day1 (da)

[Early mod. E. also daye, daie; And God called the light Day , and the darkne he called Night. Gen. i. 5. And always, night and day , he was in the mountains. Mark v. 5. It was the middle of the day . Ever the weary wind went on. Tennyson, Dying Swan. Bp. Heber, Hymn. Hence-2. Light; sunshine. I waited underneath the dawning hills. Tennyson, Enone. There has been gradually dawning upon those who think the conviction that a state-church is not so much a religious as a political institution. H. Spencer , Social Statics, p. 338. dawn (dân), n. [ dawn , v . The older nouns are dawing and dawning .] 1. The first appearance of daylight in the morning. Fairest of stars, last in the train of night, If better thou belong not to the dawn . Milton , P. L., v. 167. Full oft they met, as dawn and twilight meet In northern clime. Lowell, Legend of Britt any, ii. 5. 2. First opening or expansion; beginning; rise; first appearance: as, the dawn of intellect; the dawn of a new era. Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now. Byron, Childe Harold, iv. 182. But no cloud could overcast the dawn of so much genius and so much ambition. Macaulay , Warren Hastings. High dawn, the first indications of daylight seen above a bank of clouds. Qualtrough , Boat Sailer's Manual, p. 224. - Low dawn, daybreak on or near the horizon, the first streaks of light being low down. Qualtrough , Boat Sailer's Manual, p. 224. Let us walk honestly, as in the day . Rom. xiii, 13. It is directly in your way, we have day enough to perform our journey, and, as you like your entertainment, you may there repose yourself a day or two. Cotton , in Walton's Angler, ii. 225. While the day , Descending, struck athwart the hall, and shot A flying splendour out of bra and steel. Tennyson, Prince , vi. 3. The whole time or period of one revolution of the earth on its axis, or the space of twenty four hours; specifically, the interval of time which elapses between two consecutive returns of the same terrestrial meridian to the sun. In this latter specific sense it is called the natural, solar, or astronomical day. Since the length of this day is continually varying, owing to the eccentricity of the earth's orbit and the obliquity of the ecliptic, a mean solar day (the civil day ) is employed, which is the average period of one revolution of the earth on its axis relative to the sun's position considered as fixed. The day of twenty-four hours may be reckoned from noon to noon, as in the astronomical or nautical day, or from midnight to midnight, as in the civil day recognized in the United States, throughout the British empire, and in most of the countries of Europe. The Babylonians reckoned the civil day from sunrise to sunrise; the Umbrians, from noon to noon; the A then i ans and Hebrews, from sunset to sunset; and the Romans, from dawnering (dâ'ner-ing), p. a. Same as dander- midnight to midnight. ing. I lead a strange dawnering life at present; in general not a little relieved and quieted. Carlyle , in Froude, I. 108.