Burke
[bə:k]
Definition
(noun.) British statesman famous for his oratory; pleaded the cause of the American colonists in British Parliament and defended the parliamentary system (1729-1797).
(verb.) get rid of, silence, or suppress; 'burke an issue'.
(verb.) murder without leaving a trace on the body.
Checker: Sophia--From WordNet
Definition
(v. t.) To murder by suffocation, or so as to produce few marks of violence, for the purpose of obtaining a body to be sold for dissection.
(v. t.) To dispose of quietly or indirectly; to suppress; to smother; to shelve; as, to burke a parliamentary question.
Inputed by Harlow
Synonyms and Antonyms
SYN:Stifle, shelve, strangle, smother
ANT:Enucleate, propound, promulge, publicate, promote, foster, reanimate,eliminate, ventilate, bruit, suscitate
Editor: Meredith
Definition
v.t. to murder esp. by stifling: hence (fig.) to put an end to quietly.
Inputed by Jules
Examples
- Burke, now:--when I think of Burke, I can't help wishing somebody had a pocket-borough to give you, Ladislaw. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- The voice of Burke was, however, hardly silent when the human mind suddenly awoke, and its march in the realms of government and of natural science since then cannot be regarded as slow. William Henry Doolittle. Inventions in the Century.
- Pocket-boroughs would be a fine thing, said Ladislaw, if they were always in the right pocket, and there were always a Burke at hand. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- The march of the human mind is slow, exclaimed Burke in his great speech on Conciliation with the Colonies. William Henry Doolittle. Inventions in the Century.
- When the Countess of Fitz-Willis (her Ladyship is of the Kingstreet family, see Debrett and Burke) takes up a person, he or she is safe. William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- That avalanche and the thunder, now, was really a little like Burke. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- Burke has said that, 'in all bodies those who would lead, must also, in a considerable degree, follow. Mary Shelley. The Last Man.
- You don't mean to say he was burked, Sam? Charles Dickens. The Pickwick Papers.
Checked by Lemuel