Emily Dickinson Lexicon
Definition for AC'TION
AC'TION, n. [L. actio. See Act.]
- Literally, a driving; hence, the state of acting or moving; exertion of power or force, as when one body acts on another; or action is the effect of power exerted on one body by another; motion produced. Hence, action is opposed to rest. Action, when produced by one body on another, is mechanical; when produced by the will of a living being, spontaneous or voluntary. [See Def. 3.]
- An act or thing done; a deed. The Lord is a God of knowledge, and by him are actions weighed. 1 Sam. ii.
- In mechanics, agency; operation; driving impulse; effort of one body upon another; as, the action of wind upon a ship's sails: also the effect of such action.
- In ethics, the external signs or expression of the sentiments of a moral agent; conduct; behavior; demeanor; that is, motion or movement, with respect to a rule or propriety.
- In poetry, a series of events, called also the subject or fable: this is of two kinds; the principal action, which is more strictly the fable, and the incidental action or episode. – Encyc.
- In oratory, gesture or gesticulation; the external deportment of the speaker, or the accommodation of his attitude, voice, gestures, and countenance to the subject, or to the animal, and natural; vital and involuntary, as the action, or to the thoughts and feelings of the mind. – Encyc.
- In physiology, the motions or functions of the body, vital, animal, and natural; vital and involuntary, as the action of the heart and lungs; animal, as muscular, and all voluntary motions; natural, as manducation, deglutition, and digestion. – Encyc.
- In law, literally, an urging for right; a suit or process, by which a demand is made of a right; a claim made before a tribunal. Actions are real, personal, or mixed; real, or feudal, when the demandant claims a title to real estate; personal, when a man demands a debt, personal duty, or damage in lieu of it, or satisfaction for an injury to person or property; and mixed, when real estate is demanded, with damages for a wrong sustained. Actions are also civil or penal; civil, when instituted solely in behalf of private persons, to recover debts or damages; penal, when instituted to recover a penalty, imposed by way of punishment. The word is also used for a right of action; as, the law gives an action for every claim. – Blackstone. A chose in action, is a right to a thing, in opposition to the possession. A bond or note is a chose in action, [Fr. chose, a thing.] and gives the owner a right to prosecute his claim to the money, as he has an absolute property in a right, as with well as in a thing, in possession.
- In some countries of Europe, action is a share in the capital stock of a company, or in the public funds, equivalent to our term share; and consequently, in a more general sense, to stocks. The word is also used for movable effects.
- In painting and sculpture, the attitude or position of the several parts of the body, by which they seem to be actuated by passions; as, the arm extended, to represent the act of giving or receiving.
- Battle; fight; engagement between troops in war, whether on land or water, or by a greater or smaller number of combatants. This and the 8th definition exhibit the literal meaning of action – a driving or urging. Quantity of action, in physics, the product of the mass of a body by the space it runs through and its velocity. – Encyc. In many cases action and act are synonymous; but some distinction between them is observable. Action seems to have more relation to the power that acts, and its operation and process of acting; and act, more relation to the effect or operation complete. Action is also more generally used for ordinary transactions; and act, for such as are remarkable, or dignified; as, all our actions should he regulated by prudence; a prince is distinguished by acts of heroism or humanity. – Encyc. Action taking, in Shakspeare, is used for litigious.
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