| 释义 |
proˈlifical, a. ? Obs.
[f. as prolific + -al1.]
1. = prolific a. 1.
1615Crooke Body of Man 200 Other parts..affoord vnto it prolificall vertue. 1647Trapp Comm. John x. 42 Place is no prejudice to the powerful operation of the word, when by the Spirit it is made prolifical and generative. 1659Gentl. Calling Pref. (1660) b ij, That you would weep so long over her ashes, till that moisture had rendred them prolifical, and you see her spring out of her Urn.
b. Astrol. Favourable to the production of offspring; cf. prolific a. 3.
1647Lilly Chr. Astrol. xvi. 89 If the {moonfq} and principall Significators be in Prolificall signes, and strong, there's no question but he shall [have children]. 1658Phillips s.v., Prolifical signes are Cancer, Scorpio, and Pisces.
2. = prolific a. 2.
1608Topsell Serpents (1658) 685 They are exceeding fruitful and prolifical, and therefore also in Hieroglyphicks they are made to signifie fruitfulnesse. 1656Blount Glossogr., Prolifical, fruitful, that breeds or brings forth issue apace. 1676G. Towerson Decalogue 22 Each wound he gave it becoming strangely prolifical, and two heads starting up where there was one lopt off. 1678E. Young Serm. at Guildhall 17 Feb. 18 An Evil more prolifical in us then that of Adam.
Hence proˈlifically adv., in a prolific manner; = prolificly. proˈlificalness = prolificness.
1755Johnson, *Prolifically, fruitfully, pregnantly. 1895Westm. Gaz. 27 Mar. 1/3 Never has the blood of the martyrs proved so prolifically the seed of the Church. 1915C. S. Jones Hohenzollerns 167 He had for many years sought to win the favour of the great Frederick by writing prolifically on agriculture. 1947O. Barfield in Ess. presented to Charles Williams 113 We owe them all to tarning, a process which we find prolifically at work wherever there is poetry.
1860Pusey Min. Proph. 490 They felt..the sterility in contrast with the exceeding *prolificalness of Babylonia. 1869― Paroch. & Cathedr. Serm. xxvi. (1883) 365 Yet sin has a terrible, infective prolificalness, a hideous progeny. |