UNDERMINE • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Undermine

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/ˈəndərmˌaɪn/ Listen

verb

Undermine v. t.

To excavate the earth beneath, or the part of, especially for the purpose of causing to fall or be overthrown; to form a mine under; to sap; as, to undermine a wall. "A vast rock undermined from one end to the other, and a highway running through it."

Fig.: To remove the foundation or support of by clandestine means; to ruin in an underhand way; as, to undermine reputation; to undermine the constitution of the state. "He should be warned who are like to undermine him."

See images of 'Undermine'

Etymology of 'Undermine'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

"Undermine" Quotes from Famous Books

... political privileges of the Netherlands. The contest was, at first, favorable to the cause of arbitrary power; but little seeds were silently germinating, which, in the progress of their gigantic development, were, one day, to undermine the foundations of Tyranny and to overshadow the world. The early progress of the religious reformation in the Netherlands will be outlined in a separate chapter. Another great principle was likewise at work at this ...

— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... however, to discover that if to change over to Caesar was the safer course, to turn a political somersault once more, to try and undermine the work of the master, meant simply ruin. We have the story of his sixth and last transformation from Caesar himself, who was not, however, in Italy at the time.[199] Credit in Italy had been seriously upset by the outbreak of Civil War, and Caesar had been at ...

— Social life at Rome in the Age of Cicero • W. Warde Fowler

... ideal believer when he wrote of his father that "he was religious with the consent of his whole faculties." It is faith's ability to engross a man's entire self, going down to the very roots of his being, that renders it indestructible. It can say of those who seek to undermine it, as Hamlet said ...

— Some Christian Convictions - A Practical Restatement in Terms of Present-Day Thinking • Henry Sloane Coffin

... compared notes afterward; they went out sketching together, and instructed each other in the ways of art; and they carefully examined the foundations of each other's beliefs, and endeavoured respectively to strengthen and undermine the same. Gradually they fell into the habit of wondering every morning whether or not they should meet during the coming day; and of congratulating themselves nearly every evening that they had succeeded in ...

— The Farringdons • Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler

... evil spirits or devils, personifying who or what they please, in order to undermine Christianity and ...

— Mystic London: - or, Phases of occult life in the metropolis • Charles Maurice Davies

More quotes...