Emily Dickinson Lexicon

FORM'I-DA-BLE, a. [L. formidabilis, from formido, fear.]

Exciting fear or apprehension; impressing dread; adapted to excite fear and deter from approach, encounter or undertaking. It expresses less than terrible, terrific, tremendous, horrible, and frightful. They seemed to fear the formidable sight. Dryden. I swell my preface into a volume, and make it formidable, when you see so many pages behind. Dryden.

FORM'I-DA-BLE-NESS, n.

The quality of being formidable, or adapted to excite dread.

FORM'I-DA-BLY, adv.

In a manner to impress fear.

FORM'LESS, a. [from form.]

Shapeless; without a determinate form; wanting regularity of shape. Shak.

FORM'U-LA, or FORM'ULE, n. [L.]

1. A prescribed form; a rule or model.
2. In medicine, a prescription.
3. In church affairs, a confession of faith. Encyc. In mathematics, a general expression for resolving certain cases or problems. Cyc.

FORM'U-LA-RY, a.

Stated; prescribed; ritual. Johnson.

FORM'U-LA-RY, n. [Fr. formulaire, from L. formula.]

1. A book containing stated and prescribed forms, as of oaths, declarations, prayers and the like; a book of precedents. Encyc.
2. Prescribed form.

FORN'I-CATE, or FORN'I-CA-TED, a. [L. fornicatus, from fornix, an arch.]

Arched; vaulted like an oven or furnace. Encyc.

FORN'I-CATE, v.i. [L. fornicor, from fornix, a brothel.]

To commit lewdness, as an unmarried man or woman, or as a married man with an unmarried woman. If a brahmin fornicate with a Nayr woman, he shall not thereby lose his cast. As. Researches.

FORN-I-CA'TION, n. [L. fornicatio.]

1. The incontinence or lewdness of unmarried persons, male or female; also, the criminal conversation of a married man with an unmarried woman. Laws of Connecticut.
2. Adultery. Matth. v.
3. Incest. 1 Cor. v.
4. Idolatry; a forsaking of the true God, and worshiping of idols. 2 Chron. xxi. Rev. xix.
5. An arching; the forming of a vault.

FORN'I-CA-TOR, n.

1. An unmarried person, male or female, who has criminal conversation with the other sex; also, a married man who has sexual commerce with an unmarried woman. [See Adultery.]
2. A lewd person.
3. An idolater.

FORN'I-CA-TRESS, n.

An unmarried female guilty of lewdness. Shak.

FOR'PASS, v.i.

To go by; to pass unnoticed. [Obs.] Spenser.

FOR-PINE, v.i.

To pine or waste away. [Obs.] Spenser.

FOR-RAY, n.

The act of ravaging. [Obs.]

FOR-RAY, v.t.

To ravage. [Obs.] [Qu. forage.] Spenser.

FOR-SAKE, v.t. [pret. forsook; pp. forsaken. Sax. forsacan, forsæcan; for, a negative, and secan, to seek. See Seek. Sw. försaka, Dan. forsager, G. versagen, D. verzaaken, to deny, to renounce. See Seek and Say.]

1. To quit or leave entirely; to desert; to abandon; to depart from. Friends and flatterers forsake us in adversity. Forsake the foolish, and live. Prov. ix.
2. To abandon; to renounce; to reject. If his children forsake my law, and walk not in my judgments. Ps. lxxxix. Cease from anger, and forsake wrath- Ps. assail.
3. To leave; to withdraw from; to fail. In anger, the color forsakes the cheeks. In severe trials, let not fortitude forsake you.
4. In Scripture, God forsakes his people, when he withdraws his aid, or the light of his countenance. Brown.

FOR-SAK-EN, pp.

Deserted; left; abandoned.

FOR-SAK-ER, n.

One that forsakes or deserts.

FOR-SAK-ING, n.

The act of deserting; dereliction.

FOR-SAK-ING, ppr.

Leaving or deserting.

FOR-SAY, v.t.

To forbid; to renounce. [Obs.] Spenser.

FOR-SLACK', v.t.

To delay. [Obs.] Spenser.

FOR-SOOTH', adv. [Sax. forsothe; for and soth, true.]

In truth; in fact; certainly; very well. A fit man, forsooth, to govern a realm. Hayward. [It is generally used in an ironical or contemptuous sense.]

FORS'TER, n.

A forester. [Obs.] Chaucer.