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Neuter   /nˈutər/   Listen
Neuter

noun
1.
A gender that refers chiefly (but not exclusively) to inanimate objects (neither masculine nor feminine).






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Neuter" Quotes from Famous Books



... and the horizon was clear. The first on the look-out were, of course, the smugglers; they, and those on board the revenue cutter, were the only two interested parties—the yacht was neuter. ...
— The Pirate and The Three Cutters • Frederick Marryat

... is Brahman. And, on account of its referring to the passage last quoted ('it desired,' &c.), the later passage also, 'That is flavour,' &c., has not the Self of bliss for its subject.—But, it may be objected, the (neuter word) Brahman cannot possibly be designated by a masculine word as you maintain is done in the passage, 'He desired,' &c.—In reply to this objection we point to the passage (Taitt. Up. II, 1), 'From that Self sprang ether,' where, likewise, the masculine word 'Self' ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 1 • George Thibaut

... I say, Jesus Christ gives them to understand, that though he might justly reject them, yet he would not, but bids them not once to think that he would accuse them to the Father. Now, not to accuse, with Christ, is to plead for: for Christ in these things stands not neuter between the Father and sinners. So then, if Jesus Christ would not have them think, that yet will not come to him, that he will accuse them; then he would not that they should think so, that ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan

... often am I asked by both Sides, if it is possible for me to be an unconcerned Spectator of the Rogueries that are committed by the Party which is opposite to him that writes the Letter. About two Days since I was reproached with an old Grecian Law, that forbids any Man to stand as a Neuter or a Looker-on in the Divisions of his Country. However, as I am very sensible [my [5]] Paper would lose its whole Effect, should it run into the Outrages of a Party, I shall take Care to keep clear of every thing [which [6]] looks that Way. If I can any way ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... the positive post around to the negative post. When the cords are of equal length, this point will always be in the person of the patient, about midway between the parts where the two electrodes are applied. This central point, or "point of centrality," is practically neuter—neither positive nor negative; and upon the two opposite halves of the circuit, the positive and negative qualities of the current are in greatest force nearest to the posts, and in least force nearest to the central point. At this point they cease ...
— A Newly Discovered System of Electrical Medication • Daniel Clark

... account of a worship of such simplicity as to amount almost to poverty. But I must tell you that never have I been so overwhelmed by emotions of the noblest kind, as when sitting in the midst of these despised Nazarenes, and joining in their devotions; for to sit neuter in such a scene, it was not in my nature to do, nor would it have been in yours, much as you affect to despise this 'superstitious race.' This was indeed worship. It was a true communion of the creature with the Creator. Never before ...
— Zenobia - or, The Fall of Palmyra • William Ware

... almost as brief as a certain clause in one of the election laws of the State of Texas, which says: "The masculine gender shall include the feminine and neuter." ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various

... day that the neuter larvae inhabit an invisible, neutral territory, something like a little island, which is beseiged on all sides by the good and evil spirits. The larvae cannot long hold out and are soon forced into one or the other camp. Now, because it is these larvae they evoke, the occultists, who ...
— La-bas • J. K. Huysmans

... ri [c,]apal, etc.; this obscure passage was, I think, entirely misunderstood by Brasseur. The word [c,]apal is derived from the neuter form [c,]ape of the active tin [c,]apih, I shut up or enclose, and means "that which is shut up," lo cerrado, and [c,]apibal, the active form in the next line, means "that which shuts up," i. e., gates or doors. It will be remembered (see ante, p. 26) that the gates of Iximche were constructed ...
— The Annals of the Cakchiquels • Daniel G. Brinton

... answered hesitatingly, never very sure of herself under Rebecca's fire; "but though we often speak of a baby, a chicken, or a kitten as 'it,' they are really masculine or feminine gender, not neuter." ...
— The Flag-raising • Kate Douglas Wiggin

... went to a crest from which the view reached off for leagues over the valley and beyond that over ridge upon ridge of hilltops. There she thought of many things and was very lonely. She could not have worded it but, deep in her heart, she felt the outcry of the Spring voice: "Make me anything but neuter when the ...
— A Pagan of the Hills • Charles Neville Buck

... hand Hinduism derived its highest wisdom and deepest convictions concerning the Divine Being from the ancient rishis through the Upanishads. There they accepted, once for all, the doctrine of the Brahm (neuter)—the one passionless, immovable, unsearchable, ineffable Being who, without a second, stands as the source and embodiment ...
— India's Problem Krishna or Christ • John P. Jones

... predominatingly, Sex is predicated of Humanity, where it is developed in its highest perfection; and in the same degree Gender in Grammar is, in predominance, confined to the Proper Nouns Substantive. Masculine and Feminine are the only Proper Genders. Neuter Gender means of neither Gender, and includes the great mass of Common Nouns, or the Thing World, ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 5, No. 6, June, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... idea of God or mind is both personal and impersonal. Nor in ascribing, as appears to us, both these attributes to him, and in speaking of God both in the masculine and neuter gender, did he seem to himself inconsistent. For the difference between the personal and impersonal was not marked to him as to ourselves. We make a fundamental distinction between a thing and a person, while to Plato, by the help ...
— Philebus • Plato

... and its adjectives have numerous changes in addition to their degrees of comparison. We find no inflections to suggest case or gender. The adjective mpolo, which means "large," carries seven or eight forms. While it is impossible to tell whether a noun is masculine, feminine, or neuter, they use one adjective for all four declensions, changing its form ...
— History of the Negro Race in America From 1619 to 1880. Vol 1 - Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens • George W. Williams

... moderate extent, that you will come more and more round, the longer you keep the subject at all before your mind. I remember well how many long years it was before I could look into the faces of some of the difficulties and not feel quite abashed. I fairly struck my colours before the case of neuter insects. ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin

... to digest it. George Sand herself Balzac admired but did not care for at this time. He would talk to her amiably when he met her at the Opera; but, if she invited him to dinner, he invented an excuse, if possible, for not going. "Don't speak to me," he would say, "of this writer of the neuter gender. Nature ought to have given her more breeches and ...
— Balzac • Frederick Lawton

... ceased repeating the word "yammerschooner," which means "give me." After pointing to almost every object, one after the other, even to the buttons on our coats, and saying their favourite word in as many intonations as possible, they would then use it in a neuter sense, and vacantly repeat "yammerschooner." After yammerschoonering for any article very eagerly, they would by a simple artifice point to their young women or little children, as much as to say, "If you will not give it me, surely you will ...
— A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World - The Voyage Of The Beagle • Charles Darwin

... him, torture him severely; For, O Castalio, thou too much hast wrong'd me, In leaving me to Polydore's ill usage. He comes; and now, for once, O Love, stand neuter, Whilst a hard part's perform'd; for I must tempt, Wound, his soft nature, though ...
— The Orphan - or, The Unhappy Marriage • Thomas Otway

... like asking whether God could be conceived apart from goodness, or goodness apart from God. The God of the Timaeus is not really at variance with the idea of good; they are aspects of the same, differing only as the personal from the impersonal, or the masculine from the neuter, the one being the expression or language of mythology, the ...
— The Republic • Plato

... neuter form of the active verb pa, to break in pieces; it means "to go to pieces, to fall in ruins, to be depopulated or deserted." Applied to a city it is often translated "to be destroyed," but it does not convey quite so positive a meaning. Kuyan uincob, "men of God," from ...
— The Maya Chronicles - Brinton's Library Of Aboriginal American Literature, Number 1 • Various

... Coleridge, the yet unknown criminal, absolutely perspired and fumed in pleading for the defendant; the company demurred; the orator grew urgent; wits began to smoke the case, as active verbs; the advocate to smoke, as a neuter verb; the 'fun grew fast and furious;' until at length delinquent arose, burning tears in his eyes, and confessed to an audience, (now bursting with stifled laughter, but whom he supposed to be bursting with fiery indignation,) 'Lo! I am he ...
— Narrative And Miscellaneous Papers • Thomas De Quincey

... word used in the plural is sometimes regarded as a singular, the result being a double plural. Many Latin neuter plurals were adopted into French as feminine singulars, e.g., cornua, corne, horn; labra, levre, lip; vela, voile, sail. It is obvious that this is most likely to occur in the case of plurals which are used for a pair, or set, of things, and thus have a kind of collective sense. Breeches ...
— The Romance of Words (4th ed.) • Ernest Weekley

... said, "it must be washed at once." R. Joshua said, "it must be rendered legally unclean, and afterward washed." Everyone is suitable for purifying excepting a deaf person, an idiot, and a child. R. Judah "allows a child, but disallows a woman and a neuter." ...
— Hebrew Literature

... another be labelled "transportation"? And these words are apt and lucid compared with "proposition." Now "proposition" is America's maid-of-all-work. It means everything or nothing. It may be masculine, feminine, neuter—he, she, it. It is tough or firm, cold or warm, according to circumstances. But it has no more sense than an expletive, and its popularity is a clear proof of an ...
— American Sketches - 1908 • Charles Whibley

... creating was construed as a blemish on the splendour of the Supreme. It was held that the Soul of Things could but loll, majestic and inert, on a lotos of azure. Then, above Brahma, was lifted Brahm, a god neuter and indeclinable; neuter as having no part in ...
— The Lords of the Ghostland - A History of the Ideal • Edgar Saltus

... drawled to Ursula, in a queer resonant voice, that ended on a shrill little laugh of pure ridicule. The two women were jeering at him, jeering him into nothingness. The laugh of the shrill, triumphant female sounded from Hermione, jeering him as if he were a neuter. ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence

... genders in Icelandic—masculine, feminine, and neuter. The gender is partly natural, partly grammatical, generally agreeing with the gender in Old English. Compound words follow the gender ...
— An Icelandic Primer - With Grammar, Notes, and Glossary • Henry Sweet

... been proposed to his own father, who, as hath been already observed, stood always neuter in everything that concerned his eldest son; and as for Mrs. Pickle, she had never heard his name mentioned since his departure with any degree of temper or tranquility, except when her husband informed her that he was in a fair way of being ruined by this ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett

... exaggerated, of double-sexed creatures. Harvey, Bartholinus, Paullini, Schenck, Wolff, Wrisberg, Zacchias, Marcellus Donatus, Haller, Hufeland, de Graff, and many others discuss hermaphroditism. Many classifications have been given, as, e.g., real and apparent; masculine, feminine, or neuter; horizontal and vertical; unilateral and bilateral, etc. The anomaly in most cases consists of a malformation of the external genitalia. A prolonged clitoris, prolapsed ovaries, grossness of figure, ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould

... verb turns it into something figurative, by which they designate, seldom very appropriately, some object for which they have no positive name. Engro properly means a fellow, and engri, which is the feminine or neuter modification, a thing. When the noun or verb terminates in a vowel, engro is turned into mengro, and engri into mengri. I have already shown how, by affixing engro to kaun, the Gypsies have invented a word to express a hare. In like manner, by affixing engro to pov, ...
— Romano Lavo-Lil - Title: Romany Dictionary - Title: Gypsy Dictionary • George Borrow

... nevo. Nepotism nepotismo. Nerve nervo. Nervous nerva. Nervousness nerveco. Nest nesto. Nestle kusxigxeti. Nestling birdido. Net reto. Netting retajxo. Nettle urtiko. Network retajxo. Neuralgia neuxralgio. Neuter neuxtra. Neutral neuxtrala. Neutrality neuxtraleco. Never neniam. Nevertheless tamen. New nova. News sciigo, novajxo. Newspaper jxurnalo. New Year's Day novjartago. Next sekvanta. Next (near) plejproksima. Nibble mordeti. Nice agrabla. Niche nicxo. Nick (notch) ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes

... Latinised in the Latin Lives. The Irish lives call him Beoit, a name analysed in the Book of Leinster, p. 349, into Beo-n-Aed, which would mean something like "Living Fire." The -n- is inserted, according to a law of Old Irish accidence, because aed, "fire," is a neuter word. Thus arises the Latin form Beonnadus. By metathesis the name further becomes transformed to Beodan or Beoan. The Latharna were the people who dwelt around the site of the modern town of Larne, which preserves their ...
— The Latin & Irish Lives of Ciaran - Translations Of Christian Literature. Series V. Lives Of - The Celtic Saints • Anonymous

... the elegant philippics with which I was greeted. Suffice it to say that I found all the big ones against me, and the little ones neuter; the caterer supposing I had received suitable admonition for my future guidance, and that I was completely bound over to keep the peace—turned all the youngsters out of the berth. "As for you, Mr Fistycuff," said he, addressing himself to me, "you may walk off with the rest of the gang, so ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat

... Nations that rest neuter and at Peace with the World during a War with other Nations, have a Right to navigate freely on the Seas as they navigated before that War broke out, and to proceed to and enter the Port or Ports of any of the Belligerent Powers, with the consent of that ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine

... primitive noun; when it means "a blow on the cheek with the palm of the hand," it is a verbal substantive. Exactly the same number of curiosities distinguished "locus." In five instances it was masculine; when it signified "a seat in a theatre" it was neuter; this was familiar to every Roman with a lettered education: unfortunately it slipped the memory of Bracciolini when he wrote: An. XV. 32: "equitum Romanorum locos sedilibus plebis anteposuit apud Circum." ...
— Tacitus and Bracciolini - The Annals Forged in the XVth Century • John Wilson Ross

... Knvas read, 'He who dwells in knowledge' (vijna; III, 7, 16), but instead of this the Mdhyandinas read 'he who dwells in the Self,' and so make clear that what the Knvas designate as 'knowledge' really is the knowing Self.—That the word vijna, although denoting the knowing Self, yet has a neuter termination, is meant to denote it as something substantial. We hence conclude that he who is different from the Self consisting of knowledge, i.e. the individual Self, is the highest Self ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Ramanuja - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 48 • Trans. George Thibaut

... those knights in whom the true spirit of chivalry found rest. Pre-eminent amongst these was the noble Earl of Gloucester. His duty to his sovereign urged him to take the field; his attachment for the Bruce would have held him neuter, for the ties that bound brothers in arms were of no common or wavering nature. Brothers in blood had frequently found themselves opposed horse to horse, and lance to lance, on the same field, and no scruples of conscience, no pleadings of ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar

... some opinions in which a man should stand neuter[117], without engaging[118] his assent to one side or the other. Such a hovering faith as this, which refuses to settle upon any determination[119], is absolutely necessary in a mind that is careful to avoid errors and ...
— The De Coverley Papers - From 'The Spectator' • Joseph Addison and Others

... of "accidents,'' from the Latin neuter plural accidentia, casual events), the term for the grammatical changes to which words are subject in their inflections as to gender, number, tense and case. It is also used to denote a book containing the first principles of grammar, and so of the rudiments ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... selection; for if this be admitted, we can hardly avoid extending the same conclusion to their mutual infertility. Sterility moreover has been acquired through natural selection for other and widely different purposes, as with neuter insects in reference to their social economy. In the case of plants, the flowers on the circumference of the truss in the guelder-rose (Viburnum opulus) and those on the summit of the spike in the feather-hyacinth ...
— The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Volume II (of 2) • Charles Darwin

... was ludicrously contrasted by his embarrassed desire not to involve himself or the Pope in any untoward consequences that might ensue,—Rienzi motioned to two heralds that stood behind upon the platform, and one of these advancing, proclaimed—"That as it was desirable that all hitherto neuter should now profess themselves friends or foes, so they were invited to take at once the oath of obedience to the laws, and ...
— Rienzi • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... its petals somewhat enlarged, and these are of a dark purplish-red tint; but it cannot be supposed that this one small flower makes the large white umbel at all more conspicuous to insects. The central flowers are said to be neuter or sterile, but I obtained by artificial fertilisation a seed (fruit) apparently perfect from one such flower. (Introduction/12. 'The English Flora' by Sir J.E. Smith 1824 volume 2 page 39.) Occasionally two or three of the flowers next to the central one are similarly ...
— The Different Forms of Flowers on Plants of the Same Species • Charles Darwin

... shall hold myself neuter—will that satisfy you? You shall have a clear stage and no favor, which, if you be a man of spirit, ...
— The Emigrants Of Ahadarra - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton

... and himself gave the signal for applause. It was acted upon from some of the boxes, but the impassible pit was more silent than ever; leaving the affair entirely between the stage and the upper regions, they obstinately remained neuter. The master of Europe and France then cast a furious look at this handful of men who dared not to admire his work, feeling in his heart the wish of Nero, and thought for a moment how happy he should be if all those men had ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet

... (i.e. These things under God, we have done for ourselves, through the guidance of wisdom, and with the permission of fortune.) Luck gave him nothing: in her most generous moods, she only worked with him as with a friend, not for him as for a fondling; but more often she simply stood neuter, and suffered him to work for himself. Ah! how could I be otherwise than affected by whatever reminded me of that daily and familiar intercourse with him, which made the fifteen months from May, 1804, to October, ...
— Confessions of an Inquiring Spirit etc. • by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... That soil full many a wringing despot saw, Who worked his wantonness in form of law; Long war without and frequent broil within Had made a path for blood and giant sin, That waited but a signal to begin New havoc, such as civil discord blends, Which knows no neuter, owns but foes or friends; 810 Fixed in his feudal fortress each was lord, In word and deed obeyed, in soul abhorred. Thus Lara had inherited his lands, And with them pining hearts and sluggish hands; But that long absence from his ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron

... whatever. Burke, I think, somewhere remarked something to this effect,—that when society is in the last stage of depravity—when all parties are alike corrupt, and alike wicked and unjustifiable in their measures and objects, a good man may content himself with standing neuter, a sad and disheartened spectator of the conflict between the rival vices. But are we in this wretched condition? It is fearful to see with what avidity the worst and most dangerous characters of society seize on the occasion of obtaining the countenance of better men, ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various

... the Father and I." 17:3—"And this is life eternal that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ." The content of saving faith includes belief in Jesus Christ equally with the Father. 10:30—"I and my Father are one." "One" is neuter, not masculine, meaning that Jesus and the Father constitute one power by which the salvation of man is secured. 2 Thess. 2:16, 17—"Now our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God, even our Father...comfort your hearts." ...
— The Great Doctrines of the Bible • Rev. William Evans

... second step: 'Baptizing them into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.' Who are to be baptized? Now, notice, if I may venture upon being slightly technical for a moment, that the word 'nations' in the preceding clause is a neuter one, and that the word for 'them' in this clause is a masculine, which seems to me fairly to imply that the command 'baptizing them' does not refer to 'all nations,' but to the disciples latent among them, and to be drawn ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII • Alexander Maclaren

... for retracting his promise to stand neuter, is as curious as his doing so is natural. The unfortunate John of France was wont to say, that, if truth and faith were banished from all the rest of the universe, they should still reside in the breast and ...
— Minstrelsy of the Scottish border (3rd ed) (1 of 3) • Walter Scott

... Even in love you tote your grammar along with you, and arrange a divine passion under the active, passive, and neuter!" ...
— A Brace Of Boys - 1867, From "Little Brother" • Fitz Hugh Ludlow

... date operam ut illa nefanda schisma eradicetur," exclaims Sigismund, intent on having the Bohemian Schism well dealt with,—which he reckons to be of the feminine gender. To which a Cardinal mildly remarking, "Domine, schisma est generis neutrius (Schisma is neuter, your Majesty),"—Sigismund loftily replies, "Ego sum Rex Romanus et super grammaticam (I am King of the Romans, and above Grammar)!" [Wolfgang Mentzel, Geschichte der Deutschen, i. 477.] For which reason I call him in my Note-books ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol, II. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Of Brandenburg And The Hohenzollerns—928-1417 • Thomas Carlyle

... consonants, to explain which properly would require more space than I can afford. {27} The nouns are of two numbers, the singular and plural, and a few have a dual number. The genders are three, the Masculine, the Feminine and the Neuter. There are twelve plural terminations of nouns, of which the most common is au. Some substantives are what the grammarians call aggregate plurals, {28} "which are not used in the plural without the addition of diminutive terminations, for example adar, ...
— Wild Wales - Its People, Language and Scenery • George Borrow

... That, as became common friends, they should wish for peace to both parties, and not intermeddle in the war." Archidamus, ambassador of the Aetolians, made nearly the same request: that, as was their easiest and safest way, they should stand neuter; and, as mere spectators of the war, wait for the decision of the fortunes of others, without any hazard to their own interests. He afterwards was betrayed, by the intemperance of language, into invectives, sometimes against the Romans in general, sometimes ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius

... feminine. freq. frequentative. gen. genitive. ger. gerundive. impers. impersonal. indecl. indeclinable. indef. indefinite. infin. infinitive. interrog. interrogative. loc. locative. m. masculine. n. neuter. part. participle. pass. passive. perf. perfect. pers. personal. plur. plural. prep. preposition. pron. pronoun or pronominal. rel. relative. sing. ...
— Ritchie's Fabulae Faciles - A First Latin Reader • John Kirtland, ed.

... tail of the giraffe; the otter-like polecat (Mustela vison); the flying habit of the bat; the penguin and the logger-headed duck; flying fish; the whale-like habit of the bear; the woodpecker; diving petrels; the eye; the swimming bladder; Cirripedes; neuter insects; ...
— The Foundations of the Origin of Species - Two Essays written in 1842 and 1844 • Charles Darwin

... same author, considering the problem of the women of the common type that are classified as a "third sex," that of temperamental neuter, says: ...
— Sex-education - A series of lectures concerning knowledge of sex in its - relation to human life • Maurice Alpheus Bigelow

... language, which was enough, Ralph said, to drive a man distracted. They asked it various questions—were delighted with its replies—called its attention to the chickens—and evidently labored under the impression that it understood. They addressed the baby uniformly in the neuter gender, and requested to know whether it was not their darling. To all which the baby replied with thoughtful stares, only occasionally condescending to laugh. The feet having been examined again—there is much in babies' feet—the party ...
— The Last of the Foresters • John Esten Cooke

... Speaking of a passage cited by Joannes Andreae, in his gloss on the preface to the Clementines, he asks, "who is the Anglicus Poeta?" and "what is the name of his poem," in which it is said to the pope, "Nec Deus es nec homo, quasi neuter es ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 45, Saturday, September 7, 1850 • Various

... perhaps nothing less than he is a free agent; when he believes himself bound to act conformably to the laws, which he has sworn to observe, or which he cannot violate without wounding his justice. The theologian is a man who may be very fairly estimated neuter; because he destroys with one hand what he establishes ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 2 • Baron D'Holbach



Words linked to "Neuter" :   masculine, asexual, sterilize, sterilise, fix, defeminise, desexualize, desexualise, gender, desex, alter, grammatical gender, unsex, feminine, defeminize, nonsexual



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