PLAGUE • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Plague

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noun

Plague n.

1.

That which smites, wounds, or troubles; a blow; a calamity; any afflictive evil or torment; a great trail or vexation. "And men blasphemed God for the plague of hail." "The different plague of each calamity."

2.

(Med.) An acute malignant contagious fever, that often prevails in Egypt, Syria, and Turkey, and has at times visited the large cities of Europe with frightful mortality; hence, any pestilence; as, the great London plague. "A plague upon the people fell."

Cattle plague. See Rinderpest.

Plague mark, Plague spot, a spot or mark of the plague; hence, a token of something incurable.

verb

Plague v. t. (past & past part. plagued; pres. part. plaguing)

1.

To infest or afflict with disease, calamity, or natural evil of any kind. "Thus were they plagued And worn with famine."

2.

Fig.: To vex; to tease; to harass. "She will plague the man that loves her most."

Synonyms: To vex; torment; distress; afflict; harass; annoy; tease; tantalize; trouble; molest; embarrass; perplex.

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Etymology of 'Plague'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Plague" Quotes from Famous Books

... the town to the hut where Scip the boatman lived. Scip was at home. He lived quite alone. His father, his mother and four brothers had died of the plague since June. He started when he saw Hope, and his habitual look of fear deepened to a craven terror; he would rather have had the yellow fever than to have seen the Northern nurse just then. But Zerviah sat down by him on the hot sand, beside a rather ghastly palmetto ...

— Stories by American Authors, Volume 8 • Various

... prevent disease; the commonest matters of personal hygiene were neglected; and when disease came the remedies applied were scarcely to be preferred to the disease. Discipline, always brutal, was symbolized by the cat-o'-nine-tails. Small wonder that the navy was avoided like the plague ...

— Jefferson and his Colleagues - A Chronicle of the Virginia Dynasty, Volume 15 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Allen Johnson

... this particular sphere of etiology, then why does Dr. Meigs take such pains to reason so extensively about the laws of contagion, which, on that supposition, have no more to do with this case than with the plague which destroyed the people after David had numbered them? Above all, what becomes of the theological aspect of the question, when he asserts that a practitioner was "only unlucky in meeting with the epidemic cases?" (Op. cit. p. 633.) ...

— Medical Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... power of kicking out, or with imperturbable composure. This latter is the more useful and more dignified endowment, but it springs from a sense of self-sufficiency which fails him. If he had but the gift of epigram he might escape from his tormentors. The plague of it is that he never succeeds except when he reasons like a man of sense, and weapons forged on this anvil are too blunt to pierce the thick ...

— The Contemporary Review, January 1883 - Vol 43, No. 1 • Various

... do not imagine from this that there are many of these, for the Chinese have been for days avoiding the Legation quarter as if it were plague-stricken, and sounds that were so roaring a few weeks ago are now daily becoming more and more scarce. A blight is settling on us, for we are accursed by the whole population of North China, and who knows what will be the fate of those ...

— Indiscreet Letters From Peking • B. L. Putman Weale

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