The Collaborative International Dictionary
Break \Break\ (br[=a]k), v. i.
To come apart or divide into two or more pieces, usually with suddenness and violence; to part; to burst asunder.
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To open spontaneously, or by pressure from within, as a bubble, a tumor, a seed vessel, a bag.
Else the bottle break, and the wine runneth out.
--Math. ix. 17. -
To burst forth; to make its way; to come to view; to appear; to dawn.
The day begins to break, and night is fled.
--Shak.And from the turf a fountain broke, and gurgled at our feet.
--Wordsworth. -
To burst forth violently, as a storm.
The clouds are still above; and, while I speak, A second deluge o'er our head may break.
--Dryden. -
To open up; to be scattered; to be dissipated; as, the clouds are breaking.
At length the darkness begins to break.
--Macaulay. -
To become weakened in constitution or faculties; to lose health or strength.
See how the dean begins to break; Poor gentleman! he droops apace.
--Swift. To be crushed, or overwhelmed with sorrow or grief; as, my heart is breaking.
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To fall in business; to become bankrupt.
He that puts all upon adventures doth oftentimes break, and come to poverty.
--Bacn. To make an abrupt or sudden change; to change the gait; as, to break into a run or gallop.
To fail in musical quality; as, a singer's voice breaks when it is strained beyond its compass and a tone or note is not completed, but degenerates into an unmusical sound instead. Also, to change in tone, as a boy's voice at puberty.
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To fall out; to terminate friendship. To break upon the score of danger or expense is to be mean and narrow-spirited. --Collier. Note: With prepositions or adverbs: To break away, to disengage one's self abruptly; to come or go away against resistance. Fear me not, man; I will not break away. --Shak. To break down.
To come down by breaking; as, the coach broke down.
To fail in any undertaking; to halt before successful completion; as, the negotiations broke down due to irreconcilable demands.
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To cease functioning or to malfunction; as, the car broke down in the middle of the highway. He had broken down almost at the outset. --Thackeray. To break forth, to issue; to come out suddenly, as sound, light, etc. ``Then shall thy light break forth as the morning.'' --Isa. lviii. 8; Note: often with into in expressing or giving vent to one's feelings. ``Break forth into singing, ye mountains.'' --Isa. xliv. 23. To break from, to go away from abruptly. This radiant from the circling crowd he broke. --Dryden. To break into, to enter by breaking; as, to break into a house. To break in upon, to enter or approach violently or unexpectedly. ``This, this is he; softly awhile; let us not break in upon him.'' --Milton. To break loose.
To extricate one's self forcibly. ``Who would not, finding way, break loose from hell?''
--Milton.-
To cast off restraint, as of morals or propriety. To break off.
To become separated by rupture, or with suddenness and violence.
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To desist or cease suddenly. ``Nay, forward, old man; do not break off so.'' --Shak. To break off from, to desist from; to abandon, as a habit. To break out.
To burst forth; to escape from restraint; to appear suddenly, as a fire or an epidemic. ``For in the wilderness shall waters break out, and stream in the desert.''
--Isa. xxxv. 6To show itself in cutaneous eruptions; -- said of a disease.
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To have a rash or eruption on the akin; -- said of a patient. To break over, to overflow; to go beyond limits. To break up.
To become separated into parts or fragments; as, the ice break up in the rivers; the wreck will break up in the next storm.
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To disperse. ``The company breaks up.'' --I. Watts. To break upon, to discover itself suddenly to; to dawn upon. To break with.
To fall out; to sever one's relations with; to part friendship. ``It can not be the Volsces dare break with us.''
--Shak. ``If she did not intend to marry Clive, she should have broken with him altogether.''
--Thackeray.To come to an explanation; to enter into conference; to speak. [Obs.] ``I will break with her and with her father.''
--Shak.
Usage examples of "to break in upon".
Until he should obtain one he determined to devote half the day to blacking boots, not being willing to break in upon his small capital.
He spent the income of his prerogative nobly, but he took care not to break in upon the capital, never abandoning for a moment any of the claims which he made under the fundamental laws, nor sparing to shed the blood of those who opposed him, often in the field, sometimes upon the scaffold.
All at once a light seemed to break in upon his mind, and he woke up and there was the withered little atomy of the old lady on the other side of the moonlight, and there was the spinning wheel singing on and on in the middle of it!
Then this fellow caught me by the throat and said that if I dared to break in upon the privacy of one whom he called Red Eve and Lady Clavering, he would kill me.
An idea seemed about this time to break in upon them, that notwithstanding the annoyance they caused the manager, they were aiding to fill his coffers.
Holmes drove in silence, with his head sunk upon his breast, and the air of a man who is lost in thought, while I sat beside him, curious to learn what this new quest might be which seemed to tax his powers so sorely, and yet afraid to break in upon the current of his thoughts.
We had walked several times up and down the lawn, neither Miss Stoner nor myself liking to break in upon his thoughts before he roused himself from his reverie.