Emily Dickinson Lexicon

MIX'TURE, n. [L. mixtura.]

1. The act of mixing, or state of being mixed. Compounds are made by the mixture of different substances.
2. A mass or compound, consisting of different ingredients blended without order. In this life there is a mixture of good and evil. Most wines in market are base mixtures.
3. The ingredient added and mixed. Cicero doubted whether it is possible for a community to exist without a prevailing mixture of piety in its constitution.
4. In pharmacy, a liquid medicine which receives into its composition not only substances soluble in water, but substances not soluble. Encyc.
5. In chemistry, mixture differs from combination. In mere mixture, the several ingredients are blended without an alteration of the substances, each of which still retains its own nature and properties. In strict combination, the substances unite by chimical attraction, and losing their distinct properties, they form a compound, differing in its properties from either of the ingredients.