Between kings and their people, parents and their children, there
is so great a necessitude, propriety, and intercourse of nature.
Jer. Taylor.
Ne*ces"si*ty (?), n.; pl. Necessities (#). [OE. necessite, F.
nécessité, L. necessitas, fr. necesse. See Necessary.] 1. The quality
or state of being necessary, unavoidable, or absolutely requisite;
inevitableness; indispensableness.
2. The condition of being needy or necessitous; pressing need;
indigence; want.
Urge the necessity and state of times.
Shak.
The extreme poverty and necessity his majesty was in.
Clarendon.
3. That which is necessary; a necessary; a requisite; something
indispensable; -- often in the plural.
These should be hours for necessities, Not for delights.
Shak.
What was once to me Mere matter of the fancy, now has grown The
vast necessity of heart and life.
Tennyson.
4. That which makes an act or an event unavoidable; irresistible force;
overruling power; compulsion, physical or moral; fate; fatality.
So spake the fiend, and with necessity, The tyrant's plea, excused
his devilish deeds.
Milton.
5. (Metaph.) The negation of freedom in voluntary action; the
subjection of all phenomena, whether material or spiritual, to
inevitable causation; necessitarianism.
Of necessity, by necessary consequence; by compulsion, or irresistible
power; perforce.
Syn. -- See Need.
Neck (?), n. [OE. necke, AS. hnecca; akin to D. nek the nape of the
neck, G. nacken, OHG. nacch, hnacch, Icel. hnakki, Sw. nacke, Dan.
nakke.] 1. The part of an animal which connects the head and the trunk,
and which, in man and many other animals, is more slender than the
trunk.
2. Any part of an inanimate object corresponding to or resembling the
neck of an animal; as: (a) The long slender part of a vessel, as a
retort, or of a fruit, as a gourd. (b) A long narrow tract of land
projecting from the main body, or a narrow tract connecting two larger
tracts. (c) (Mus.) That part of a violin, guitar, or similar
instrument, which extends from the head to the body, and on which is
the finger board or fret board.
3. (Mech.) A reduction in size near the end of an object, formed by a
groove around it; as, a neck forming the journal of a shaft.
4. (Bot.) the point where the base of the stem of a plant arises from
the root.
Neck and crop, completely; wholly; altogether; roughly and at once.
[Colloq.] -- Neck and neck (Racing), so nearly equal that one cannot be
said to be before the other; very close; even; side by side. -- Neck of
a capital. (Arch.) See Gorgerin. -- Neck of a cascabel (Gun.), the part
joining the knob to the base of the breech. -- Neck of a gun, the small
part of the piece between the chase and the swell of the muzzle. --
Neck of a tooth (Anat.), the constriction between the root and the
crown. -- Neck or nothing (Fig.), at all risks. -- Neck verse. (a) The
verse formerly read to entitle a party to the benefit of clergy, said
to be the first verse of the fifty-first Psalm, "Miserere mei," etc.
Sir W. Scott. (b) Hence, a verse or saying, the utterance of which
decides one's fate; a shibboleth.
These words, "bread and cheese," were their neck verse or
shibboleth to distinguish them; all pronouncing "broad and cause,"
being presently put to death.
Fuller.
-- Neck yoke. (a) A bar by which the end of the tongue of a wagon or
carriage is suspended from the collars of the harnesses. (b) A device
with projecting arms for carrying things (as buckets of water or sap)
suspended from one's shoulders. -- On the neck of, immediately after;
following closely. "Commiting one sin on the neck of another." W.
Perkins. -- Stiff neck, obstinacy in evil or wrong; inflexible
obstinacy; contumacy. "I know thy rebellion, and thy stiff neck." Deut.
xxxi. 27. -- To break the neck of, to destroy the main force of. "What
they presume to borrow from her sage and virtuous rules . . . breaks
the neck of their own cause." Milton. -- To harden the neck, to grow
obstinate; to be more and more perverse and rebellious. Neh. ix. 17. --
To tread on the neck of, to oppress; to tyrannize over.
Neck, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Necked (?); p. pr. & vb. n. Necking.] (Mech.)
To reduce the diameter of (an object) near its end, by making a groove
around it; -- used with down; as, to neck down a shaft.
Neck"ar nut` (?). (Bot.) See Nicker nut.
Neck"band` (?), n. A band which goes around the neck; often, the part
at the top of a garment.
Neck"cloth` (?; 115), n. A piece of any fabric worn around the neck.
Necked (?), a. 1. Having (such) a neck; -- chiefly used in composition;
as, stiff- necked.