Revolution
Webster's Dictionary [1]
(1): ( n.) Return to a point before occupied, or to a point relatively the same; a rolling back; return; as, revolution in an ellipse or spiral.
(2): ( n.) The space measured by the regular return of a revolving body; the period made by the regular recurrence of a measure of time, or by a succession of similar events.
(3): ( n.) The motion of a point, line, or surface about a point or line as its center or axis, in such a manner that a moving point generates a curve, a moving line a surface (called a surface of revolution), and a moving surface a solid (called a solid of revolution); as, the revolution of a right-angled triangle about one of its sides generates a cone; the revolution of a semicircle about the diameter generates a sphere.
(4): ( n.) A total or radical change; as, a revolution in one's circumstances or way of living.
(5): ( n.) A fundamental change in political organization, or in a government or constitution; the overthrow or renunciation of one government, and the substitution of another, by the governed.
(6): ( n.) The motion of any body, as a planet or satellite, in a curved line or orbit, until it returns to the same point again, or to a point relatively the same; - designated as the annual, anomalistic, nodical, sidereal, or tropical revolution, according as the point of return or completion has a fixed relation to the year, the anomaly, the nodes, the stars, or the tropics; as, the revolution of the earth about the sun; the revolution of the moon about the earth.
(7): ( n.) The act of revolving, or turning round on an axis or a center; the motion of a body round a fixed point or line; rotation; as, the revolution of a wheel, of a top, of the earth on its axis, etc.
King James Dictionary [2]
REVOLU'TION, n. L. revolutus, revolvo.
1. In physics, rotation the circular motion of a body on its axis a course or motion which brings every point of the surface or periphery of a body back to the place at which it began to move as the revolution of a wheel the diurnal revolution of the earth. 2. The motion of a body round any fixed point or center as the annual revolution of the earth or other planet in its orbit round the center of the system. 3. Motion of any thing which brings it to the same point or state as the revolution of day and night or of the seasons. 4. Continued course marked by the regular return of years as the revolution of ages. 5. Space measured by some regular return of a revolving body or of a state of things as the revolution of a day. 6. In politics, a material or entire change in the constitution of government. Thus the revolution in England, in 1688, was produced by the abdication of king James II the establishment of the house of Orange upon the throne, and the restoration of the constitution to its primitive state. So the revolutions in Poland, in the United States of America, and in France, consisted in a change of constitution. We shall rejoice to hear that the Greeks have effected a revolution. 7. Motion backward.
This word is used adjectively, as in the phrase, revolution principles.
Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature [3]
The name given to that change in the civil and ecclesiastical constitution of England which took place when James II had been expelled from the throne in the year 1688, and his son-in-law, William, prince of Orange, was elected by the voice of the people. The immediate occasion of the Revolution was a fallacious proclamation issued by James, under the pretence of extending toleration; but the true object of which was to place all the offices of trust in the hands of the papists, whose hopes had been revived by the death of Charles II. Some Protestant Dissenters were imposed upon by this specious pretence; but the sagacity of the bishops justly apprehending the intended consequences, they strenuously contended and petitioned against the proclamation, and alarmed the fears of Protestants throughout the kingdom.
The Nuttall Encyclopedia [4]
A sudden change for most part in the constitution of a country in consequence of internal revolt, particularly when a monarchy is superseded by a republic, as in France in 1789, in 1848, and 1870, that in 1830 being merely from one branch of the Bourbon family to another, such as that also in England in 1658. The French Revolution of 1798 is the revolution by pre-eminence, and the years 1848-49 were years of revolutions in Europe.
