The Collaborative International Dictionary
Right \Right\, n. [AS. right. See Right, a.]
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That which is right or correct. Specifically:
The straight course; adherence to duty; obedience to lawful authority, divine or human; freedom from guilt, -- the opposite of moral wrong.
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A true statement; freedom from error of falsehood; adherence to truth or fact.
Seldom your opinions err; Your eyes are always in the right.
--Prior. -
A just judgment or action; that which is true or proper; justice; uprightness; integrity.
Long love to her has borne the faithful knight, And well deserved, had fortune done him right.
--Dryden.
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That to which one has a just claim. Specifically:
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That which one has a natural claim to exact.
There are no rights whatever, without corresponding duties.
--Coleridge. That which one has a legal or social claim to do or to exact; legal power; authority; as, a sheriff has a right to arrest a criminal.
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That which justly belongs to one; that which one has a claim to possess or own; the interest or share which anyone has in a piece of property; title; claim; interest; ownership.
Born free, he sought his right.
--Dryden.Hast thou not right to all created things?
--Milton.Men have no right to what is not reasonable.
--Burke. Privilege or immunity granted by authority.
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The right side; the side opposite to the left.
Led her to the Souldan's right.
--Spenser. In some legislative bodies of Europe (as in France), those members collectively who are conservatives or monarchists. See Center,
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5. The outward or most finished surface, as of a piece of cloth, a carpet, etc. At all right, at all points; in all respects. [Obs.] --Chaucer. Bill of rights, a list of rights; a paper containing a declaration of rights, or the declaration itself. See under Bill. By right, By rights, or By good rights, rightly; properly; correctly. He should himself use it by right. --Chaucer. I should have been a woman by right. --Shak. Divine right, or Divine right of kings, a name given to the patriarchal theory of government, especially to the doctrine that no misconduct and no dispossession can forfeit the right of a monarch or his heirs to the throne, and to the obedience of the people. To rights.
In a direct line; straight. [R.]
--Woodward.-
At once; directly. [Obs. or Colloq.]
--Swift.To set to rights, To put to rights, to put in good order; to adjust; to regulate, as what is out of order.
Writ of right (Law), a writ which lay to recover lands in fee simple, unjustly withheld from the true owner.
--Blackstone.
Usage examples of "by good rights".
This retreat is called The Porcupine, and I ought by good rights to know something about the habits of the small animal from which it derives its name.