Emily Dickinson Lexicon

HARD'EN, v.i. [hàrdn.]

1. To become hard or more hard; to acquire solidity or more compactness. Mortar hardens by drying.
2. To become unfeeling.
3. To become inured.
4. To indurate, as flesh.

HARD'EN, v.t. [hàrdn.]

1. To make hard or more hard; to make firm or compact; to indurate; as, to harden iron or steel; to harden clay.
2. To confirm in effrontery; to make impudent; as, to harden the face.
3. To make obstinate, unyielding or refractory; as, to harden the neck. Jer. xix.
4. To confirm in wickedness, opposition or enmity; to make obdurate. Why then do ye harden your hearts, as Pharaoh and the Egyptians hardened their hearts? 1 Sam. vi. So God is said to harden the heart, when he withdraws the influences of his Spirit from men, and leaves them to pursue their own corrupt inclinations.
5. To make insensible or unfeeling; as, to harden one against impressions of pity or tenderness.
6. To make firm; to endure with constancy. I would harden myself in sorrow. John vi.
7. To inure; to render firm or less liable to injury, by exposure or use; as, to harden to a climate or to labor.

HARD'EN-ED, pp.

Made hard, or more hard or compact; made unfeeling; made obstinate; confirmed in error or vice.

HARD'EN-ER, n.

He or that which makes hard, or more firm and compact.

HARD'EN-ING, n.

The giving a greater degree of hardness to bodies than they had before. Encyc.

HARD'EN-ING, ppr.

Making hard or more compact; making obdurate or unfeeling; confirming; becoming more hard.

HARD'ER, a.

More hard.

HARD'EST, a.

Most hard.

HARD-FA'VOR-ED, a.

Having coarse features; harsh of countenance. Dryden.

HARD-FA'VOR-ED-NESS, n.

Coarseness of features.

HARD-FEA'TUR-ED, a.

Having coarse features. Smollett.

HARD-FEA-TUR-ED, a.

Having coarse features. [1841 Addenda only.]

HARD'FIST-ED, a.

Close fisted; covetous. Hall.

HARD'FOUGHT, a.

Vigorously contested; as, a hard-fought battle.

HARD'GOT-TEN, a.

Obtained with difficulty.

HARD'HAND-ED, a.

Having hard hands, as a laborer. Shak.

HARD'HEAD, n.

Clash or collision of heads in contest. Dryden.

HARD-HEART'ED, a.

Cruel; pitiless; merciless; unfeeling; inhuman; inexorable. Shak. Dryden.

HARD-HEART'ED-LY, adv.

In a hard-hearted manner.

HARD-HEART'ED-NESS, n.

Want of feeling or tenderness; cruelty; inhumanity. South.

HARD'I-EST, a.

Most hardy. Baxter.

HARD'I-HOOD, n. [See Hardy and Hood.]

Boldness, united with firmness and constancy of mind; dauntless bravery; intrepidity. Milton. It is the society of numbers which gives hardihood to iniquity. Buckminster. Hardihead and Hardiment, in the sense of hardihood, are obsolete. Spenser. Fairfax.

HARD'I-LY, adv.

1. With great boldness; stoutly. Scott.
2. With hardship; not tenderly. Goldsmith.

HARD'I-NESS, n. [Fr. hardiesse. See Hardy.]

1. Boldness; firm courage; intrepidity; stoutness; bravery; applied to the mind, it is synonymous with hardihood.
2. Firmness of body derived from laborious exercises.
3. Hardship; fatigue. [Obs.] Spenser.
4. Excess of confidence; assurance; effrontery.

HARD-LA'BOR-ED, a.

Wrought with severe labor; elaborate; studied; as, a hard-labored poem. Swift.