The Collaborative International Dictionary
Confine \Con*fine"\ (k[o^]n*f[imac]n"), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Confined; p. pr. & vb. n. Confining.] [F. confiner to border upon, LL. confinare to set bounds to; con- + finis boundary, end. See Final, Finish.] To restrain within limits; to restrict; to limit; to bound; to shut up; to inclose; to keep close.
Now let not nature's hand
Keep the wild flood confined! let order die!
--Shak.
He is to confine himself to the compass of numbers and
the slavery of rhyme.
--Dryden.
To be confined, to be in childbed.
Syn: To bound; limit; restrain; imprison; immure; inclose; circumscribe; restrict.
Wiktionary
vb. (present participle of confine English)
WordNet
adj. restricting the scope or freedom of action [syn: constraining, constrictive, limiting, restricting]
crowded; "close quarters" [syn: close]
Usage examples of "confining".
For the seventy-two dogs it was a wonderful respite from their confining life aboard the lurching train and the previous months of hard training.
The barbaric Shinyar, near-naked and tattooed and earringed, flailed at the sagging defense, but their numbers and the confining cave walls prevented them surging like a tidal wave.
It was a relief to be able to escape to the court now and then, when life at The Jugged Hare began to feel too confining.
I thought, be used to quite a lot of space, to judge the rooms of Il Piacere as being too small, too confining.
This was effected by confining him in a close cell, that he might seriously reflect, in solitude and darkness, on the business he was engaged in: and his mind be prepared for the reception of the sublime and mysterious truths of primitive revelation and philosophy.
Draco would love to take him for walks on the grounds, when Dunkirk finds the courtyard confining.
Instantly the captain ran forward, and in a loud voice commanded his crew to desist from hoisting the cutting-tackles, and at once cast loose the cables and chains confining the whales to the ship.
A college professor studying the habits of the giraffe, for example, and confining his observations to specimens in zoos, would inevitably come to the conclusion that the giraffe is a sedentary and melancholy beast, standing immovable for hours at a time and employing an Italian to feed him hay and cabbages.
I received all my guests at the door, confining my compliments to begging their pardons for having been so bold as to procure myself this great honour.
That is, we limit our knowledge by ignoring such subjective causal factors as human desires and beliefs and confining ourselves solely to the objective, unconscious workings of the brain.
She sets the intruder alert wailing, sends the message racing along the datastream, confining all but the highest-level users to their own spheres.
They are freedoms from the lesser and more confining spaces, by finding freedom in the deeper and wider.
Donna Ignazia feigned to be persuaded and asked her lover to sit down, but she did not speak another word to him, confining her remarks to me, saying how much she had enjoyed the ball, and how kind I had been to take her cousins.
The Protestant Episcopal Church, on the contrary, has aimed to avoid that field, confining itself, aside from its own people in the American and British contingents, to the non-Christian elements--as, for example, the hill-tribes of Luzon, the pagans and the Mohammedans.
I was just going through a stage of postadolescent confusion in which life seems temporarily meaningless and confining.