1 definition found
From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) [web1913]:
Avoid \A*void"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Avoided}; p. pr & vb n.
{Avoiding}.] [OF. esvuidier es (L. ex) + vuidier voidier
to empty. See {Void}, a.]
1. To empty. [Obs.] --Wyclif.
2. To emit or throw out to void; as to avoid excretions.
[Obs.] --Sir T. Browne.
3. To quit or evacuate; to withdraw from [Obs.]
Six of us only stayed, and the rest avoided the
room --Bacon.
4. To make void; to annul or vacate; to refute.
How can these grants of the king's be avoided?
--Spenser.
5. To keep away from to keep clear of to endeavor no to
meet to shun; to abstain from as to avoid the company
of gamesters.
What need a man forestall his date of grief. And run
to meet what he would most avoid ? --Milton.
He carefully avoided every act which could goad them
into open hostility. --Macaulay.
6. To get rid of [Obs.] --Shak.
7. (Pleading) To defeat or evade; to invalidate. Thus in a
replication, the plaintiff may deny the defendant's plea,
or confess it and avoid it by stating new matter.
--Blackstone.
Syn: To escape; elude; evade; eschew.
Usage: To {Avoid}, {Shun}. Avoid in its commonest sense
means to keep clear of an extension of the meaning,
to withdraw one's self from It denotes care taken not
to come near or in contact as to avoid certain
persons or places. Shun is a stronger term, implying
more prominently the idea of intention. The words may
however, in many cases be interchanged.
No man can pray from his heart to be kept from
temptation, if the take no care of himself to
avoid it --Mason.
So Chanticleer, who never saw a fox, Yet shunned
him as a sailor shuns the rocks. --Dryden.
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