TRACT • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Tract

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noun

Tract n. A written discourse or dissertation, generally of short extent; a short treatise, especially on practical religion. "The church clergy at that time writ the best collection of tracts against popery that ever appeared."

Tracts for the Times. See Tractarian.

Tract n.

1.

Something drawn out or extended; expanse. "The deep tract of hell."

2.

A region or quantity of land or water, of indefinite extent; an area; as, an unexplored tract of sea. "A very high mountain joined to the mainland by a narrow tract of earth."

3.

Traits; features; lineaments. (Obs.) "The discovery of a man's self by the tracts of his countenance is a great weakness."

4.

The footprint of a wild beast. (Obs.)

5.

Track; trace. (Obs.) "Efface all tract of its traduction." "But flies an eagle flight, bold, and forthon, Leaving no tract behind."

6.

Treatment; exposition. (Obs.)

7.

Continuity or extension of anything; as, the tract of speech. (Obs.)

8.

Continued or protracted duration; length; extent. "Improved by tract of time."

9.

(R. C. Ch.) Verses of Scripture sung at Mass, instead of the Alleluia, from Septuagesima Sunday till the Saturday befor Easter; so called because sung tractim, or without a break, by one voice, instead of by many as in the antiphons.

Synonyms: Region; district; quarter; essay; treatise; dissertation.

verb

Tract v. t. To trace out; to track; also, to draw out; to protact. (Obs.)

See images of 'Tract'

Etymology of 'Tract'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Tract" Quotes from Famous Books

... (vol. ii. p. 202) represent and compare the decrees of the civil with those of the canon and common law. A separate tract of Julius Paulus, de gradibus et affinibus, is inserted or abridged in the Pandects, (l. xxxviii. tit. x.) In the viith degrees he computes (No. ...

— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon

... twice they heard the sound of oars, as some Genoese galley passed up or down, but none came near enough to perceive them, and they crossed the main channel, and entered one of the numerous passages practicable only for boats of very light draught, without being once hailed. A broad shallow tract of water was now crossed, passable only by craft drawing but a few inches of water; then again they were in a deeper channel, and the lights of Chioggia rose but ...

— The Lion of Saint Mark - A Story of Venice in the Fourteenth Century • G. A. Henty

... sent a copy of it likewise to Posidonius of Rhodes, and requested of him to undertake the same subject in a more elegant and masterly manner. But the latter returned for answer, that, instead of being encouraged to write by the perusal of his tract, he was quite deterred ...

— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus

... being employed as agent to explore a tract of wild land, he purchased a lot of fifty acres in what is now the town of Hillsborough. In the spring of the succeeding year, he built himself a log hut, and began the clearing and cultivation of his ...

— Sketches and Studies • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... of which there is little enough in Balder: but not Balder is more abstract, or more inhuman in its action. Types, not people, move in it; their speech is doctrine, not utterance; it is rather a tract than a poem. The technique of the verse, if we can judge it from the brilliant translation of Professor Herford, which reads almost everywhere like an original, is more than sufficient for its purpose; all ...

— Figures of Several Centuries • Arthur Symons

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