STATE

Definitions

1. 1. The circumstances or condition of a being or thing at any given time. State is a term nearly synonymous with "mode," but of a meaning more extensive, and is not exclusively limited to the mutable and contingent. Sir W. Hamilton. Declare the past and present state of things. Dryden. Keep the state of the question in your eye. Boyle.
2. 2. Rank; condition; quality; as, the state of honor. Thy honor, state, and seat is due to me. Shak.
3. 3. Condition of prosperity or grandeur; wealthy or prosperous circumstances; social importance. She instructed him how he should keep state, and yet with a modest sense of his misfortunes. Bacon. Can this imperious lord forget to reign, Quit all his state, descend, and serve again Pope.
4. 4. Appearance of grandeur or dignity; pomp. Where least og state there most of love is shown. Dryden.
5. 5. A chair with a canopy above it, often standing on a dais; a seat of dignity; also, the canopy itself. [Obs.] His high throne, . . . under state Of richest texture spread. Milton. When he went to court, he used to kick away the state, and sit down by his prince cheek by jowl. Swift.
6. 6. Estate, possession. [Obs.] Daniel. Your state, my lord, again in yours. Massinger.
7. 7. A person of high rank. [Obs.] Latimer.
8. 8. Any body of men united by profession, or constituting a community of a particular character; as, the civil and ecclesiastical states, or the lords spiritual and temporal and the commons, in Great Britain. Cf. Estate, n., 6.
9. 9. The principal persons in a government. The bold design Pleased highly those infernal states. Milton.
10. 10. The bodies that constitute the legislature of a country; as, the States-general of Holland.
11. 11. A form of government which is not monarchial, as a republic. [Obs.] Well monarchies may own religion's name, But states are atheists in their very fame. Dryden.
12. 12. A political body, or body politic; the whole body of people who are united one government, whatever may be the form of the government; a nation. Municipal law is a rule of conduct prescribed by the supreme power in a state. Blackstone. The Puritans in the reign of Mary, driven from their homes, sought an asylum in Geneva, where they found a state without a king, and a church without a bishop. R. Choate.
13. 13. In the United States, one of the commonwealth, or bodies politic, the people of which make up the body of the nation, and which, under the national constitution, stands in certain specified relations with the national government, and are invested, as commonwealth, with full power in their several spheres over all matters not expressly inhibited.
14. 14. Highest and stationary condition, as that of maturity between growth and decline, or as that of crisis between the increase and the abating of a disease; height; acme. [Obs.]