DELIRIUM • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Delirium

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/dɪlˈɪriəm/ Listen

noun

Delirium n.

(Med.) A state in which the thoughts, expressions, and actions are wild, irregular, and incoherent; mental aberration; a roving or wandering of the mind, usually dependent on a fever or some other disease, and so distinguished from mania, or madness.

Strong excitement; wild enthusiasm; madness. "The popular delirium (of the French Revolution) at first caught his enthusiastic mind." "The delirium of the preceding session (of Parliament)."

Delirium tremens. (Med.), a violent delirium induced by the excessive and prolonged use of intoxicating liquors.

Traumatic delirium (Med.), a variety of delirium following injury.

Synonyms: Insanity; frenzy; madness; derangement; aberration; mania; lunacy; fury. See Insanity.

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Etymology of 'Delirium'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Delirium" Quotes from Famous Books

... into the large ball-room before we descended the stairs, where these poor creatures are allowed at stated times to meet for pleasure and amusement. But such a spectacle would be to me more revolting than the scene I had just witnessed; the delirium of their frightful disease would be less shocking in my eyes than the madness of their mirth. The struggling gleams of sense and memory in these unhappy people reminded me a beautiful ...

— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie

... was drawn with difficulty, and was succeeded by sneezing and hoarseness; when once settled in the stomach, it excited vomitings of black bile, attended with excessive torture, weakness, hiccough, and convulsion. Some were seized with sudden shivering, or delirium, and had a sensation of such intense inward heat, that they threw off their clothes, and would have walked about naked in quest of water wherein to plunge themselves. Cold water was eagerly resorted to by the unwary and imprudent, and proved fatal to those who indulged in its momentary relief. Some ...

— An Account of Timbuctoo and Housa Territories in the Interior of Africa • Abd Salam Shabeeny

... insanely, had burst into cheerings, moblike and barbaric, but tuned in strange keys that can arouse the dullard and the stoic. It made a mad enthusiasm that, it seemed, would be incapable of checking itself before granite and brass. There was the delirium that encounters despair and death, and is heedless and blind to the odds. It is a temporary but sublime absence of selfishness. And because it was of this order was the reason, perhaps, why the youth wondered, afterward, what reasons he could ...

— The Red Badge of Courage - An Episode of the American Civil War • Stephen Crane

... Richard Lander was now distressing in the extreme, his brother became hourly worse, and every moment was expected to be his last. During the few intervals he had from delirium, he seemed to be aware of his danger, and entered into arrangements respecting his family concerns. At this moment Richard's feelings were of too painful a nature to be described. The unhappy fate of his late master, Clapperton, came forcibly to his mind. He had followed him into the country, ...

— Lander's Travels - The Travels of Richard Lander into the Interior of Africa • Robert Huish

... in fever and delirium. Then they buried the rude minister of justice in the place where she commanded—under the pile of broken stones and bricks among the trees in the hollow. And it is said that the inquisitive villagers who had a part in the simple ceremonies stirred about till they ...

— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

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