616 S T R 
whose footsteps naturally are right. Hooker. —To make 
tense; to tighten. 
STRAI'GHTENER, s. A director; one who sets right. 
STRAIGIIT'FORTH, adv. Directly; thenceforth. 
She smote the ground, the which straightforth did yield 
A fruitful olive tree. Spenser. 
STRAI'GHTLY, adv. In a right line; not crookedly.— 
Tightly; with tension.—The soul may deem herself too 
straitly girt up. More. 
STRAI'GHTNESS, s. Rectitude; the contrary to crook¬ 
edness.—Some are for masts, as fir and pine, because of 
their length and straightness. Bacon. —Tension ; tight¬ 
ness. 
STRAI'GHTWAY, adv. [It is very often written 
straightway s, and therefore is perhaps more properly written 
straight-wise.'] Immediately; straight. 
Like to a ship, that, having ’scap’d a tempest. 
Is straightway claim’d and boarded with a pirate. 
Shakspeare. 
To STRAIN, v. a. [estreindre, French.]—To squeeze 
through something.—Their aliment ought to be light, rice 
boiled in whey and strained. Arbuthnot. —To purify by 
filtration.—Earth doth not strain water so finely as sand. 
Bacon. —To squeeze in an embrace. 
Old Evander, with a close embrace, 
Strain'd his departing friend; and tears o’erflow’d his face. 
Dry den. 
To sprain; to weaken by too much violence.—The jury 
make no more scruple to pass against an Englishman and the 
queen, though it be to strain their oaths, than to drink milk 
unstrained. Spenser. 
Prudes decay’d about may tack, 
Strain their necks with looking back. Swift. 
To put to its.utmost strength. 
Thus mine enemy fell, 
And thus I set my foot on his neck;—even then 
The princely blood flows in his cheek, he sweats, 
Strains his young nerves, and puts himself in posture 
That acts my words. Shakspeare. 
To make strait or tense. 
Thou, the more he varies forms, beware 
To strain his fetters with a stricter care. Dryden. 
To push beyond the proper extent. 
See they suffer death. 
But in their deaths remember they are men. 
Strain not the laws to make their torture grievous. Addison. 
To force; to constrain ; to make uneasy or unnatural. 
The lark sings so out of tune. 
Straining harsh discords and unpleasing sharps. Shakspeare. 
To STRAIN, v. n. To make violent efforts. 
To build his fortune I will strain a little, 
For ’tis a bond in men. Shakspeare. 
To be filtered by compression.—Caesar thought that all 
sea-sands had natural springs of fresh water: but it is the 
sea-water; because the pit filled according to the measure of 
the tide, and the sea-water passing or straining through the 
sands, leaveth the saltness behind them. Bacon. 
STRAIN, s. An injury by too much violence.—Credit 
is gained by custom, and seldom recovers a strain; but if 
broken, is never well set again. Temple. —[ptpeng, Sax.] 
Race; generation ; descent. 
Thus far I can praise him; he is of a noble strain. 
Of approv’d valour. Shakspeare. 
Hereditary-disposition.—Amongst these sweet knaves and 
all this courtesy! the strain of man’s bred out into baboon 
and monkey. Shakspeare. —A style or manner of speaking. 
—'In our liturgy' are as great strains of true sublime elo¬ 
quence, as are any where to be found in our language. Swift. 
—Song; note; sound.—Wilt thou love such a woman ? 
S T R 
what, to make thee an instrument, and play false strains 
upon thee ? Shakspeare. 
Orpheus self may heave his head 
From golden slumber on a bed 
Of heap’d Elysian flowers, and hear 
Such strains as would have won the ear 
Of Pluto, to have quite set free 
His half-regain’d Eurydice. Milton. 
Rank ; character. 
But thou who lately of the common strain, 
Wert one of us, if still thou do’st retain 
The same ill habits, the same follies too. 
Still thou art bound to vice, and still a slave. Dryden. 
Turn ; tendency; inborn disposition.—Because heretics 
have a strain of madness, he applied her with some corporal 
chastisements, which with respite of time might haply reduce 
her to good order. Hayward. —Manner of speech or action. 
—Such take too high a strain at the first, and are mag¬ 
nanimous more than tract of years can uphold, as was Scipio 
Africanus, of whom Livy saith, ultima primis cedebant. 
Bacon. 
STRAI'NABLE, adj. Capable of being pushed beyond 
the proper extent.—A thing captious and strainable. 
Bacon. 
STRAFNER, s. An instrument of filtration. 
These when condens’d, the airy region pours 
On the dry earth, in rain or gentle showers, 
Th’ insinuating drops sink through the sand, 
And pass the porous strainers of the land. Blackmore. 
One who exerts his utmost strength. 
Is he therefore to be deemed 
Rude, or savage ? or esteemed 
But a sorry entertainer, 
’Cause he is no common strainer 
After painted nymphs for favours ? B. Jonson. 
STRAFNING, s. The act of filtration; the substance 
strained.—The act of putting to the utmost stretch.—Our 
words flow from us in a smooth continued stream, without 
those strainings of the voice, motions of the body, and 
majesty of the hand, which are so much celebrated in the 
orators of Greece and Rome. Atterbury. 
STRAINT, s. Violent tension. Not in use. 
Sir Artegall- 
Upon his iron coller griped fast. 
That with the straint his wesand nigh he brast. Spenser. 
STRAIT, adj. [stretto , Ital.] Narrow; close; not 
wide. 
Witnesses, like watches, go 
Just as they’re set, too fast or slow; 
And where in conscience they’re strait lac’d, 
’Tis ten to one that side is cast. Hudibras. 
Close; intimate.—He, forgetting all former injuries, had 
received that naughty Plexirtus into a straight degree of 
favour, his goodness being as apt to be deceived, as the other’s 
craft was to deceive. Sidney. —Strict; rigorous. 
Proceed no straiter ’gainst our uncle Glo’ster, 
Than from the evidence of good esteem 
He be approv’d in practice culpable. Shakspeare. ' 
Difficult; distressful.—Narrow; avaricious. 
I do not ask you much, 
I beg cold comfort; and you are so strait. 
And so ingrateful, you deny me that. Shakspeare. 
It is used in opposition to crooked, but is then more 
properly written straight. [See Straight]. —A bell or a 
cannon may be hear<l beyond a hill which intercepts the 
sight of the sounding body, and sounds are propagated as 
readily through crooked pipes as through straight ones. 
Newton. 
STRAIT, s. A narrow pass, or frith. 
Honour 
