Emily Dickinson Lexicon

GRACE'CUP, n.

The cup or health drank after grace. Prior.

GRAC'ED, pp.

1. Adorned; embellished; exalted; dignified; honored.
2. adj. Beautiful; graceful. [Not in use.] Sidney.
3. Virtuous; regular; chaste. [Not in use.] Shak.

GRACE'FUL, a.

Beautiful with dignity; elegant; agreeable in appearance, with an expression of dignity or elevation of mind or manner; used particularly of motion, looks and speech; as, a graceful walk; a graceful deportment; a graceful speaker; a graceful air. High o'er the rest in arms the graceful Turnus rode. Dryden.

GRACE'FUL-LY, adv.

With a pleasing dignity; elegantly. with a natural ease and propriety; as, to walk or speak gracefully.

GRACE'FUL-NESS, n.

Elegance of manner or deportment; beauty with dignity in manner, motion or countenance. Gracefulness consists in the natural ease and propriety of an action, accompanied with a countenance expressive of dignity or elevation of mind. Happy is the man who can add the gracefulness of ease to the dignity of merit.

GRACE'LESS, a.

Void of grace; corrupt; depraved; unregenerate; unsanctified.

GRACE'LESS-LY, adv.

Without grace.

GRACE'LESS-NESS, n.

Destitution of grace. Dr. Favour.

GRA'CES, n.

Good graces, favor; friendship.

GRACE'-SAY-ER, n.

One who says grace.

GRAC'ILE, or GRAC'I-LENT, a. [L. gracilis.]

Slender. [Not in use.]

GRA-CIL'I-TY, n.

Slenderness. [Not in wse.]

GRA'CIOUS, a. [Fr. gracieux; L. gratiosus.]

1. Favorable; kind; friendly; as, the envoy met with a gracious reception.
2. Favorable; kind; benevolent; merciful; disposed to forgive offenses and impart unmerited blessings. Thou art a God ready to pardon, gracious and merciful. Neh. ix.
3. Favorable; expressing kindness and favor. All bore him witness, and wondered at the gracious words which proceeded from his mouth. Luke iv.
4. Proceeding from divine grace; as, a person in a gracious state.
5. Acceptable; favored. He made us gracious before the kings of Persia. [Little used.] 1 Esdras.
6. Renewed or implanted by grace; as, gracious affections.
7. Virtuous; good. Shak.
8. Excellent; graceful; becoming. [Obs.] Hooker. Camden.

GRA'CIOUS-LY, adv.

1. Kindly; favorably; in a friendly manner; with kind condescension. His testimony he graciously confirmed. Dryden.
2. In a pleasing manner.

GRA'CIOUS-NESS, n.

1. Kind condescension. Clarendon.
2. Possession of graces or good qualities. Bp. Barlow.
3. Pleasing manner. Jonson.
4. Mercifulness. Sandys.

GRACK'LE, n. [L. graculus, dim. of Goth. krage, a crow. See Crow. Varro's deduction of this word from grex is an error.]

A genus of birds, the Gracula, of which the crow blackbird is a species.

GRA-DA'TION, n. [L. gradatio; Fr. gradation. See Grade.]

1. A series of ascending steps or degrees, or a proceeding step by step; hence, progress from one degree or state to another; a regular advance from step to step. We observe a gradation in the progress of society from a rude to a civilized life. Men may arrive by several gradations to the most horrid impiety.
2. A degree in any order or series; we observe a gradation in the scale of being, from brute to man, from man to angels.
3. Order; series; regular process by degrees or steps; as, a gradation in argument or description.

GRA-DA'TION-AL, a.

According to gradation. Lawrence.

GRA-DA'TION-ED, a.

Formed by gradation. New An. Reg.

GRAD'A-TO-RY, a.

Proceeding step by step. Seward.

GRAD'A-TO-RY, n.

Steps from the cloisters into the church. Ainsworth.

GRADE, n. [Fr. grade; Sp. and It. grado; Port. grao; from L. gradus, a step; gradior, to step, to go; G. grad; D. graad; Dan. and Sw. grad, a step or degree; W. grâz, a step, degree, rank, from rhâz, a going forward or advance, Arm. radd. It may be from a common root with W. rhawd, way, course, rout; rhodiaw, to walk about; rhod, a wheel, L. rota. We observe by the Welsh that the first letter g is a prefix, and the root of the word then is Rd. We observe further, that the Latin gradior forms gressus, by a common change of d to s, or as it is in Welsh z [th.]

1. Now if g is a prefix, then gressus [ressus] coincides with the Sw. resa, Dan. rejser, G. reisen, D. reizen, to go, to travel, to journey; D. reis, a journey or voyage. In Sw. and Dan. the verbs signify not only to travel, but to raise. Whether the latter word raise is of the same family, may be doubtful; but the others appear to belong to one radix, coinciding with the Syr. ܪܕܐ radah, to go, to walk; Ch. רדה, to open, expand, flow, instruct; Heb. to descend. A step then is a stretch, a reach of the foot. Class Rd, No. 1, 2, 26.]
2. A degree or rank in order or dignity, civil, military or ecclesiastical. J. M. Mason. Walsh. While questions, periods, and grades and privileges an never once formally discussed. S. Miller.
3. A step or degree in any ascending series; as, crimes of every grade. When we come to examine the intermediate grades. S. S. Smith.

GRADE, v.t.

To reduce to a certain degree of ascent or descent, as a road or way.

GRAD'ED, pp.

Reduced to a proper degree of ascent.

GRADE'LY, a.

Decent orderly. [Local.]