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Lose   /luz/   Listen
verb
Lose  v. t.  (past & past part. lost; pres. part. losing)  
1.
To part with unintentionally or unwillingly, as by accident, misfortune, negligence, penalty, forfeit, etc.; to be deprived of; as, to lose money from one's purse or pocket, or in business or gaming; to lose an arm or a leg by amputation; to lose men in battle. "Fair Venus wept the sad disaster Of having lost her favorite dove."
2.
To cease to have; to possess no longer; to suffer diminution of; as, to lose one's relish for anything; to lose one's health. "If the salt hath lost his savor, wherewith shall it be salted?"
3.
Not to employ; to employ ineffectually; to throw away; to waste; to squander; as, to lose a day; to lose the benefits of instruction. "The unhappy have but hours, and these they lose."
4.
To wander from; to miss, so as not to be able to and; to go astray from; as, to lose one's way. "He hath lost his fellows."
5.
To ruin; to destroy; as destroy; as, the ship was lost on the ledge. "The woman that deliberates is lost."
6.
To be deprived of the view of; to cease to see or know the whereabouts of; as, he lost his companion in the crowd. "Like following life thro' creatures you dissect, You lose it in the moment you detect."
7.
To fail to obtain or enjoy; to fail to gain or win; hence, to fail to catch with the mind or senses; to miss; as, I lost a part of what he said. "He shall in no wise lose his reward." "I fought the battle bravely which I lost, And lost it but to Macedonians."
8.
To cause to part with; to deprive of. (R.) "How should you go about to lose him a wife he loves with so much passion?"
9.
To prevent from gaining or obtaining. "O false heart! thou hadst almost betrayed me to eternal flames, and lost me this glory."
To lose ground, to fall behind; to suffer gradual loss or disadvantage.
To lose heart, to lose courage; to become timid. "The mutineers lost heart."
To lose one's head, to be thrown off one's balance; to lose the use of one's good sense or judgment, through fear, anger, or other emotion. "In the excitement of such a discovery, many scholars lost their heads." To lose one's self.
(a)
To forget or mistake the bearing of surrounding objects; as, to lose one's self in a great city.
(b)
To have the perceptive and rational power temporarily suspended; as, we lose ourselves in sleep. To lose sight of.
(a)
To cease to see; as, to lose sight of the land.
(b)
To overlook; to forget; to fail to perceive; as, he lost sight of the issue.



Lose  v. i.  (past & past part. lost; pres. part. losing)  To suffer loss, disadvantage, or defeat; to be worse off, esp. as the result of any kind of contest. "We 'll... hear poor rogues Talk of court news; and we'll talk with them too, Who loses and who wins; who's in, who's out."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Lose" Quotes from Famous Books



... the easterly route you will have gained a day, and instead of its being Wednesday, as you might think, it would be Tuesday, wherefore you would be obliged to have two Wednesdays in one week. By the westerly route, on the contrary, you would lose a day, so that returning on a Wednesday by your reckoning you would find everyone else calling it Thursday, and the following morning you would be obliged to ...
— Life and sport in China - Second Edition • Oliver G. Ready

... will beguile"—to the drunken messenger who allowed the letter carried by him to be stolen from him,—and to the treacherous Queen-mother who caused them to be stolen. Indeed, in addressing the last-named personage, the poet seems to lose all control over himself. ...
— Chaucer • Adolphus William Ward

... the King to him, "is it thus you acknowledge my favours and your obligations? My justice saved you when I believed you innocent: guilty now, it condemns you to lose your sight." ...
— Eastern Tales by Many Story Tellers • Various

... probably in each of the principal European capitals, on Peace. Now, God restrain me from saying, much more from doing, anything rash. But if I've got to go home at all, I'd rather go before he comes. It'll take years for the American Ambassadors to recover what they'll lose if he carry out this plan. They now laugh at him here. Only the President's great personality saves the situation in foreign relations. Of course the public here doesn't know how utterly unorganized the State Department is—how we can't get ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume I • Burton J. Hendrick

... place. She was veiled in two veils, but she had been seen in the train without these, and some of her fellow-travellers, though strangers to her, were walking near her in a hypocritical way, hoping still not to lose sight of her, even veiled. And although the shroudings permitted the most meagre information of her features, what they did reveal was harmfully piquant; moreover, there was a sweetness of figure, a disturbing grace; while nothing could disguise her air of wearing that many violets casually as ...
— Gentle Julia • Booth Tarkington


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