The Collaborative International Dictionary
Commit \Com*mit"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Committed; p. pr. & vb. n. Committing.] [L. committere, commissum, to connect, commit; com- + mittere to send. See Mission.]
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To give in trust; to put into charge or keeping; to intrust; to consign; -- used with to, unto.
Commit thy way unto the Lord.
--Ps. xxxvii. 5.Bid him farewell, commit him to the grave.
--Shak. -
To put in charge of a jailor; to imprison.
These two were committed.
--Clarendon. -
To do; to perpetrate, as a crime, sin, or fault.
Thou shalt not commit adultery.
--Ex. xx. 1 4. To join for a contest; to match; -- followed by with. [R.]
--Dr. H. More.-
To pledge or bind; to compromise, expose, or endanger by some decisive act or preliminary step; -- often used reflexively; as, to commit one's self to a certain course.
You might have satisfied every duty of political friendship, without commiting the honor of your sovereign.
--Junius.Any sudden assent to the proposal . . . might possibly be considered as committing the faith of the United States.
--Marshall. -
To confound. [An obsolete Latinism.]
Committing short and long [quantities].
--Milton.To commit a bill (Legislation), to refer or intrust it to a committee or others, to be considered and reported.
To commit to memory, or To commit, to learn by heart; to memorize.
Syn: To Commit, Intrust, Consign.
Usage: These words have in common the idea of transferring from one's self to the care and custody of another. Commit is the widest term, and may express only the general idea of delivering into the charge of another; as, to commit a lawsuit to the care of an attorney; or it may have the special sense of intrusting with or without limitations, as to a superior power, or to a careful servant, or of consigning, as to writing or paper, to the flames, or to prison. To intrust denotes the act of committing to the exercise of confidence or trust; as, to intrust a friend with the care of a child, or with a secret. To consign is a more formal act, and regards the thing transferred as placed chiefly or wholly out of one's immediate control; as, to consign a pupil to the charge of his instructor; to consign goods to an agent for sale; to consign a work to the press.
Wiktionary
vb. (present participle of commit English)
WordNet
See commit
v. perform an act, usually with a negative connotation; "perpetrate a crime"; "pull a bank robbery" [syn: perpetrate, pull]
give entirely to a specific person, activity, or cause; "She committed herself to the work of God"; "give one's talents to a good cause"; "consecrate your life to the church" [syn: give, dedicate, consecrate, devote]
cause to be admitted; of persons to an institution; "After the second episode, she had to be committed"; "he was committed to prison" [syn: institutionalize, institutionalise, send, charge]
confer a trust upon; "The messenger was entrusted with the general's secret"; "I commit my soul to God" [syn: entrust, intrust, trust, confide]
make an investment; "Put money into bonds" [syn: invest, put, place] [ant: divest]
[also: committing, committed]
Usage examples of "committing".
Any Rralan found guilty of committing an act of physical violence against any other Rralan within that five-year period would render the Treaty null and void.
Nevertheless he had been forced to take an action which he ought to have discussed, at least with Mllaba, before committing himself.
She was committing to memory the feeling of Tee's gentle touch along her body, the growing urgency of his caresses, his hot strength meeting hers.
Surely someone, somewhere is committing a vicious crime that these guys should be trying to stop!
Mainlanders are often subjected to a spectrum ranging from xenophobia," Lars began ticking the subjects off on his fingers, "a fear of races in their own territories, to claustrophobia to nip any budding interest in space-faring, to fear of disobedience, fear and disgust of acts that are 'unnatural,' fear of committing an illegal action, rational or not.
As he worked, he asked for English words for various items and cheerfully muttered them under his breath, committing them to memory.
Zainal had no trouble committing the sequence of the alphabet to memory--nor of naming any of them when Kris drilled him.
It was the most flattering dress she'd worn and she examined it thoroughly, committing the details of its design to her mind so that she could reproduce it the next time she had marks enough for a Gather dress.
I believe there have always been blood relations in the Harper Hall, undoubtedly in the Records Rooms, scanning hides and committing them to memory before the ink fades completely.
The bare bones of that unexpected event was already the talk of the Hall, and Piemur had heard the public version so often that he knew he wasn't committing any indiscretion.
Unfortunately, the Army soon developed a new problem: many of the soldiers became sick of each other after three years, resulting in soldiers committing suicide or going AWOL.
And… if McVeigh was planning on committing such a horrific crime, why would he make it a point to tell people his name, saying to Dr.
Terrell described it as a "continuous undercurrent of… really terrorist activity to try to draw the United States Government into direct conflict with the Nicaraguans because they were to be made to look like they were committing overt acts against a neutral and unarmed country, Costa Rica.
I am not committing the contemptible act of asking you to take me on faith.
The idea was to draw the Erewhonese Navy into committing additional light units to piracy suppression in the vicinity, then to pounce on those units with modern Solarian heavy cruisers and wipe them out.