accelerate

t. [In Fr. accélérer; Ital. accelerare = to hasten ad to; celero = to hasten; celer quick: Gr. κέλης ( keles ) = a riding-horse, a courser; κέλλα ( kello ) = to drive on; from the root kel; in Sansc. kal, kalyâmi = to drive or urge. Po ibly remotely connected with the Heb., Aram., and Eth. gala to be light in weight, to be swift.] [CELERITY.] 1. Lit : To cause a moving body, a planet for example, to move more rapidly. a disturbing force oblique to the line joining the moon and earth, which in some situations acts to accelerate, in others to retard her elliptical annual motion." Herschel Astron ., 9th edit., § 415. 2. In the Natural World : To quicken development, e.g., the growth of a plant or animal. 3. To hasten proceedings in a deliberative body, or to precipitate the coming of an event by removing the causes which delay its approach. could do little or nothing to accelerate the proceedings of the Congre ."-Macaulay: Hist. Eng., ch. xxii. ăc-çel-er-ā-těd, pa . par . & a . [ACCELERATE.] has proceeded, during the nineteenth, with accelerated velocity."-Macaulay: Hist . Eng . , ch. iii. Nat. Phil.: Accelerated motion is that of which the velocity is continually becoming greater and greater. If the increase of speed is equal in equal times, it is called uniformly accelerated motion ; but if unequal, then it is denominated variably accelerated motion. The fall of a stone to the ground is an example of uniformly accelerated motion . ăc-çel-er-ā-ting, pr. par. & s. [ACCELERATE.] 1. As a participle : the gravity of the accelerating force ceases to act."-Gregory: Hauy's Nat. Phil., p. 51. 2. As substantive: Hastening. and, it may be, in the spring, the accelerating would have been the speedier. -Lord Bacon: Works (1765), vol. 1.