and undertaking are in every mouth; you must press forward and justify your cause: and justified it shall be, if you persevere; it cannot be otherwise. The benevolence you contemplate is as superior to that already in operation, as the interest ...
— The Power of Faith - Exemplified In The Life And Writings Of The Late Mrs. Isabella Graham. • Isabella Graham

... learn very little. With the steady progress of Phi-oo in English, however, my ignorance will no doubt as steadily disappear. I am of opinion that, as with the ants and bees, there is a large majority of the members in this community of the neuter sex. Of course on earth in our cities there are now many who never live that life of parentage which is the natural life of man. Here, as with the ants, this thing has become a normal condition of the race, and the whole of such eplacement ...
— The First Men In The Moon • H. G. Wells

... These are mostly those which denote relationships and familiar animals, and there are in some cases, as in English, further words to denote the young of both sexes, or the neuter. ...
— A Handbook of the Cornish Language - chiefly in its latest stages with some account of its history and literature • Henry Jenner

... do ye boast of your free-will, and thereby ascribe your deeds to your own hearts? But ye are all saints while there is nothing to tempt ye. No, Faustus; I will remain neuter, and merely offer delights to his senses; for the Devil has no need to creep into ye when you are already ...
— Faustus - his Life, Death, and Doom • Friedrich Maximilian von Klinger

... Nations that rest neuter and at Peace with the World during a War with other Nations, have a Right to navigate freely on the Seas as they navigated before that War broke out, and to proceed to and enter the Port or Ports of any of the Belligerent Powers, with the consent ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine

... 'Verb neuter, not to care. Indicative mood, present tense. First person singular, I do not care; second person singular, thou dost not care; third person singular, she ...
— Hard Times • Charles Dickens*

... can noun substantive stand, Impose on my Owners, and save my own land; You call me masculine, feminine, neuter, or block, Be what will the gender, sirs, hic, ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole

... we turn to the Greek, we notice that in the first of the verses quoted the word all is in the neuter gender, and so does not necessarily apply to persons at all, and we are more likely to catch the true meaning of the words by reading it as follows: "Everything that the Father hath given Me shall come to Me"; and in the other passage a similar ...
— Memoranda Sacra • J. Rendel Harris

... me one day that the neuter larvae inhabit an invisible, neutral territory, something like a little island, which is beseiged on all sides by the good and evil spirits. The larvae cannot long hold out and are soon forced into one or the other ...
— La-bas • J. K. Huysmans

... true peace which derogateth not from the truth, we may not, we dare not, leave off to debate with them. Among the laws of Solon, there was one which pronounced him defamed and unhonest who, in a civil uproar among the citizens, sitteth still a looker-on and a neuter (Plut. in Vita. Solon); much more deserve they to be so accounted of who shun to meddle with any controversy which disquieted the church, whereas they should labour to win the adversaries of the truth, and, if they prove ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie

... affect and dominate an adversary's will both physically and psychologically. Physical dominance includes the ability to destroy, disarm, disrupt, neutralize, and to render impotent. Psychological dominance means the ability to destroy, defeat, and neuter the will of an adversary to resist; or convince the adversary to accept our terms and aims short of using force. The target is the adversary's will, perception, and understanding. The principal mechanism for ...
— Shock and Awe - Achieving Rapid Dominance • Harlan K. Ullman and James P. Wade

... Plato, the idea of God or mind is both personal and impersonal. Nor in ascribing, as appears to us, both these attributes to him, and in speaking of God both in the masculine and neuter gender, did he seem to himself inconsistent. For the difference between the personal and impersonal was not marked to him as to ourselves. We make a fundamental distinction between a thing and a person, ...
— Philebus • Plato

... one or two ways. For instance, a word which has become common to us is the neuter possessive pronoun "its." That word does not occur in the edition of 1611, and appears first in an edition in the printing of 1660. In place of it, in the edition of 1611, the more dignified personal pronoun "his" or ...
— The Greatest English Classic A Study of the King James Version of • Cleland Boyd McAfee

... have the genders feminine, masculine, and neuter as Latin does. There are, however, certain nouns which are feminine or masculine because of their meaning. Other nouns are common to both these genders. For things which do not have a proper gender vo is placed before masculine nouns and me before feminine; ...
— Diego Collado's Grammar of the Japanese Language • Diego Collado

... Mr. Marrapit's first occupancy of Herons' Holt, this man was a mighty amateur breeder of cats, and a rare army of cats possessed. Regal cats he had, queenly cats, imperial neuter cats; blue cats, grey cats, orange cats, and white cats—cats for which nothing was too good, upon which too much money could not be spent nor too much love be lavished. Latterly, with tremendous wrenchings of the heart, he had disbanded this galaxy of cats. Changes ...
— Once Aboard The Lugger • Arthur Stuart-Menteth Hutchinson

... great discredit be it spoken, the editors of Shakspeare (Second Part of Hen. IV., Act I. Sc. 1.) are at fault for an example. Mr. Halliwell gives one in his Dictionary of the passive participle, which see. In Shakspeare it occurs as a neuter verb: ...
— Notes and Queries, No. 181, April 16, 1853 • Various

... and rel. pronoun; Pawnee ka interrogative; Dak ka interrogative suffix and in compounds; Ger wer; Dak tu-we who int. and rel; Gk po; Min tape who, tapa or tako what. I E neuter base ku what; Dak ta-ku what rel. ...
— The Dakotan Languages, and Their Relations to Other Languages • Andrew Woods Williamson

... will take on before your eyes either masculine or feminine traits. Gender, in a broad sense, is universal, and nothing was created neuter. The Upper Missouri is decidedly female: an Amazon, to be sure, but nevertheless not a man. Beautiful, she is, alluring or terrible, but always womanlike. But when you strike the ragged curdling line of muddy water where the Yellowstone comes in, ...
— The River and I • John G. Neihardt

... which reigned in England at the time this young peer made his first entry into public life, rendered it almost impossible for him to stand neuter, and on whatever side he should declare himself, still there was danger. The world generally expected he would follow the steps of his father, who was one of the first English gentlemen who joined the prince of Orange, and continued firm to the Revolution principles, and consequently approved ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Vol. IV • Theophilus Cibber

... which a man should stand neuter[117], without engaging[118] his assent to one side or the other. Such a hovering faith as this, which refuses to settle upon any determination[119], is absolutely necessary in a mind that is careful ...
— The De Coverley Papers - From 'The Spectator' • Joseph Addison and Others

... greater scripturalness of episcopacy that turns the second generation of dissenting manufacturers in our busy Lancashire into churchmen? Certainly such conversions do no violence to the conscience of the proselyte, for he is intellectually indifferent, a spiritual neuter. ...
— On Compromise • John Morley

... Fear, refusing to discuss either in any terms or under any circumstances, but he also declined to speak of Ariel Tabor or of Joseph Louden; or of their affairs, singular or plural, masculine, feminine, or neuter, or in any declension. Not a word, committal or ...
— The Conquest of Canaan • Booth Tarkington

... all I could to prevent it, but the voice of numbers was against me, and of authority too, and, both together, they prevailed. You, I believe, stood neuter, or indeed, I may suppose, knew nothing ...
— Aurelian - or, Rome in the Third Century • William Ware

... he said, "you are so certain sure of the righteousness of your side in this quarrel that you cannot, for your life's sake, for your love's sake, consent to stand neuter and look on, ...
— The Lady of Loyalty House - A Novel • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... cita: That about the appointment. The neuter article lo, thus used instead of a word or phrase unexpressed, is equivalent to 'the affair,' 'the thing,' 'the fact,' ...
— Ms vale maa que fuerza • Manuel Tamayo y Baus

... is a neuter noun not personified, a writer should prefer of which to whose, unless euphony ...
— Practical Exercises in English • Huber Gray Buehler

... been, had I followed my real inclinations in joining the King's troops at Stirling, I was forced to take party with the adherents of the Pretender; for the country being all in arms, it was neither safe nor indeed possible for me to stand neuter. I should not, however, plead my being forced into that unnatural rebellion against his Majesty, King George, if I could not at the same time assure your Excellency, that I not only avoided acting offensively against his Majesty's ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... and divine, as evident to common sense as to conscience, decided the response of the Pope. He was moderate, tender, prudent; but he replied categorically to the requirements of the emperor. Pius VII wished to remain neuter, and not to drive from his states the English or the Russians; he did not admit the claim of the emperor to exercise over Rome a supreme protectorate. "The Pope does not recognize, and never has recognized, any power superior to himself. ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt

... schisma eradicetur," exclaims Sigismund, intent on having the Bohemian schism well dealt with—which he reckons to be of the feminine gender. To which a cardinal mildly remarking, "Domine, schisma est generis neutrius (schisma is neuter, your Majesty)," Sigismund loftily replies: "Ego sum Rex Romanus et super grammaticam (I am King of the Romans, and above Grammar)!" For which reason I call him in my note-books Sigismund Super Grammaticam, to distinguish him in the ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... as brief as a certain clause in one of the election laws of the State of Texas, which says: "The masculine gender shall include the feminine and neuter." ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various

... advantage over its enemies; and the timid, the doubtful, or indifferent, for the most part, determine in favour of whatever wears the appearance of established authority. The people, indeed, remained perfectly neuter; but the Jacobins, the Committees of the Sections, and their dependents, might have composed a force more than sufficient to oppose the few guards which surrounded the National Palace, had not the publication of this summary outlawry ...
— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady

... hecho buena; see Vocabulary under hacer. The feminine la is used in a number of idioms in a true neuter sense; at least, no obvious noun can be supplied. Such idioms are: habrselas con 'to deal with'; me la pagars 'you shall pay for it'; pegrsela 'to deceive'; correrla 'to go on ...
— Heath's Modern Language Series: Mariucha • Benito Perez Galdos

... to have discovered in "Estrades' Memoirs" the real occasion of Richelieu's conduct. In 1639 the French and Dutch proposed dividing the Low Country provinces; England was to stand neuter. Charles replied to D'Estrades, that his army and fleet should instantly sail to prevent these projected conquests. From that moment the intolerant ambition of Richelieu swelled the venom of his heart, and he eagerly seized on the first opportunity ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. II (of 3) - Edited, With Memoir And Notes, By His Son, The Earl Of Beaconsfield • Isaac D'Israeli

... desire, Lay wrapt in Smoke, half Cole, half Dido, Too late repenting Crime Libido, Monsieur AEneas went his waies; For which I con him little praise, To leave a Lady, not i'th'Mire, But which was worser, in the Fire. He Neuter-like, had no great aim, To kindle or put out the flame. He had what he would have, the Wind; More than ten Dido's to his mind. The merry gale was all in Poop, Which made the ...
— The Lives of the Most Famous English Poets (1687) • William Winstanley

... admitted, we can hardly avoid extending the same conclusion to their mutual infertility. Sterility moreover has been acquired through natural selection for other and widely different purposes, as with neuter insects in reference to their social economy. In the case of plants, the flowers on the circumference of the truss in the guelder-rose (Viburnum opulus) and those on the summit of the spike in the feather-hyacinth (Muscari comosum) have been rendered conspicuous, and apparently in consequence ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Volume II (of 2) • Charles Darwin

... never very sure of herself under Rebecca's fire; "but though we often speak of a baby, a chicken, or a kitten as 'it,' they are really masculine or feminine gender, not neuter." ...
— The Flag-raising • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... the neuter plural calls attention rather to the Characteristics than to the Personality.—Through this whole passage we cannot too distinctly remember that it occurs in the Scriptures, and in the writings of one who was ...
— Philippian Studies - Lessons in Faith and Love from St. Paul's Epistle to the Philippians • Handley C. G. Moule

... as it were, without attributes. The sun is called the Self of all that moves and rests (Rv. I. 115, 1), and still more frequently self becomes a mere pronoun. But Atman remained always free from mythe and worship, differing in this from the Brahman (neuter), who has his temples in India even now, and is worshipped as Brahman (masculine), together with Vishnu and Siva, and other popular gods. The idea of the Atman or Self, like a pure crystal, was too transparent for poetry, and therefore was ...
— Chips From A German Workshop - Volume I - Essays on the Science of Religion • Friedrich Max Mueller

... opinion of the word, I hold it is to be taken neither in the sense of the neuter nor of the passive, but of the active, inasmuch as the word "naphal" is often used in the sense of the active, though it does not belong to the third conjugation, in which almost all transitive verbs are found. Thus in Joshua ...
— Commentary on Genesis, Vol. II - Luther on Sin and the Flood • Martin Luther

... of it. "I grieve", he says, "more than I ought for a mere slave". Just as one might now apologise for making too much fuss about a favourite dog; for the slave was looked upon in scarcely a higher light in civilised Rome. They spoke of him in the neuter gender, as a chattel; and it was gravely discussed, in case of danger in a storm at sea, which it would be right first to cast overboard to lighten the ship, a valuable horse or an indifferent slave. Hortensius, the rival advocate who has been mentioned, ...
— Cicero - Ancient Classics for English Readers • Rev. W. Lucas Collins

... itself the mystery of reproduction. It forms the basis of the vegetable and the animal kingdoms. It is seen in bone and muscle and fibrous tissue, and protoplasm may be said to contain within its cells the principles of both sexes. It is not sexless, but bi-sexual; not neuter but masculine-feminine. Every form of life has sex, and in some rare instances both sexes are present in one form. This does not mean that there is another phase of sex unclassified, but rather it proves the union in one Whole Entity ...
— Sex=The Unknown Quantity - The Spiritual Function of Sex • Ali Nomad

... of honour are not cut so short; they may give themselves a little rein, and relax a little without being faulty: there lies on the frontier some space free, indifferent, and neuter. He that has beaten and pursued her into her fort is a strange fellow if he be not satisfied with his fortune: the price of the conquest is considered by the difficulty. Would you know what impression your service and merit have made ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne

... you. Small 'ouse, by the river. Kep' by Miss Horkings, now her father's kicked. Female party." This was due to a vague habit of the speaker's mind, which divided the opposite sex into two genders, feminine and neuter; the latter including all those samples, unfortunate enough—or fortunate enough, according as one looks at it—to present no attractions to masculine impulses. Micky would never have described his great-aunt as a female party. She was, though worthy, neuter ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan

... -i]. It is, then, an adjective of intransitive signification. Now it is true that, by means of the feminine termination, adjectives are changed into abstract nouns, but never into such as indicate an action; but always into such only for which, in Latin and Greek, the neuter of the adjective might be used. This, however, is here inadmissible. 2. To this must be added the constant use; as in Is. xxxvii. 31, 32: "And that which has escaped ([Hebrew: pliTt]) of the house of Judah, the remnant, ...
— Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions, v. 1 • Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg

... diabolical Envy, and its brother Malice [Footnote: This fair and elegant prefacer (sic) has resolved that Malice should be of the masculine gender: I believe it is both masculine and feminine, and I heartily wish it were neuter.] with all their accursed company, sly whispering, cruel back-biting, spiteful detraction, and the rest of that hideous crew, which, I hope, are very falsely said to attend the Tea-table, being more apt to think, they frequent those public places, where virtuous women never come. Let ...
— Letters of the Right Honourable Lady M—y W—y M—e • Lady Mary Wortley Montague

... the other, Piccinists. Their inveteracy was great, somewhat like that which, forty years before, existed between the Molinists and Jansenists: and few persons, if any, I believe, remained neuter. Victory seems to have crowned the former party. Indeed the music of GLUCK possesses a melody which is wonderfully energetic and striking. PICCINI is skilful and brilliant in his harmony, as well as sweet and varied in his composition; but this style of beauty has been thought to be ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon

... knowledge of the two languages, that, when the imitation of the Greek, noticed by Quintilian, has reference merely to the word [Greek: philei], amat, they should think of extending it to the dependence of a singular verb on a neuter plural? With truth, indeed, though with much simplicity, does Gerlach observe, that you will in vain seek for instances of this mode of expression in other writers." Kritzius. Dietsch agrees with Kritzius; and there will, I hope, be no further ...
— Conspiracy of Catiline and The Jurgurthine War • Sallust

... could be done in Oxford—and well acted, would be more unbecoming the gravity of our collected wisdom, or more derogatory to the dignity of our noble "theatre," than the squalling of Italian singers, masculine, feminine, and neuter—is a question which, when I take my M.A., I shall certainly propose in convocation. Thus much I am sure of, if a classical play-bill were duly announced for the next grand commemoration, it would "draw" almost as well as the Duke; the dresses might be quite as showy, the action hardly less ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 54, No. 338, December 1843 • Various

... Uncle Tim; he was small, very small—not in stature, for he was a six-footer, but small in mind and small in heart; his soul was no bigger than a flea's. "Zeb, my boy," says he to me one day, "always be neuter in elections. You can't get nothing by them but ill-will. Dear, dear! I wish I had never voted. I never did but oncest, and, dear, dear! I wish I had let that alone. There was an army doctor oncest, Zeb, lived right opposite ...
— Humour of the North • Lawrence J. Burpee

... being to the synthesis or "embrace" of the two opposed forces of expansion and contraction. Nothing whatever exists in a single entity but in virtue of its being thesis, antithesis, and synthesis and in humanity and natural life this takes the form of sex, the masculine, the feminine, and the neuter, or third, forgotten sex spoken of by Plato, which is not the absence of the life of sex, but its fulfilment and power, as the electric fire is the fulfilment and power of positive ...
— Mysticism in English Literature • Caroline F. E. Spurgeon

... the personal enemy of the great duke; nor could time, or death, or his own retreat to a monastery, extort a feeling of sympathy or forgiveness. Ducas is inclined to praise and pity the martyr; Chalcondyles is neuter, but we are indebted to him for the hint ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon

... though my dictionary translates it. Backfisch, m. fried fish; young girl; says the dictionary. In Germany a woman does not arrive at her own gender till she marries and becomes somebody's Frau. Woman in general, girl, and miss are neuter; and the fried-fish girl is masculine. But if one little versed in German wished to tell you that he liked a fried sole, and said Ich liebe einen Backfisch, it might lead to misunderstandings. The origin of the word in this application is dubious. Some say it means fish that are baked ...
— Home Life in Germany • Mrs. Alfred Sidgwick

... high. Himself liberated from the several kinds of taste and scent, and sound and touch and form, He is incapable of being grasped by the senses, unmanifest, without colour, the One, and He has created the five kinds of objects[662] for His creatures. He is neither female, nor male, nor of the neuter sex. He is neither existent, nor non-existent, nor existent-nonexistent.[663] Only those that are acquainted with Brahma behold Him. ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 3 - Books 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 • Unknown

... Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.' Who are to be baptized? Now, notice, if I may venture upon being slightly technical for a moment, that the word 'nations' in the preceding clause is a neuter one, and that the word for 'them' in this clause is a masculine, which seems to me fairly to imply that the command 'baptizing them' does not refer to 'all nations,' but to the disciples latent among them, and to be drawn from them. Surely, surely ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren

... predominatingly, Sex is predicated of Humanity, where it is developed in its highest perfection; and in the same degree Gender in Grammar is, in predominance, confined to the Proper Nouns Substantive. Masculine and Feminine are the only Proper Genders. Neuter Gender means of neither Gender, and includes the great mass of Common Nouns, or the Thing World, ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... Stormonth, p. 234. Lentibulariaceae, neuter, plural. (Lenticula, the shape of a lentil; from lens, a lentil.) The Butterwort family, an order of plants so named from the lenticular shape of the air-bladders on the branches of utricularia, one of the genera. (But ...
— Proserpina, Volume 2 - Studies Of Wayside Flowers • John Ruskin

... governor and himself there was very little intercourse. On the other hand, the kindest feelings towards him were evinced by Chief-justice Jay, who was a most amiable man. It was his wish, therefore, as far as practicable, consistent with his principles, to remain neuter. He had never been an electioneering character, and with the people he wished to leave the pending question, without the exercise of any influence he ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis

... in having continually unforeseen accidents in his favor, as Prince Eugene was unlucky to have them against him to thwart and cross the execution of the best-combined projects, which extorted admiration, and seemed to have only need of Fortune's standing neuter to be successful. The fate of an army,—can it depend upon the personal good fortune of the General who commands it? Cardinal Mazarin seemed to be of this opinion, since he never failed to ask those who recommended persons to him to head expeditions, ...
— The Campaign of 1760 in Canada - A Narrative Attributed to Chevalier Johnstone • Chevalier Johnstone

... schism of Antioch must have ended, had not his abettors kept open the breach by choosing Evagrius in his room; though it does not appear that he had one bishop in communion with him, Egypt and the West being now neuter, and the East all holding communion with Flavian. Evagrius dying in 395, the Eustathians, though now without a pastor, still continued their separate meetings, and kept up the schism several years longer. St. ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... frequent use of the word engro. This word affixed to a noun or verb turns it into something figurative, by which they designate, seldom very appropriately, some object for which they have no positive name. Engro properly means a fellow, and engri, which is the feminine or neuter modification, a thing. When the noun or verb terminates in a vowel, engro is turned into mengro, and engri into mengri. I have already shown how, by affixing engro to kaun, the Gypsies have invented a word to express a hare. In like ...
— Romano Lavo-Lil - Title: Romany Dictionary - Title: Gypsy Dictionary • George Borrow

... a neuter, she a foe. Thy love we doubt; her heart too well we know. [Aside. What suitors are without? let them ...
— A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. VII (4th edition) • Various

... practical purposes, I give numerals, personal, possessive, and demonstrative pronouns, the mode of qualifying nouns, e.g., some languages interpose a monosyllable between the substantive and adjective, others do not. The words used (as it is called) as prepositions and adverbs, the mode of changing a neuter verb into a transitive or causative verb, usually by a word prefixed, which means do or make, e.g., die, ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge

... Revolution would far transcend the prescribed limits of this sketch. The principles of civil and religious freedom which he received in his parental, as well as in his collegiate training, would not allow him to remain neuter or indifferent, when a cruel, invading foe was trampling on the just and dearest rights of ...
— Sketches of Western North Carolina, Historical and Biographical • C. L. Hunter

... nevertheless, persons of intellectual ability. Let them be the school teachers. This solution is, however, not acceptable. Many women of the character described undoubtedly exist, but they are better placed in some other occupation. It is wholly undesirable that children should be reared under a neuter influence, which is probably ...
— Applied Eugenics • Paul Popenoe and Roswell Hill Johnson

... nourisheth the birds that are on the trees. Hail to Thee, O Author of the totality of all forms. The ONE who art alone, yet numberless through Thy extended arms: watching over all humanity when it sleeps, seeking the good of Its creatures."[87] I have used the neuter It and not He, the Egyptian idea of the highest deity was, that it was androgenic not masculine. Although it would seem that this Hymn, of which I have cited but a small portion, applied to Ammon-Ra, yet it expressly says, that: Its name is also ...
— Scarabs • Isaac Myer

... double-sexed creatures. Harvey, Bartholinus, Paullini, Schenck, Wolff, Wrisberg, Zacchias, Marcellus Donatus, Haller, Hufeland, de Graff, and many others discuss hermaphroditism. Many classifications have been given, as, e.g., real and apparent; masculine, feminine, or neuter; horizontal and vertical; unilateral and bilateral, etc. The anomaly in most cases consists of a malformation of the external genitalia. A prolonged clitoris, prolapsed ovaries, grossness of figure, and hirsute appearance have been accountable for many supposed ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould

... language three genders, masculine, feminine and neuter. The masculine was formed by adding the words chireu, curi, or curireu, to the noun; the feminine by the suffixes chireuda and curireuda. There were many words which were used unaltered for either gender. In the case of animals, the additional words ...
— Across Unknown South America • Arnold Henry Savage Landor

... the giraffe; the otter-like polecat (Mustela vison); the flying habit of the bat; the penguin and the logger-headed duck; flying fish; the whale-like habit of the bear; the woodpecker; diving petrels; the eye; the swimming bladder; Cirripedes; neuter ...
— The Foundations of the Origin of Species - Two Essays written in 1842 and 1844 • Charles Darwin

... those knights in whom the true spirit of chivalry found rest. Pre-eminent amongst these was the noble Earl of Gloucester. His duty to his sovereign urged him to take the field; his attachment for the Bruce would have held him neuter, for the ties that bound brothers in arms were of no common or wavering nature. Brothers in blood had frequently found themselves opposed horse to horse, and lance to lance, on the same field, and no scruples of conscience, no pleadings of affection, had power to avert the unnatural ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar

... that co-operation; that Russia had not contributed in any shape to the common cause; that Denmark and Sweden had coalesced to defend themselves against any attempt to force them into it; that Venice and Switzerland remained neuter; that Sardinia was subsidized merely to act on the defensive; and that Great Britain was loaded with a subsidy which ought properly to be borne by Prussia; and, finally, that the time was now come when peace might be secured on a permanent basis, and that it was the duty of His ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham

... confesse, Because my power is weake, and all ill left: But if I could, by him that gaue me life, I would attach you all, and make you stoope Vnto the Soueraigne Mercy of the King. But since I cannot, be it knowne to you, I doe remaine as Neuter. So fare you well, Vnlesse you please to enter in the Castle, And there repose you ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... thinks that the verb "endeavour" takes a middle voice form in the collect for the second Sunday after Easter, in the preface to the Confirmation Service, and in the Form of Ordering of Priests: but in these instances is it any thing more than the verb neuter, implying that we should endeavour ourselves to ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 18. Saturday, March 2, 1850 • Various

... thin fingers and arms, like human attachments to typewriting machines. There was a something not in the least mannish, but still not appealingly womanly, in these self-reliant, quiet business beings. Was it a sort of neuter gender, a sexless being that was there in course of development? Somehow, they did not strike one as beings who would bear and suckle and nurse children. Was this severe struggle and necessity of existence to eliminate the supreme joy of motherhood ...
— Impressions of a War Correspondent • George Lynch

... the terminations of the Latin family names will be, for the most part, of the masculine, {184} feminine, and neuter forms, us, a, um, with these following ...
— Proserpina, Volume 1 - Studies Of Wayside Flowers • John Ruskin

... class of young men who nibble away an income of fifteen hundred francs with the same air with which their prototypes devour two hundred thousand francs a year in Paris. These are beings of the great neuter species: impotent men, parasites, cyphers, who have a little land, a little folly, a little wit; who would be rustics in a drawing-room, and who think themselves gentlemen in the dram-shop; who say, "My fields, my peasants, my woods"; who hiss actresses at the theatre to prove that they are ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo

... whether any part of any determinate quantity be a fourth, or a fifth, or a sixth, or a moiety of the whole; or whether it be of equal length with any other part, or double its length, or but one half, is a matter merely indifferent to the mind; it stands neuter in the question: and it is from this absolute indifference and tranquillity of the mind, that mathematical speculations derive some of their most considerable advantages; because there is nothing to interest the imagination; ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... spoken of, these languages are totally unlike our own in determining the gender of words. For instance: in Latin, hortus (garden) is masculine, mensa (table) is feminine, corpus (body) is neuter; in German, das Messer (knife) is neuter, der Tisch (table) is masculine, die Gabel (fork) ...
— An English Grammar • W. M. Baskervill and J. W. Sewell

... most precious ornament, should, in reward of his services, be transferred to that of England.[*] Impatient also of acquiring that distinction in Europe, to which his power and opulence entitled him, he could not long remain neuter amidst the noise of arms; and the natural enmity of the English against France, as well as their ancient claims upon that kingdom, led Henry to join that alliance which the pope, Spain, and Venice had formed ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. - From Henry VII. to Mary • David Hume

... of our secret admiration, though we knew no reason for it. Did it lie in his secretly simple habits, his monastic regularity, his hermit-like frugality, his idiotically mechanical labor, allowing his mind to remain neuter or to work on his own lines, seeming to us to hint at an expectation of some stroke of good luck, or at some foregone conclusion as to ...
— Z. Marcas • Honore de Balzac

... Lamarck can be ignored or passed over in a couple of sentences. I only find Lamarck's name twice in the 1859 edition of the 'Origin,' once on p. 242, where Mr. Darwin writes: "I am surprised that no one has advanced this demonstrative case of neuter insects, against the well-known doctrine of Lamarck;" and again, p. 427, where Lamarck is stated to have been the first to call attention to the "very important distinction between real affinities and analogical or adaptive resemblances." ...
— Evolution, Old & New - Or, the Theories of Buffon, Dr. Erasmus Darwin and Lamarck, - as compared with that of Charles Darwin • Samuel Butler

... thought, the idea, the logos of dog. Can there be a thought without a thinker? Did the ideas in nature, the millions of objects which make up our knowledge, fall from the clouds? Did they make themselves or did nature make them? Who, then, is nature? Is it a masculine, feminine, or neuter? If nature can choose, then it can also think and produce. But can it? No, nature is a word, very useful for certain purposes; but empty, intangible, and incomprehensible. Nature is an abstraction, as much as dog or tree, but far more ...
— The Silesian Horseherd - Questions of the Hour • Friedrich Max Mueller

... the Quakers make the following observations:—The word "this" does not belong to the word "bread," that is, it does not mean that this bread is my body. For the word "bread" in the original Greek is of the masculine, and the word "this" is of the neuter gender. But it alludes to the action of the breaking of the bread, from which the following new meaning will result. "This breaking of the bread, which you now see me perform, is a symbol or representation of the ...
— A Portraiture of Quakerism, Volume II (of 3) • Thomas Clarkson

... themselves (to whatever class they may belong) are either masculines, feminines, or intermediates (neuter). All ending in N, P, S, or in the two compounds of this last, PS and X, are masculines. All ending in the invariably long vowels, H and O, and in A among the vowels that may be long, are feminines. So that there is an equal number of masculine and feminine terminations, as PS and X ...
— The Poetics • Aristotle

... did not care for at this time. He would talk to her amiably when he met her at the Opera; but, if she invited him to dinner, he invented an excuse, if possible, for not going. "Don't speak to me," he would say, "of this writer of the neuter gender. Nature ought to have given her more breeches ...
— Balzac • Frederick Lawton

... materially dependent position, and compelled to look upon marriage as a means of support: moreover, as a divorced wife, she finds herself socially in no enviable situation: unless special reasons render intercourse with her desirable, she is considered and treated by society as a neuter, so to speak. When, despite all this, most actions for divorce proceed from wives, the circumstance is an evidence of the heavy moral torture that they lie under. In France, even before the new divorce law came into effect ...
— Woman under socialism • August Bebel

... This substantival use of a neuter adjective is confined in classical Latin to the nominative ...
— Selections from Erasmus - Principally from his Epistles • Erasmus Roterodamus

... form Compound Neuter Verbs, the verb dan, I go, is frequently used, as bahtunan, I melt (active); bahtudaan, I melt, or am melting, the neuter, barnan, I soften; baricdaan, I go on to soften; zicnan, I break; ziccdaan, I break (neuter); the perfect ...
— Grammatical Sketch of the Heve Language - Shea's Library Of American Linguistics. Volume III. • Buckingham Smith

... "to affirm nothing; on the contrary, you sceptics have two conclusions, though in a negative form, for every body else's one,—together with the pleasant addition, that they are contraries to one another; and as Pascal said that the man who attempted to be neuter between the sceptic and dogmatist was a sceptic par excellence, so the genuine sceptic may be called ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers

... this effect: "That unless all the people of Kasson would embrace the Mahomedan religion, and evince their conversion by saying eleven public prayers, he (the King of Foota Torra) could not possibly stand neuter in the present contest, but would certainly join his arms to those of Kajaaga." A message of this nature, from so powerful a prince, could not fail to create great alarm; and the inhabitants of Teesee, after a long consultation, agreed to conform to his good pleasure, humiliating as it was ...
— Life and Travels of Mungo Park in Central Africa • Mungo Park

... etc.; this obscure passage was, I think, entirely misunderstood by Brasseur. The word [c,]apal is derived from the neuter form [c,]ape of the active tin [c,]apih, I shut up or enclose, and means "that which is shut up," lo cerrado, and [c,]apibal, the active form in the next line, means "that which shuts up," i. e., gates or doors. It will be remembered ...
— The Annals of the Cakchiquels • Daniel G. Brinton

... in such gerunds and gerandives, see Zumpt, S 167. [38] Auxerat. He had increased both by the above-mentioned qualities—namely, his poverty by extravagance, and the consciousness of guilt by the crimes he committed. The neuter plural quae, referring to two feminine substantives denoting abstract ideas, is not very common, though quite justifiable. Zumpt, S 377. [39] Respecting the infinitive after hortari, instead of ...
— De Bello Catilinario et Jugurthino • Caius Sallustii Crispi (Sallustius)

... the poor diabolic writer's head as if it had been a tennis-ball. Coleridge, the yet unknown criminal, absolutely perspired and fumed in pleading for the defendant; the company demurred; the orator grew urgent; wits began to smoke the case, as active verbs; the advocate to smoke, as a neuter verb; the "fun grew fast and furious;" until at length delinquent arose, burning tears in his eyes, and confessed to an audience, (now bursting with stifled laughter, but whom he supposed to be bursting with fiery indignation,) "Lo! I am he ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 57, No. 351, January 1845 • Various

... Where to Plant What, may become for a moment, Where to Plant Shrubbery; and the response of the free-line garden will be, of course, "Remember, concerning each separate shrub, that he or she—or it, if you really prefer the neuter—is your guest, and plant him or her or it where it will best enjoy itself, while promoting the whole company's joy." Before it has arrived in the garden, therefore, learn—and carefully consider—its likes and dislikes, habits, manners and accomplishments and its friendly ...
— The Amateur Garden • George W. Cable

... inclusive (of personal pronouns, including the person addressed). interj., interjection. interr., interrogative. metath., metathesis. n., noun. na, marks a noun as taking the suffixed pronoun in the third singular only. neg., negative. neut., neuter. obj., object. part., particle. partic., participle. pers., person, personal. pl., plural. poss., possessive. pr., pronoun. pref., prefix. prep., preposition. S, Sa'a language. See Sa'a and Ulawa dictionary. sing., singular. sub., subject. suff., ...
— Grammar and Vocabulary of the Lau Language • Walter G. Ivens

... proposed to his own father, who, as hath been already observed, stood always neuter in everything that concerned his eldest son; and as for Mrs. Pickle, she had never heard his name mentioned since his departure with any degree of temper or tranquility, except when her husband informed ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett

... decent, communistic femino-masculine honor demands that I refrain from any manoeuvers in his direction to attract his thoughts and attention to the feminine me. I can only meet him on the ordinary grounds of fellowship. And I suppose the glad-to-see him coming up the street was of the neuter gender, but it ...
— The Tinder-Box • Maria Thompson Daviess

... neuter—will that satisfy you? You shall have a clear stage and no favor, which, if you be a man ...
— The Emigrants Of Ahadarra - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton

... head as if it had been a tennis-ball. Coleridge, the yet unknown criminal, absolutely perspired and fumed in pleading for the defendant; the company demurred; the orator grew urgent; wits began to smoke the case, as active verbs; the advocate to smoke, as a neuter verb; the 'fun grew fast and furious;' until at length delinquent arose, burning tears in his eyes, and confessed to an audience, (now bursting with stifled laughter, but whom he supposed to be bursting with fiery indignation,) 'Lo! I am he that ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey

... Negroes, who had remained neuter in the first mutiny, and some of whom had even ranged themselves on our side,[26] formed a plot to throw us all into the sea, hoping to execute their design by falling on us by surprise. These wretches suffered themselves to be persuaded by the negroes, who assured them that the coast was ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to Senegal in 1816 • J. B. Henry Savigny and Alexander Correard

... commerce of the subjects or citizens of the party remaining neuter with the belligerent powers ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume VI (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various

... t y a m, as a neuter, is often used as an abstract, and is then rightly translated by truth. But it also means that which is, the true, the real; and there are several passages in the Rig-Veda where, instead of truth, I think we ought simply to translate s a t y a m by the true, ...
— India: What can it teach us? - A Course of Lectures Delivered before the University Of Cambridge • F. Max Mueller

... Article, used definitely both in the masculine and neuter genders, viz. Owh, the, m.; Ewh, ...
— Sketch of Grammar of the Chippeway Languages - To Which is Added a Vocabulary of some of the Most Common Words • John Summerfield



Words linked to "Neuter" :   fix, sterilize, defeminise, sterilise, unsex, desex, feminine, castrate, gender, defeminize, spay, grammatical gender, desexualise



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