RETAIN • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Retain

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/rɪtˈeɪn/ /ritˈeɪn/ Listen

verb

Retain v. t. (past & past part. retained; pres. part. retaining)

To continue to hold; to keep in possession; not to lose, part with, or dismiss; to restrain from departure, escape, or the like. "Thy shape invisible retain." "Be obedient, and retain Unalterably firm his love entire." "An executor may retain a debt due to him from the testator."

To keep in pay; to employ by a preliminary fee paid; to hire; to engage; as, to retain a counselor. "A Benedictine convent has now retained the most learned father of their order to write in its defense."

To restrain; to prevent. (Obs.)

Retaining wall (Arch. & Engin.), a wall built to keep any movable backing, or a bank of sand or earth, in its place; called also retain wall.

Synonyms: To keep; hold; restrain. See Keep.

Retain v. i.

To belong; to pertain. (Obs.) "A somewhat languid relish, retaining to bitterness."

To keep; to continue; to remain. (Obs.)

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Etymology of 'Retain'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Retain" Quotes from Famous Books

... other? Would not the story of those awful, those irrevocable moments be plain to my eye, if the quickly responsive glass could but retain the impressions it receives and give back at need what had once informed its surface ...

— The House of the Whispering Pines • Anna Katharine Green

... New England. Many of them exist as yet among the scattered fragments of Indian tribes here and there. The Penobscots of Oldtown, Maine, still possess many. In fact, there is not an old Indian, male or female, in New England or Canada who does not retain stories and songs of the greatest interest. I sincerely trust that this work may have the effect of stimulating collection. Let every reader remember that everything thus taken down, and deposited in a local historical society, or sent to ...

— The Algonquin Legends of New England • Charles Godfrey Leland

... situations in some of them audacious almost beyond belief. Under a thin varnish of good breeding, the sentiments and manners were really brutal. The loosest gallants of Beaumont and Fletcher's theater retain a fineness of feeling and that politesse de coeur—which marks the gentleman. They are poetic creatures, and own a capacity for romantic passion. But the Manlys and Homers of the Restoration comedy have a prosaic, cold-blooded profligacy that ...

— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers

... will. But since this is so, how can the individual, the reality, sacrifice himself for the happiness of man, an abstract being? It is all very well for you to revolt against the old God; you still retain the religious point of view, and the emancipation you are trying to help us to is absolutely theological, i.e., "God-inspired." "The highest Being is certainly that of man, but because it is his Being and is not he himself, it is quite indifferent if we see this Being outside ...

— Anarchism and Socialism • George Plechanoff

... result had William repeated Miss Pratt's inquiry in Jane's hearing: "Who IS that curious child?" Jane had preserved her sang-froid, but the words remained with her, for she was one of those who ponder and retain in silence. ...

— Seventeen - A Tale Of Youth And Summer Time And The Baxter Family Especially William • Booth Tarkington

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