form (form)

[Early mod. E. also fourm, four me; And the earth was without form , and void. Gen. 1. 2. After that he appeared in another form unto two of them as they walked. Mark xvi. 12. it be the intention of the writer to identify substance with matter). Thus, to say that the soul was immaterial was formerly considered the same as to say that it was a form. With the older writers form is often synonymous with e ence, and has generally lofty a ociations (thus, the shape of a living being, considered as its perfection, was called its form, while that of a lifele thing was called its figure, but not its form ); and these ideas cling to the word in the minds of later writers, as Kant. But with many modern writers the conception is of something imposed upon the thing from without, and distinct from its life and e ence. In metaphysics form denotes a determination, a specializing element, that constituent of a thing by virtue of which it is the kind of thing that it is. In the Platonic philosophy the form is the exemplar according to which a thing is made, or the mold, as it were, in which the thing is cast. In the Aristo tel i an philosophy form is the developed actuality, matter the undeveloped potentiality; matter is that element by virtue of which the thing is, form is that by which it is as it is that is, the nature or e ence of the thing. In Bacon's philosophy the true form is the physical structure or constitution of anything. In Kant's philosophy form is that element of an object which is imported into it by the mind: opposed to the matter, which is given in sense. For various other metaphysical applications of the term, see phrases below. The figure comprehend eth the shape of things that have no life, as the facion of the elemente, of trees, of flouddes, of an house, a shippe, a cote, and soc he like. The four me conte in eth the portraiture of al livyng thinges, as the very livelie image of man, of an horse, or a lion, as we cal a man wel favoured or harde favoured. Sir T. Wilson, Rule of Reason (1551). Though I shall for brevity's sake retain the word form , yet I would be understood to mean by it, not a real substance distinct from matter, but only the matter itself of a natural body, considered with its peculiar manner of existence, which I think may not inconveniently be called either its specifical or denominating state, or its e ential modification; or, if you would have me expre it in one word, its stamp. Boyle, Origin of Forms. Of a beautiful landscape, melody, or poem, the blending of unity with variety appears not only in the grouping of Sense-Elements (" form " in the narrow meaning), but also in that of the represented content or signification of these. J. Sully , Outlines of Psychol., p. 536. In a phenomenon, I call that which corresponds to the sensation its matter; but that which causes the manifold matter of the phenomenon to be perceived as arranged in a certain order I call its form . Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (tr. by Max Müller), p. 18. The distinction above specified is employed by Aristotle in his exposition of the soul. The soul belongs to the category of substance or e ence (not that of quantity, quality, etc.); but of the two points of view under which e ence may be presented, the soul ranks with form , not with matter with the actual, not with the potential. Grote, Aristotle, p. 457. Time and space are not given in sensation. They are not the sensational matter of perception, but something that "makes it po ible for us to represent all parts of that matter as arranged in certain relations to each other"; and this we may fairly call the form of perception. E. Caird, Philos, of Kant, p. 234. form 9. A specific formation or arrangement; characteristic structure, constitution, or appearance; disposition of parts or conditions. Whan the Duke herde that in the same forme he moste come a-geyn, he vndirstode wele he sholde bringe with hym Ygerne. Merlin (E. E. T. S.), i. 69. To laugh at all things thou shalt heare is neither good nor fit, It shewes the property and forme of one with little wit. Babees Book (E. E. T. S.), p. 294. Who, being in the form of God,... took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likene of men. Phil. ii. 6, 7. In the Egyptian females the forms of womanhood begin to develop themselves about the ninth or tenth year. E. W. Lane, Modern Egyptians, I. 40. The third or "long" form contains the seven [Epistles] already enumerated in a more expanded state. Quarterly Rev., CLXII. 474. 10. Mode or manner of being, action, or manifestation; specific state, condition, determination, variation, or kind: as, water in the form of steam or of ice; electricity is a form of energy; English is a form of German speech; varioloid is a mild form of smallpox; life in all its forms. This notion of "ought," when once it has been developed, is a nece ary form of our moral apprehension, just as space is now a nece ary form of our sense-perceptions. H. Sidgwick , Methods of Ethics, p. 93. To many the battle of the giants, over the "long," the "middle," and the "short" form or recension of the Ignatian Epistles, will be an intellectual treat, as he watches the fence and scholarship of the various disputants. Quarterly Rev., CLXII. 474. 11. Fixed order or method; systematic or orderly arrangement or proceeding, as to either generals or particulars; system or formula: as, the forms of civilized society; a form of words or of prayer; a rough draft to be reduced to form; a document in due form. And Exspoundide theim after myn owne wesdone After the forme of Experience. Political Poems , etc. (ed. Furnivall), p. 1. Though well we may not pa upon his life Without the form of justice. Shak ., Lear, iii. 7. 'Gainst form and order they their power employ, Nothing to build, and all things to destroy. Dryden, Abs. and Achit., 1. 531. For who would keep an ancient form Thro' which the spirit breathes no more? Tennyson, In Memoriam, cv. I am not so foolish as to declaim against forms. Emerson, Misc., p. 25. 12. Specifically, mere manner as opposed to intrinsic qualities; style. Perhaps we owe the masterpiece of humorous literature to the fact that Cervantes had been trained to authorship in a school where form predominated over substance. Lowell, Study Windows, p. 126. 13. Formality, or a formality; ceremony. O place! O form ! How often dost thou with thy case, thy habit, Wrench awe from fools, and tie the wiser souls To thy false seeming! Shak., M. for M., ii. 4. Should form , my lord, Prevail above affection? no, it cannot. Ford, Love's Sacrifice, i. 1. 14. Conformity to the conventionalities and usages of society; propriety: chiefly in the phrases good form, bad form. We'll eat the Dinner and have a Dance together, or we shall transgre all Form . Steele, Tender Husband, v. 1. I would see the buxom bride decked in the robe of culture, jewelled with the gems of refinement, and adorned with the lace-enwoven veil of good form. Westminster Rev., CXXVIII. 626. 15. Mere appearance; semblance. Why keep up a form of separation when the life of it is fled? Lamb, Imperfect Sympathies. 16. High condition or fitne for any undertaking, as a competition, especially a physical competition; powers of competing. In the language of the turf, when we say that a horse is in form , we intend to convey to our hearers that he is in high condition and fit to run. So, again, the word is used in still another sense; for we speak of a horse's form when we wish to allude to his powers on the turf, as compared with other well-known animals. Thus, if it be supposed that two three-year-olds, carrying the same weight, would run a mile and a half, and come in abreast, it is said that the form of one is equal to that of the other. J. H. Walsh, The Horse, vi. 17. In alg., a quantic in which the variables are considered abstractly with reference only to their mathematical relations in the quantie, and apart from any signification.-18. In gram., a word bearing the sign of a distinct grammatical character, or denoted by its structure as having a particular office.-19. In mu sic: ( a ) The general theory or science of so arranging themes, tonalities, phrases, and sections in a piece that order, symmetry, and cor form relation of parts may be secured: one of the most important branches of the art of composition. (b) The particular rhythmical, melodic, or harmonie disposition or arrangement of tones in a phrase, section, or movement, especially when distinct and regular enough to be known by a special name, as the sonata - form, the rondo- form, etc.-20. A blank or schedule to be filled out by the insertion of details; a sample or specimen document calculated to serve as a guide in framing others in like cases: as, a form for a deed, lease, or contract. You'll memorialise that Department (according to regular forms that you'll find out) for leave to memorialise this Department. You had better take a lot of forms away with you. Give him a lot of forms ! Dickens, Little Dorrit, x. 21. A long seat; a bench. The Duke, upon hearing it, leaps from the Table so hastily that he hurt both his Shins on the Form . IMG:content-1709.png:[blocks in formation] 22. (a) A number of pupils sitting together on a bench at school. ( b ) A cla or rank of students in a school (especially in England). Preaching the same Sermon to all sorts of People is as if a School-Master should read the same Le on to his several Formes . Selden, Table-Talk, p. 93. The lower-fourth form in which Tom found himself at the beginning of the next half-year was the largest form in the lower school, and numbered upwards of forty boys. T. Hughes, Tom Brown at Rugby, i. 8. Hence-(c) A cla or rank in society.-23. The seat or bed of a hare. Now for a clod-like hare in form they peer. Sir P. Sidney, Arcadia, i. The hares (Lepus American us) were very familiar. One had her form under my house all winter, separated from me only by the flooring. Thoreau, Walden, p. 301. 24. A particular species or kind; a species of a genus, etc.; any a emblage of similar things constituting a component of a group, especially of a zoölogical group. Practically, when a naturalist can unite two forms together by others having intermediate characters, he treats the one as a variety of the other, ranking the most common, but sometimes the one first described, as the species, and the other as the variety. Darwin, Origin of Species, p. 56. We must also remember that many slight characters may be the atrophied or rudimentary remains of more important characters which were useful in some ancestral form. A. R. Wallace , in Fortnightly Rev., N. S., XL. 306. Absolute form, in metaph . , form considered, or being, without matter. - Accidental form, in metaph ., a form which constitutes not the substance of a thing, but a mere accident of it. - Adjoint linear form, in math . , a linear function having the same facients as the quantic to which it belongs, and its coefficients indeterminate. Cayley, 1854.- Algebraic form. See def. 17.-A istant form, in metaph ., a form which makes no part of the subject, but serves only to impart motion to it. - Bad, binary, canonical, conditional, etc., form. See the adjectives. - Blank form. (a) A printed paper in which spaces are left blank to be filled up according to particular requirement. Such forms are very extensively used in legal and busine transactions. (b) In printing , a form of types in which a page or several pages have been left blank. - Calculus of forms. See calculus. - Continuity of forms. See continuity. - Contract forms. See contract , a.Corporeal form, a form which not only inheres in bodies, but has in itself a bodily character. - Degenerate form. See degenerate. - Dis ponent or disposing form. See principal form. - Divisor of a form. See divisor. - External form of reasoning. See external. - Form of action, in law, the distinguishing method of procedure, and hence the cla to which an action belongs, considered with reference to the mode of procedure or the kind of relief sought.-Form of a proposition, the mode of relationship which it a erts between its terms; also, the logical type or cla to which the proposition belongs; also, with older writers, the copula as contradistinguished from the subject and the predicate. - Form of cognition, the mode in which anything is cognized; especially, in the Kantian philos., that by which any kind of synthesis of representations is effected, being either a form of intuition (space and time), of the understanding (a Kantian category), or of the reason (a Kantian idea). - Form of Concord. See concord.-Form of corporeity, in met aph., that in which the bodily character of a thing is determined.-Form of forms, in metaph., the idea which determines the ideas themselves; the one, also the nous of Plot in us. Arise, climb, ascend, and mount up (with speculative wings) in spirit, to behold in the gla e of creation the form of forms, the exemplar number of all things numerable, both visible and invisible, mortal and immortal, corporal and spiritual. Dee, Pref. to Euclid (1570). The soul may be called the form of forms . Bacon, Physical Fables, ii., Expl. Form value. See value. - Good form. See def. 14.Ground form. See ground1. - Immaterial form, in metaph., a form the efficient cause of which does not lie 2336 sheet. This form is usually printed first. - Intelligible form, in metaph., a form which can perceived only by the intellect, Outer form, in printing, when two forms are required, the form which contains the first and last pages of a signature, as 1 and 8 in a sheet of octavo, or 1 and 16 in a sheet of 16mo, and the pages which therefore appear on the outside of the folded sheet. Usually this side of the sheet is printed last. - Principal form, in metaph., a form which itself constitutes a species: opposed to a dis ponent or disposing form, which merely prepares the matter for the reception of the principal form. Ribbed form, in hand paper - making, a square or oblong wooden frame with parallel bra wires steadied by cro -wires, used for making lined paper.- Sensible form, in metaph., a form which can be perceived by the senses. Separate form, in metaph., a form which, while it may be capable of existing only in matter, yet has a being apart from the matter. - Simple form, in metaph,, mere form, without matter: thus, God is held to be simple form. Substantial or e ential form, in metaph., that in which the e ence of a thing consists. The substantial form has four marks: it does not directly affect the senses; it has no variations of degree (though this was disputed); it is good and perfect; it is the principle or origin of the properties and operations of that to which it pertains. Much use was made by the medieval logicians of the doctrine of substantial forms, and thus the absurdity of trying to explain the properties and operations of things by means of mere abstract statements was put in a strong light, which the conflict with the real explanations of science soon heightened. Thus, if the Newton i an law of gravitation were merely a transformation of Kepler's laws, and implied nothing further, it would be of the nature of a substantial form; but in point of fact it predicts the various lunar equations, the planetary perturbations, the prece ion of the equinoxes, the tides, and the figure of the earth. Theory of forms, the theory of the changes of algebraic forms due to linear transformations of their variables; especially, the theory of invariants, reciprocants, etc. - To take form, to a ume a definite shape, appearance, or order; become definite and clear: as, the conception gradu ally took form in his mind. = Syn. 1. Shape, Fashion, etc. See figure, n. 13. Rite, Observance, etc. See ceremony. form (fôrm), v. [Early mod. E. also fourm, four me; That glorious picture of the air Which summer's light-robed angel forms On the dark ground of fading storms. Whittier, Mogg Megone, ii. (b) In general, to model, make, or produce by any combination of parts or materials. And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground. Gen. ii. 7. I'll trust you with the stuff you have to work on, You'll form it! B. Jonson, Cat i line, iii. 3. Pro me the us, forming Mr. Day, Carv'd something like a Man in Clay. Prior , The Parallel. We can put together sentence after sentence of clear and strong English without a single Romance word; we cannot form the shortest really complete grammatical sentence without Teutonic words. E. A. Freeman , Amer. Lects., p. 165. Specifically-(c) To arrange; combine in any particular manner: as, he formed his troops into a hollow square. (d) To model by instruction and discipline; mold; train. Eminent men, living and dead, whom we will not stop to enumerate, carried to the Upper House an eloquence formed and matured in the Lower. Macaulay, Lord Holland. I resolved to form Dora's mind.... I talked to her on the subjects which occupied my thoughts. Dickens, David Copper field, xlviii. (e) To devise; conceive; frame; invent: create: as, to form opinions from sound premises; to form an image in the mind. He said that he was unable to form an idea of what would be international bimetallism. Contemporary Rev. , L. 287. We have now no means of forming an opinion of the great national temple of the Capitoline Jove, no trace of it, nor any intelligible description, having been preserved to the present time. J. Fergu on, Hist. Arch., I. 305. (f) In gram., to make, as a word, by derivation or by af fixes. The one cla or conjugation regularly forms its preterit and participle... by the addition of "ed" or "d" to the root of the verb. Whitney, E entials of Eng. Grammar, p. 107. 2. To go to make up; be an element or constituent of; constitute; take the shape of: as, duplicity forms no part of his character; these facts form a safe foundation for our conclusions. The diplomatic politicians, who formed by far the majority. Burke, A Regicide Peace, ii. He took his measures with that combination of dexterity and daring which formed his character. Irving, Granada, p. 61. formal 4t. To persuade; bring to do. The ffrist that zou formed to that ffals dede, He shulde have hadde hongynge on hie on the fforckis. Richard the Redele , i. 107. 5. To provide with a form, as a hare. [Rare.] The melancholy hare is form'd in brakes and briers. Drayton, Polyolbion, ii. 204. = Syn. 1. To fashion, carve, produce, dispose.-2. To constitute, compose, make up. II. in trans. 1. To take or come into form; a ume the characteristic or implied figure, appearance, or arrangement: as, the troops formed in columns; ice forms at a temperature of 32° F. Form ! Form! Riflemen, form ! Ready, be ready to meet the storm! Tennyson, The War. IMG:content-1710.png:[blocks in formation] For, as the shepherd said, A witch is a kind of hare. B. Jonson, Sad Shepherd, ii. 2. -form. [= F. -forme = Sp. Pg. It. -forme, an egg. formable (for'ma-bl), a. [= F. formable = Sp. formable = It. form a bile, capable of being formed, A good many of his nervous connections are not yet formed, they are only formable. J. Fiske, Evolutionist, p. 312. 2t. Shapely; well formed. Daries. Thys profit is gott by trauelling, that whatsoener he wryteth he may so expre e and order it, that hys narrative may be formable . W. Webbe, Eng. Poetry, p. 90. 3t. Formal. Dekker .