ASPIRE • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Aspire

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/əspˈaɪr/ Listen

verb

Aspire v. t. To aspire to; to long for; to try to reach; to mount to. (Obs.) "That gallant spirit hath aspired the clouds."

Aspire v. i. (past & past part. aspired; pres. part. aspiring)

To desire with eagerness; to seek to attain something high or great; to pant; to long; followed by to or after, and rarely by at; as, to aspire to a crown; to aspire after immorality. "Aspiring to be gods, if angels fell; Aspiring to be angels, men rebel."

To rise; to ascend; to tower; to soar. "My own breath still foments the fire, Which flames as high as fancy can aspire."

noun

Aspire n. Aspiration. (Obs.)

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Etymology of 'Aspire'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Aspire" Quotes from Famous Books

... over seventy years of age can claim to be excused from acting as guardian or curator, and by the older law persons less than twentyfive were similarly exempted. But our constitution, having forbidden the latter to aspire to these functions, has made excuses unnecessary. The effect of this enactment is that no pupil or person under twentyfive years of age is to be called to a statutory guardianship; for it was most incongruous to place persons under the guardianship or administration of those who are known themselves ...

— The Institutes of Justinian • Caesar Flavius Justinian

... men who, employing symbolical forms borrowed principally from the mason's trade and from architecture, work for the welfare of mankind, striving morally to ennoble themselves and others, and thereby to bring about a universal league of mankind, which they aspire to exhibit even now ...

— The Builders - A Story and Study of Masonry • Joseph Fort Newton

... an experience as genuine religion, and it is the most blessed estate that a soul can aspire to. There is a place for prayer in the divine economy of God's providence. But neither religion nor prayer can help a soul that is sick unto death with the malady of doubt. "Dodd" was thus circumstanced. It was ...

— The Evolution of Dodd • William Hawley Smith

... to her foibles, with which woman has been accustomed to be treated, and which have made her either the slave, the toy, or the ridicule of man; and it is getting to see that she is at least of as much relative importance as man; that without her he will in vain aspire to rise; that, by a law as infallible as that which moves and regulates the spheres, his condition is determined by hers; that wherever she has been a slave, he has been a tyrant, and that all oppression and injustice practised upon her has been sure in the end to rebound ...

— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 4, October, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... if not, we may at least console ourselves for its indefinite postponement, by reflecting that Omnipotence itself is, equally with ourselves, subject to the sort of necessity under which we are groaning; equally destitute of the sort of free-will to which we aspire. It is manifest that, since there cannot be omnipotence without boundless liberty, omnipotence must possess completest freedom of will. Yet even the Will of Omnipotence is subject to the despotism of causation. Divine perfection cannot but be ...

— Old-Fashioned Ethics and Common-Sense Metaphysics - With Some of Their Applications • William Thomas Thornton

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