What is "body politic"

Body \Bod"y\, n.; pl. Bodies. [OE. bodi, AS. bodig; akin to OHG. botah. [root]257. Cf. Bodice.]

1. The material organized substance of an animal, whether living or dead, as distinguished from the spirit, or vital principle; the physical person.

   Absent in body, but present in spirit.
   --1 Cor. v. 3

   For of the soul the body form doth take. For soul is form, and doth the body make.
   --Spenser.

2. The trunk, or main part, of a person or animal, as distinguished from the limbs and head; the main, central, or principal part, as of a tree, army, country, etc.

   Who set the body and the limbs Of this great sport together?
   --Shak.

   The van of the king's army was led by the general; . . . in the body was the king and the prince.
   --Clarendon.

   Rivers that run up into the body of Italy.
   --Addison.

3. The real, as opposed to the symbolical; the substance, as opposed to the shadow.

   Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ.
   --Col. ii. 17.

4. A person; a human being; -- frequently in composition; as, anybody, nobody.

   A dry, shrewd kind of a body.
   --W. Irving.

5. A number of individuals spoken of collectively, usually as united by some common tie, or as organized for some purpose; a collective whole or totality; a corporation; as, a legislative body; a clerical body.

   A numerous body led unresistingly to the slaughter.
   --Prescott.

6. A number of things or particulars embodied in a system; a general collection; as, a great body of facts; a body of laws or of divinity.

7. Any mass or portion of matter; any substance distinct from others; as, a metallic body; a moving body; an a["e]riform body. ``A body of cold air.''
   --Huxley.

   By collision of two bodies, grind The air attrite to fire.
   --Milton.

8. Amount; quantity; extent.

9. That part of a garment covering the body, as distinguished from the parts covering the limbs.

10. The bed or box of a vehicle, on or in which the load is placed; as, a wagon body; a cart body.

11. (Print.) The shank of a type, or the depth of the shank (by which the size is indicated); as, a nonpareil face on an agate body.

12. (Geom.) A figure that has length, breadth, and thickness; any solid figure.

13. Consistency; thickness; substance; strength; as, this color has body; wine of a good body.

    Note: Colors bear a body when they are capable of being ground so fine, and of being mixed so entirely with oil, as to seem only a very thick oil of the same color.

14. (A["e]ronautics) The central, longitudinal framework of a flying machine, to which are attached the planes or a["e]rocurves, passenger accommodations, controlling and propelling apparatus, fuel tanks, etc. Also called fuselage. After body (Naut.), the part of a ship abaft the dead flat. Body cavity (Anat.), the space between the walls of the body and the inclosed viscera; the c[ae]lum; -- in mammals, divided by the diaphragm into thoracic and abdominal cavities. Body of a church, the nave. Body cloth; pl. Body cloths, a cloth or blanket for covering horses. Body clothes. (pl.)

    1. Clothing for the body; esp. underclothing.

    2. Body cloths for horses. [Obs.]
       --Addison.

       Body coat, a gentleman's dress coat.

       Body color (Paint.), a pigment that has consistency, thickness, or body, in distinction from a tint or wash.

       Body of a law (Law), the main and operative part.

       Body louse (Zo["o]l.), a species of louse ( Pediculus vestimenti), which sometimes infests the human body and clothes. See Grayback.

       Body plan (Shipbuilding), an end elevation, showing the conbour of the sides of a ship at certain points of her length.

       Body politic, the collective body of a nation or state as politically organized, or as exercising political functions; also, a corporation.
       --Wharton.

       As to the persons who compose the body politic or associate themselves, they take collectively the name of ``people'', or ``nation''.
       --Bouvier.

       Body servant, a valet.

       The bodies seven (Alchemy), the metals corresponding to the planets. [Obs.]

       Sol gold is, and Luna silver we threpe (=call), Mars yren (=iron), Mercurie quicksilver we clepe, Saturnus lead, and Jupiter is tin, and Venus coper.
       --Chaucer.

       Body snatcher, one who secretly removes without right or authority a dead body from a grave, vault, etc.; a resurrectionist.

       Body snatching (Law), the unauthorized removal of a dead body from the grave; usually for the purpose of dissection.

n. 1 The collective body of a nation or state as politically organized, or as exercising political functions. 2 (context archaic English) A corporation.

n. a politically organized body of people under a single government; "the state has elected a new president"; "African nations"; "students who had come to the nation's capitol"; "the country's largest manufacturer"; "an industrialized land" [syn: state, nation, country, land, commonwealth, res publica]

A body politic is a metaphor in which a nation is considered to be a corporate entity, being likened to a human body. The word "politic" in this phrase is a postpositive adjective; so it is "a body of a politic nature" rather than "a politic of a bodily nature". A body politic comprises all the people in a particular country considered as a single group. The analogy is typically continued by reference to the top of government as the head of state, but may be extended to other anatomical parts, as in political readings of the Aesop's fable, " The Belly and the Members".The first mentioning of the term in print in Europe appears through the works The Book Of The Body Politic by Poet and Court writer Christine de Pizan in 1407 in which she readily admits to borrowing the concept from Plutarch in an letter addressed to the Emperor Trajan without ever mentioning John of Salisbury great and now considered classical work Policraticus The metaphor appears in the French language as the corps-état. The metaphor developed in Renaissance times, as the medical knowledge based upon the classical work of Galen was being challenged by new thinkers such as William Harvey. Analogies were made between the supposed causes of disease and disorder and their equivalents in the political field which were considered to be plagues or infections which might be remedied by purges and nostrums.

Body Politic is a television pilot that starred Minka Kelly, Gabrielle Union, Jason Dohring, and Brian Austin Green. It was produced by CBS Television Studios for The CW.

After much speculation on the show's status, the show did not appear in the CW's fall schedule in early 2009. However, on May 21, 2009, in an interview with Dawn Ostroff, the CW's CEO stated the show was still in consideration for midseason. On August 4, 2009, Dawn Ostroff announced that the project was officially dead for the CW.

A body politic is a metaphor in which a nation is considered to be a corporate entity, being likened to a human body.

Body politic may also refer to:

• Body Politic (magazine), a Canadian monthly magazine published from 1971 to 1987
• Body Politic (TV pilot), 2009 television pilot, which was not picked up as a series