King James Bible Dictionary

DISSOLVE, verb transitive dizzolv. [Latin , to loose, to free.]

1. To melt; to liquefy; to convert from a solid or fixed state to a fluid state, by means of heat or moisture.

To desolve by heat, is to loosen the parts of a solid body and render them fluid or easily movable. Thus ice is converted into water by dissolution.

To dissolve in a liquid, is to separate the parts of a solid substance, and cause them to mix with the fluid; or to reduce a solid substance into minute parts which may be sustained in that fluid. Thus water dissolves salt and sugar.

2. To disunite; to break; to separate.

Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness? 2 Peter 3:11.

3. To loose; to disunite.

Down fell the duke, his joints dissolved.

4. To loose the ties or bonds of any thing; to destroy an connected system; as, to dissolve a government; to dissolve a corporation.

5. To loose; to break; as, to dissolve a league; to dissolve the bonds of friendship.

6. To break up; to cause to separate; to put an end to; as, to dissolve the parliament; to dissolve an assembly.

7. To clear; to solve; to remove; to dissipate, or to explain; as, to dissolve doubts. We usually say, to solve doubts and difficulties.

8. To break; to destroy; as, to dissolve a charm, spell or enchantment.

9. To loosen or relax; to make languid; as dissolved in pleasure.

10. To waste away; to consume; to cause to vanish or perish.

Thou dissolvest my substance. Job 30:1.

11. To annul; to rescind; as, to dissolve an injunction.

DISSOLVE, verb intransitive dizzolv.

1. To be melted; to be converted from a solid to a fluid state; as, sugar dissolves in water.

2. To sink away; to lose strength and firmness.

3. To melt away in pleasure; to become soft or languid.

4. To fall asunder; to crumble; to be broken. A government may dissolve by its own weight or extent.

5. To waste away; to perish; to be decomposed. Flesh dissolves by putrefaction.

6. To come to an end by a separation of parts.

DISSOLVED, participle passive Melted; liquefied; disunited; parted; loosed; relaxed; wasted away; ended.

DISSOLVED blood, is that which does not readily coagulate.

DISSOLVENT, adjective Having power to melt or dissolve; as the dissolvent juices of the stomach.

DISSOLVENT, noun

1. Any thing which has the power or quality of melting, or converting a solid substance into a fluid, or of separating the parts of a fixed body so that they mix with a liquid; as, water is a dissolvent of salts and earths. It is otherwise called a menstruum.

2. In medicine, a remedy supposed capable of dissolving concretions in the body, such as calculi, tubercles, etc.

DISSOLVER, noun That which dissolves or has the power of dissolving. Heat is the most powerful dissolver of substances.