Crossword Dictionary

What's The Definition Of Abstract?

\Ab"stract`\ (#; 277), a. [L. abstractus, p. p. of abstrahere to draw from, separate; ab, abs + trahere to draw. See {Trace}.] 1. Withdraw; separate. [Obs.] The more abstract . . . we are from the body. --Norris. 2. Considered apart from any application to a particular object; separated from matter; existing in the mind only; as, abstract truth, abstract numbers. Hence: ideal; abstruse; difficult. 3. (Logic) (a) Expressing a particular property of an object viewed apart from the other properties which constitute it; -- opposed to {concrete}; as, honesty is an abstract word. --J. S. Mill. (b) Resulting from the mental faculty of abstraction; general as opposed to particular; as, ``reptile'' is an abstract or general name. --Locke. A concrete name is a name which stands for a thing; an abstract name which stands for an attribute of a thing. A practice has grown up in more modern times, which, if not introduced by Locke, has gained currency from his example, of applying the expression ``abstract name'' to all names which are the result of abstraction and generalization, and consequently to all general names, instead of confining it to the names of attributes. --J. S. Mill. 4. Abstracted; absent in mind. ``Abstract, as in a trance.'' --Milton. {An abstract idea} (Metaph.), an idea separated from a complex object, or from other ideas which naturally accompany it; as the solidity of marble when contemplated apart from its color or figure. {Abstract terms}, those which express abstract ideas, as beauty, whiteness, roundness, without regarding any object in which they exist; or abstract terms are the names of orders, genera or species of things, in which there is a combination of similar qualities. {Abstract numbers} (Math.), numbers used without application to things, as 6, 8, 10; but when applied to any thing, as 6 feet, 10 men, they become concrete. {Abstract} or {Pure mathematics}. See {Mathematics}.
\Ab*stract"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Abstracted}; p. pr. & vb. n. {Abstracting}.] [See {Abstract}, a.] 1. To withdraw; to separate; to take away. He was incapable of forming any opinion or resolution abstracted from his own prejudices. --Sir W. Scott. 2. To draw off in respect to interest or attention; as, his was wholly abstracted by other objects. The young stranger had been abstracted and silent. --Blackw. Mag. 3. To separate, as ideas, by the operation of the mind; to consider by itself; to contemplate separately, as a quality or attribute. --Whately. 4. To epitomize; to abridge. --Franklin. 5. To take secretly or dishonestly; to purloin; as, to abstract goods from a parcel, or money from a till. Von Rosen had quietly abstracted the bearing-reins from the harness. --W. Black. 6. (Chem.) To separate, as the more volatile or soluble parts of a substance, by distillation or other chemical processes. In this sense extract is now more generally used.
\Ab*stract"\, v. t. To perform the process of abstraction. [R.] I own myself able to abstract in one sense. --Berkeley.
\Ab"stract`\, n. [See {Abstract}, a.] 1. That which comprises or concentrates in itself the essential qualities of a larger thing or of several things. Specifically: A summary or an epitome, as of a treatise or book, or of a statement; a brief. An abstract of every treatise he had read. --Watts. Man, the abstract Of all perfection, which the workmanship Of Heaven hath modeled. --Ford. 2. A state of separation from other things; as, to consider a subject in the abstract, or apart from other associated things. 3. An abstract term. The concretes ``father'' and ``son'' have, or might have, the abstracts ``paternity'' and ``filiety.'' --J. S. Mill. 4. (Med.) A powdered solid extract of a vegetable substance mixed with sugar of milk in such proportion that one part of the abstract represents two parts of the original substance. {Abstract of title} (Law), an epitome of the evidences of ownership. Syn: Abridgment; compendium; epitome; synopsis. See {Abridgment}.