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Webster's Dictionary (1865)

Death, n.

noun

(dĕth), n. [A-S. death, L. Ger. & D. dood, Sw. & Dan. dōd, Icel. dauði, Goth. dauthus, Ger. tod. See DEAD and DIE.] 1. That state of a being, animal or vegetable, but more particularly of an animal, in which there is total and permanent cessation of all the vital functions, when the organs have not only ceased to act, but have lost the susceptibility of renewed action; cessation of life; extinction of bodily life; decease; demise; departure; dissolution; exit. Seeing that death, a necessary end, Will come when it will come. Shak.

  1. Total privation or loss; extinction; as, the death of memory.
  2. Mode or manner of dying. “A death which I abhor.” Shak.
  3. Cause, agent, or instrument of loss of life. “Swiftly flies the feathered death.” Dryden.
  4. A skeleton, as the symbol of death; loss of life personified; as, Death, the king of terrors.

Death! great proprietor of all. Young.

  1. Danger of death. “In deaths oft.” 2 Cor. xi. 23.
  2. The act of unlawfully taking life; murder.

Not to suffer a man of death to live. Bacon. Civil death, the separation of a man from civil society, or from the enjoyment of civil rights, as by banishment, abjuration of the realm, entering into a monastery, &c. Blackstone.—Death’s-door, a near approach to death; the gates of death.—Spiritual death (Scripture), the corruption and perversion of the soul by sin, with the loss of the favor of God.—To be the death of, to be the cause of death to; to make die. “It was one who should be the death of both his parents.” Milton. Syn.—DEATH, DECEASE, DEMISE, DEPARTURE, RELEASE. Death applies to the termination of every form of existence, both animal and vegetable; the other words only to the human race. Decease is the term used in law for the removal of a human being out of life in the ordinary course of nature. Demise was formerly confined to the decease of princes, but is now sometimes used of distinguished men in general; as, the demise of Mr. Pitt. Departure and release are peculiarly terms of Christian affection and hope. A violent death is not usually called a decease. Departure implies a friendly taking leave of life. Release implies a deliverance from a life of suffering or sorrow.