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Sharpen   /ʃˈɑrpən/   Listen
verb
Sharpen  v. t.  (past & past part. sarpened; pres. part. sharpening)  To make sharp. Specifically:
(a)
To give a keen edge or fine point to; to make sharper; as, to sharpen an ax, or the teeth of a saw.
(b)
To render more quick or acute in perception; to make more ready or ingenious. "The air... sharpened his visual ray To objects distant far." "He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skill."
(c)
To make more eager; as, to sharpen men's desires. "Epicurean cooks Sharpen with cloyless sauce his appetite."
(d)
To make more pungent and intense; as, to sharpen a pain or disease.
(e)
To make biting, sarcastic, or severe. "Sharpen each word."
(f)
To render more shrill or piercing. "Inclosures not only preserve sound, but increase and sharpen it."
(g)
To make more tart or acid; to make sour; as, the rays of the sun sharpen vinegar.
(h)
(Mus.) To raise, as a sound, by means of a sharp; to apply a sharp to.



Sharpen  v. i.  To grow or become sharp.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Sharpen" Quotes from Famous Books



... never to have had any neighbours whose studies have led them towards the pursuit of natural knowledge; so that, for want of a companion to quicken my industry and sharpen my attention, I have made but slender progress in a kind of information to which I have been ...
— The Natural History of Selborne, Vol. 1 • Gilbert White

... watching Uncle Remus sharpen his shoe-knife. The old man's head moved in sympathy with his hands, and he mumbled fragments of a song. Occasionally he would feel of the edge of the blade with his thumb, and then begin to sharpen it again. The comical appearance of the venerable darkey finally had its effect upon ...
— Nights With Uncle Remus - Myths and Legends of the Old Plantation • Joel Chandler Harris

... once crossing a series of undulating ranges abutting on Mount Hermon with an English tourist who was making merry at the utterly barren appearance of "the promised land." It turned out, however, that his attempted wit served to sharpen our observation, and we found that all the hill-sides had once been terraced by human hands. A few miles further on we came to Rasheiya, where the vineyards still flourish on such terraces, and we had no difficulty ...
— The Contemporary Review, January 1883 - Vol 43, No. 1 • Various

... how to learn is a much greater thing than to be crammed," said Carey. "Of course when one begins to teach oneself, the world has become "mine oyster," and one has the dagger. The point becomes how to sharpen the dagger." ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge

... proprietor will not do all the talking. Everybody in the little room will join. Wits will sharpen against wits; and if the company is of a grave and respectable sort, the conversation will grow brisk upon Plato's theory of the "reality of ideas," upon Euripides's interpretation of the relations of God to man, or upon the spiritual symbolism ...
— A Day In Old Athens • William Stearns Davis


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