So-lū'tion, n.
n. [Lat. solutio, from solvere, solutum, to loosen, dissolve; Fr. solution, Pr. solutio, Sp. solucion, It. soluzione.]
Sense 1. The act of separating the parts of any body; disruption; breach.
In all bodies there is an appetite of union and evitation of solution of continuity. Bacon.
Sense 2. The disentanglement of any intricate problem or question; — used especially in mathematics, either of the process of solving an equation or problem, or of the result of the process.
Sense 3. The state of being solved or disintegrated; resolution; disintegration.
It is unquestionably an enterprise of more promise to assail the nations in their hour of faintness and solution, than at a time when magnificent and seductive systems of worship were at their height of energy and splendor. L. Taylor.
☞ This word is not used, in chemistry or mineralogy, for the melting of bodies by the heat of fire.
Sense 4. The action of an attraction between one or more solids and a fluid when brought in contact, by which the former become themselves fluid, and are diffused through the latter without other change or loss of properties; the state of a body as thus diffused.
☞ When this attraction is so completely satisfied that no more of the solid will be dissolved, the fluid is said to be saturated with it. Solution may be regarded as a form of molecular attraction, allied to that of adhesion, diffusion, and osmosis.
Sense 5. The product of the action above described; the preparation made by dissolving a solid in a liquid; as, a solution of morphine.
Sense 6. Release; deliverance; discharge. [Obs.]
Sense 7. (Law.) Release from an obligation; especially, release from a debt by payment.
Sense 8. (Med.) (a.) The termination of a disease; sometimes, a termination accompanied by critical signs. (b.) A crisis. Dunglison.
Solution of continuity, the separation of connection, or of connected substances or parts; — applied, in surgery, to a fracture, laceration, and the like. “As in the natural body a wound, or solution of continuity, is worse than a corrupt humor, so in the spiritual.” Bacon.