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for their visibility, upon the dimness of the light they are 
beheld by. Boyle. —State of being apparent, or openly 
discoverable; conspicuousness.—In these, the visibility and 
example of our virtues will chiefly consist. Rogers. 
VI'SIBLE, adj. [yisibilis, Lat.] Perceptible by the eye. 
On this mount he appeared ; under this tree 
Stood visible ; and I- 
Here with him at this fountain talk’d. Milt-on. 
Discovered to the eye. 
If that the heavens do not their visible spirits 
Send quickly down to tame the vile offences, 
Humanity must perforce prey on itself. 
Like monsters of the deep. Shakspeare. 
Apparent; open; conspicuous.—The factions at court 
were greater, or more visible than before. Clarendon. 
VI'SIBLE, s. Perceptibility by the eye.— Visibles work 
upon a looking-glass, which is like the pupil of the eye; and 
audibles upon the places of echo, which resemble the cavern 
of the ear. Bacon , 
VI'SIBLENESS, s. State or quality of being visible. 
VI'SIBLY, adv. In a manner perceptible by the eye.— 
The day being visibly governed by the sun, is a little longer 
than the revolution of the equator; so much as is occasioned 
by the advance of the sun in his annual contrary motion 
along the ecliptic. Holder. 
VISINGSOE, the principal island of the lake of Wetter, in 
the south of Sweden. 
Vl'SION, s. [visio, Lat.] Sight; the faculty of seeing.— 
Anatomists, when they have taken off from the bottom of the 
eye that outward and most thick coat called the dura mater, 
can then see through the thinner coats, the pictures of objects 
livelily painted thereon. And these pictures, propagated by 
motion along the fibres of the optic nerves into the brain, 
are the cause of vision. Newton. —The act of seeing.— 
Vision in the next life is the perfecting of faith in this ; or 
faith here is turned into vision there, as hope into enjoying. 
Hammond. —A supernatural appearance ; a spectre ; a phan¬ 
tom ; a dream ; something shewn in a dream.—A dream 
happens to a sleeping, a vision may happen to a waking man. 
A dream is supposed natural, a vision miraculous; but they 
are confounded. 
His dream returns; his friend appears again : 
The murd’rer’s come; now help, or I am slain! 
‘Twas but a vision still, and visions are but vain. Dryden. 
Any appearance; any thing which is the object of sight. 
These, [colours,] when the clouds distil the rosy shower. 
Shine out distinct adown the watery bow, 
While o’er our heads the dewy vision bends, 
Delightful, melting in the fields beneath. Thomson . 
Vl'SIONAL, adj. Pertaining to a vision.—It remains to 
be considered, whether the want of that single circumstance 
be sufficient to make us think it was not a vision, See. So 
much in favour of the visional construction. Waterland. 
VI'SIONARY, adj. [visionnaire , French.] Affected by 
phantoms; disposed to receive impressions on the imagina¬ 
tion. 
No more these scenes my meditation aid. 
Or lull to rest the visionary maid. Pope. 
Imaginary ; not real; seen in a dream ; perceived by the 
imagination only. 
The hounds at nearer distance hoarsely bray’d; 
The hunter close pursu’d the visionary maid. Dryden. 
VI'SIONARY, or Vi'sionist, s. [visionnaire, French.] 
One whose imagination is disturbed.—The crazy fancies of 
every idle visionist. Spencer. —The lovely visionary gave 
him perpetual uneasiness. Female Quixote. 
To VI'SIT, v. a. [ visito, Lat.] To go to see.—You must 
go visit the lady that lies in.—I visit her with my prayers; 
but I cannot go thither. Shakspeare —[In scriptural lan¬ 
guage.] To send good or evil judicially.—When God 
visiteth, what shall 1 answer him? Job. —God visit thee 
in good things. Judith. —To salute with a present.—Sam¬ 
son visited his wife with a kid. Judges. —To come to a 
survey, with judicial authority.—The bishop ought to visit 
his diocese every year in person. Ayliffe. 
To VI'SIT, v. n. To keep up the intercourse of cere¬ 
monial salutations at the houses of each other.—Whilst she 
was under her mother she was forced to be genteel, to live in 
ceremony, to sit up late at nights, to be in the folly of every 
fashion, and always visiting on Sundays. Law. 
VI'SIT, s. [visite, Fr., from the verb.] The act of going 
to see another.—In a designed or accidental visit, let some 
one take a book, which may be agreeable, and read in it. 
IFatts. 
Vl'SITABLE, adj. Liable to be visited.—All hospitals 
built since the reformation, are visitable by the king or lord 
chancellor. Ayliffe. 
VI'SITANT, s. One who goes to see another. 
He alone 
To find where Adam shelter’d, took Iris way. 
Not unperceiv’d of Adam, who to Eve, 
While the great visitant approach’d, thus spake. Milton. 
VISITATION, s. [visito , Lat.] The act of visiting. 
What would you with the princess?- 
-Nothing but peace and gentle visitation. Shakspeare. 
Object of visits. 
O flowers. 
My early visitation, and my last. Milton. 
[visitation, Fr.] Judicial visit or perambulation.—Your 
grace, in your metropolitical visitation, hath begun a good 
work in taking this into your religious consideration; and 
you have endeavoured a reformation. White. —Judicial evil 
sent by God; state of suffering judicial evil.—That which 
thou dost not understand when thou readest, thou shalt un¬ 
derstand in the day of thy visitation. For many secrets of 
religion are not perceived till they be felt, and are not felt 
but in the day of a great calamity. Bp. Taylor. —Com¬ 
munication of divine love.—The most comfortable visita¬ 
tions God hath sent men from above, have taken especially 
the times of prayer as their most natural opportunities. 
Hooker. 
VISITATORIAL, adj. Belonging to a judicial visitor.— 
Some will have it, that an archdeacon does of common right 
execute this visitatorial power in his archdeaconry; but 
others say that an archdeacon has a visitatorial power only 
of common right per tnodum simplicis scrutinii, as being 
bishop’s vicar. Ayliffe. 
VI'SITER, or Vi'sitor, s. One who comes to see 
another.—Here’s ado to lock up honesty and honour from the 
access of gentle visitors. Shakspeare. — [visiteur, Fr.] An 
occasional judge.; one who regulates the disorders of any 
society.—The visiters expelled the orthodox; they, without 
scruple or shame, possessed themselves of their colleges. 
Walton. 
VI'SITING, s. Visitation ; act of visiting.—Compunctious 
visitings of nature. Shakspeare. 
VI'SIVE, adj. [visas, Lat.] Formed in the act of seeing; 
belonging to the power of seeing.—This happens when the 
axis of the visive cones, diffused from the object, fall not 
upon the same plane ; but that which is conveyed into one 
eye is more depressed or elevated than that which enters the 
other. Brown. 
VISMEA [so named by the younger Linnaeus, in memory 
of Mr. De Visme, a Portugueze merchant, well known for 
his love and knowledge of plants], in Botany, a genus of 
the class dodecandria, order trigynia, natural order of onagrse 
(Juss.J —Generic Character. Calyx: perianth-five-leaved, 
permanent; leaflets lanceolate, recurved; three outer hairy. 
Corolla : petals five, elliptic, spreading, scarcely longer than 
the calyx. Stamina: filaments twelve, filiform, erect, shorter 
than the petals, inserted into the receptacle. Anthers quad¬ 
rangular, erect, terminated by an awn. Pistil. germ rough¬ 
haired, superior, attenuated as it were into a very short, 
tough-haired style. Styles three, filiform, smooth. Stig¬ 
mas 
