Emily Dickinson Lexicon

MOR'TI-FI-ED, pp.

1. Affected by sphacelus or gangrene.
2. Humbled subdued; abased.

MOR'TI-FI-ED-NESS, n.

Humiliation; subjection of the passions. Taylor.

MOR'TI-FI-ER, n.

He or that which mortifies.

MOR'TI-FY, v.i.

1. To lose vitality, as flesh; to gangrene.
2. To be subdued. Johnson.
3. To practice severities and penance from religious motives. This makes him gives alms of all that he hath, watch, fast, and mortify. Law.

MOR'TI-FY, v.t. [Fr. mortifier; It. mortificare; Sp. mortificar; L. mors, death, and facio, to make.]

1. To destroy the organic texture and vital functions of some part of a living animal; to change to sphacelus or gangrene. Extreme inflammation speedily mortifies flesh.
2. To subdue or bring into subjection, as the bodily appetites by abstinence or rigorous severities. We mortify ourselves with fish. Brown. With fasting mortified, worn out with tears. Harte.
3. To subdue; to abase; to humble; to reduce; to restrain; as, inordinate passions. Mortify thy learned lust. Prior. Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth. Col. iii.
4. To humble; to depress; to affect with slight vexation. How often is the ambitious man mortified with the very praises he receives, if they do not rise so high as he thinks they ought. Addison. He is controlled by a nod, mortified by a frown, and transported with a smile. Addison.
5. To destroy active powers or essential qualities. He mortified pearls in vinegar. Hakewill. Quicksilver – mortified with turpentine. Bacon. [I believe this application is not now in use.]

MORT'I-FY-ING, pp.

1. Changing from soundness to gangrene or sphacelus.
2. Subduing; humbling; restraining.
3. adj. Humiliating; tending to humble or abase. He met with a mortifying repulse.

MOR'TI-FY-ING-LY, adv.

Humiliatingly.

MOR'TISE, n. [mor'tis; Fr. mortaise; Arm. mortez; Sp. mortaja; Ir. mortis. The Armoric mortez signifies both a mortar and a mortise, and the Spanish mortaja signifies a mortise and a winding sheet or shroud. In the latter sense the Portuguese use mortalha, from mortal. These alliances indicate that these words are all from the root of mors, death, which may be from beating or throwing down.]

A cut or hollow place made in timber by the augur and chisel, to receive the tenon of another piece of timber.

MOR'TISE, v.t.

1. To cut or make a mortise in.
2. To join timbers by a tenon and mortise; as, to mortise a beam into a post, or a joist into a girder.

MOR'TIS-ED, pp.

Having a mortise; joined by a mortise and tenon.

MOR'TIS-ING, ppr.

Making a mortise; uniting by a mortise and tenon.

MORT'MAIN, n. [Fr. mort, dead, and main, hand.]

In law, possession of lands or tenements in dead hands, or hands that can not alienate. Alienation in mortmain is an alienation of lands or tenements to any corporation, sole or aggregate, ecclesiastical or temporal, particularly to religious houses, by which the estate becomes perpetually inherent in the corporation, and unalienable. Blackstone.

MORT'PAY, n. [Fr. mort, dead, and pay.]

Dead pay; payment not made. [Not used.] Bacon.

MOR'TRESS, n. [from mortar.]

A dish of meat of various kinds beaten together. [Not used.] Bacon.

MOR'TU-A-RY, a.

Belonging to the burial of the dead.

MOR'TU-A-RY, n. [Fr. mortuaire, pertaining to the dead.]

1. A sort of ecclesiastical heriot, a customary gift claimed by and due to the minister of a parish on the death of a parishioner. It seems to have been originally a voluntary bequest or donation, intended to make amends for any failure in the payment of tithes of which the deceased had been guilty. Blackstone.
2. A burial place. Whitlock.

MO-SA'IC, a. [s as z; Fr. mosaique; It. mosaico; Sp. mosayco; L. musivum.]

1. Mosaic work is an assemblage of little pieces of glass, marble, precious stones, &c. of various colors, cut square and cemented on a ground of stucco, in such a manner as to imitate the colors and gradations of painting. Encyc.
2. [from Moses.] Pertaining to Moses, the leader of the Israelites; as, the Mosaic law, rites or institutions.

MO-SA'IC-AL, a.

Pertaining to Moses.

MOS'CHA-TEL, n. [from Gr. μοσχος, L. muscus, musk.]

A plant of the genus Adoxa, hollow root or inglorious. There is one species only, whose leaves and flowers smell like musk; and hence it is sometimes called musk-crowfoot. Encyc.

MOSK, n. [Fr. mosquée; It. moschea; Sp. mezquita; Ar. مَسْجِدٌ masjidon, from سَجَدَ sajada, to bend, bow, adore.]

A Mohammedan temple or place of religious worship. Mosks are square buildings, generally constructed of stone. Before the chief gate is a square court paved with white marble, and surrounded with a low gallery whose roof is supported by pillars of marble. In this gallery the worshipers wash themselves before they enter the mosk. Encyc.

MOS'LEM, n.

A mussulman; an orthodox Mohammedan.

MOS'O-SAU-RUS, n. [L. Mosa, the Latin name of Mæstricht, and Gr. ςαυρος, a lizard.]

The name of a saurian reptile, related to the crocodile, whose remains are found in beds of clay, near Mæstricht, in Germany.

MOSS, n. [Sax. meοs; G. moos; D. mos; Sw. mossa; W. mwswg, from mws, that shoots up, and of a strong scent; L. muscus; Gr. μοσχος. The two latter signify moss and musk, both from shooting out; hence, It. musco, muschio; Sp. musco; Port. musgo; Fr. mousse. The Greek word signifies also a young animal, and a shoot or twig. From the French mousse, comes mousseline, muslin, from its softness or resemblance to moss. Lunier says it is from Mossoul, a city of Mesopotamia.]

1. The mosses are one of the families or classes into which all vegetables are divided by Linnæus in the Philosophia Botanica. In Ray's method, the mosses form the third class and in Tournefort's, they constitute a single genus. In the sexual system, they are the second order of the class Cryptogamia, which contains all the plants in which the parts of the flower and fruit are wanting or not conspicuous. Milne. The mosses, musci, form a natural order of small plants with leafy stems and narrow simple leaves. Their flower are generally monecian or diecian, and their seeds are contained in a capsule covered with a calyptra or hood. Ed. Encyc. The term moss is also applied to many other small plants particularly lichens, species of which are called tree-moss, rock-moss, coral-moss, &c. The fir-moss and club-moss, are of the genus Lycopodium.
2. [Sw. måse.] A bog; a place where peat is found.

MOSS, v.t.

To cover with moss by natural growth. An oak whose boughs were mossed with age. Shak.

MOSS'CAP-PED, a.

Capped or covered with moss. Mrs. Butler.