King James Bible Dictionary

FLAT, adjective [Latin latus, broad; Gr.; Eng. blade.]

1. Having an even surface, without risings or indentures, hills or valleys; as flat land.

2. Horizontal; level; without inclination; as a flat roof; or with a moderate inclination or slope; for we often apply the word to the roof of a house that is not steep, though inclined.

3. Prostrate; lying the whole length on the ground. He fell or lay flat on the ground.

4. Not elevated or erect; fallen.

Cease t'admire, and beauty's plumes fall flat

5. Level with the ground; totally fallen.

What ruins kingdoms, and lays cities flat

6. In painting, wanting relief or prominence of the figures.

7. Tasteless; stale; vapid; insipid; dead; as fruit flat to the taste.

8. Dull; unanimated; frigid; without point or spirit; applied to discourses and compositions. The sermon was very flat

9. Depressed; spiritless; dejected.

I feel - my hopes all flat

10. Unpleasing; not affording gratification.

How flat and insipid are all the pleasures of this life!

11. Peremptory; absolute; positive; downright. He gave the petitioner a flat denial.

Thus repulsed, our final hope is flat despair.

12. Not sharp or shrill; not acute; as a flat sound.

13. Low, as the prices of goods; or dull, as sales.

FLAT, noun

1. A level or extended plain. In America, it is applied particularly to low ground or meadow that is level, but it denotes any land of even surface and of some extent.

2. A level ground lying at a small depth under the surface of water; a shoal; a shallow; a strand; a sand bank under water.

3. The broad side of a blade.

4. Depression of thought or language.

5. A surface without relief or prominences.

6. In music, a mark of depression in sound. A flat denotes a fall or depression of half a tone.

7. A boat, broad and flat-bottomed. A flat-bottomed boat is constructed for conveying passengers or troops, horses, carriages and baggage.

FLAT, verb transitive

1. To level; to depress; to lay smooth or even; to make broad and smooth; to flatten.

2. To make vapid or tasteless.

3. To make dull or unanimated.

FLAT, verb intransitive

1. To grow flat; to fall to an even surface.

2. To become insipid, or dull and unanimated.

FLAT'-BOTTOMED, adjective Having a flat bottom, as a boat, or a moat in fortification.

FLA'TIVE, adjective [Latin flatus, from flo, to blow.] Producing wind; flatulent. [Not in use.]

FLAT'LONG, adverb With the flat side downward; not edgewise.

FLAT'LY, adverb

1. Horizontally; without inclination.

2. Evenly; without elevations and depressions.

3. Without spirit; dully; frigidly.

4. Peremptorily; positively; downright.

He flatly refused his aid.

FLAT'NESS, noun

1. Evenness of surface; levelness; equality of surface.

2. Want of relief or prominence; as the flatness of a figure in sculpture.

3. Deadness; vapidness; insipidity; as the flatness of cider or beer.

4. Dejection of fortune; low state.

The flatness of my misery.

5. Dejection of mind; a low state of the spirits; depression; want of life.

6. Dullness; want of point; insipidity; frigidity.

Some of Homer's translators have swelled into fustian, and others sunk into flatness

7. Gravity of sound, as opposed to sharpness, acuteness or shrillness.

Flatness of sound - joined with a harshness.

FLAT'-NOSED, adjective Having a flat nose.

FLAT'TED, participle passive Made flat; rendered even on the surface; also, rendered vapid or insipid.

FLAT'TEN, verb transitive flat'n.

1. To make flat; to reduce to an equal or even surface; to level.

2. To beat down to the ground; to lay flat.

3. To make vapid or insipid; to render stale.

4. To depress; to deject, as the spirits; to dispirit.

5. In music, to reduce, as sound; to render less acute or sharp.

FLAT'TEN, verb intransitive flat'n.

1. To grow or become even on the surface.

2. To become dead, stale, vapid or tasteless.

3. To become dull or spiritless.

FLAT'TENING, participle present tense Making flat.

FLAT'TER, noun The person or thing by which any thing is flattened.

FLAT'TER, verb transitive [Flatter may be from the root of flat, that is, to make smooth, to appease, to soothe. Latin plaudo. Perhaps flat and plaudo are from one root, the radical sense of which must be to extend, strain, stretch.]

1. To soothe by praise; to gratify self-love by praise or obsequiousness; to please a person by applause or favorable notice, by respectful attention, or by any thing that exalts him in his own estimation, or confirms his good opinion of himself. We flatter a woman when we praise her children.

A man that flattereth his neighbor, spreadeth a net for his feet. Proverbs 29:5.

2. To please; to gratify; as, to flatter one's vanity or pride.

3. To praise falsely; to encourage by favorable notice; as, to flatter vices or crimes.

4. To encourage by favorable representations or indications; as, to flatter hopes. We are flattered with the prospect of peace.

5. To raise false hopes by representations not well founded; as, to flatter one with a prospect of success; to flatter a patient with the expectation of recovery when his case is desperate.

6. To please; to soothe.

A concert of voices - makes a harmony that flatters the ears.

7. To wheedle; to coax; to attempt to win by blandishments, praise or enticements. How many young and credulous persons are flattered out of their innocence and their property, by seducing arts!

FLAT'TERED, participle passive Soothed by praise; pleased by commendation; gratified with hopes, false or well founded; wheedled.

FLAT'TERER, noun One who flatters; a fawner; a wheedler; one who praises another, with a view to please him, to gain his favor, or to accomplish some purpose.

When I tell him he hates flatterers,

He says he does; being then most flattered.

The most abject flatterers degenerate into the greatest tyrants.

FLAT'TERING, participle present tense

1. Gratifying with praise; pleasing by applause; wheedling; coaxing.

2. adjective Pleasing to pride or vanity; gratifying to self-love; as a flattering eulogy. The minister gives a flattering account of his reception at court.

3. Pleasing; favorable; encouraging hope. We have a flattering prospect of an abundant harvest. The symptoms of the disease are flattering

4. Practicing adulation; uttering false praise; as a flattering tongue.

FLAT'TERINGLY, adverb

1. In a flattering manner; in a manner to flatter.

2. In a manner to favor; with partiality.

General references
Job 17:5; Job 32:21-22; Psalms 5:8-9; Psalms 12:2-3; Psalms 36:2; Psalms 49:13; Psalms 49:18; Proverbs 6:24; Psalms 78:36; Proverbs 5:3; Proverbs 7:5; Proverbs 7:21; Proverbs 14:20; Proverbs 19:4; Proverbs 19:6; Proverbs 20:19; Proverbs 22:16; Proverbs 24:24; Proverbs 25:26; Proverbs 26:28; Proverbs 27:21; Proverbs 28:23; Proverbs 29:5; Daniel 11:21; Daniel 11:34; Luke 6:26; Galatians 1:10; 1 Thessalonians 2:4-6; Jude 1:16

Instances of:

By Jacob
Genesis 33:10

By Gideon
Judges 8:1-3

By Mephibosheth
2 Samuel 9:8

By woman of Tekoah
2 Samuel 14:17-20

By Absalom
2 Samuel 15:2-6

By Israel and Judah
2 Samuel 19:41-43

By Adonijah
1 Kings 1:42

By Ahab
1 Kings 20:4

By false prophets
1 Kings 22:13

By Darius's courtiers
Daniel 6:7

By Herodians
Luke 20:21

By Tyrians
Acts 12:22

Tertullus flatters Felix
Acts 24:2-4

Paul flatters Felix
Acts 24:10

By Agrippa
Acts 26:2-3

FLAT'TERY, noun

1. False praise; commendation bestowed for the purpose of gaining favor and influence, or to accomplish some purpose. Direct flattery consists in praising a person himself; indirect flattery consists in praising a person through his works or his connections.

Simple pride for flattery makes demands.

Just praise is only a debt, but flattery is a present.

2. Adulation; obsequiousness; wheedling.

3. Just commendation which gratifies self-love.

FLAT'TISH, adjective [from flat.] Somewhat flat; approaching to flatness.

FLAT'ULENCE,

FLAT'ULENCY, noun [See Flatulent.]

1. Windiness in the stomach; air generated in a weak stomach and intestines by imperfect digestion, occasioning distension, uneasiness, pain, and often belchings.

2. Airiness; emptiness; vanity.

FLAT'ULENT, adjective [Latin flatulentus, flatus, from flo, to blow.]

1. Windy; affected with air generated in the stomach and intestines.

2. Turgid with air; windy; as a flatulent tumor.

3. Generating or apt to a generate wind in the stomach. Pease are a flatulent vegetable.

4. Empty; vain; big without substance or reality; puffy; as a flatulent writer; flatulent vanity.

FLATUOS'ITY, noun Windiness; fullness of air; flatulence. [Not used.]

FLAT'UOUS, adjective [Latin flatuosus.] Windy; generating wind. [Not used.]

FLA'TUS, noun [Latin from flo, to blow.]

1. A breath; a puff of wind.

2. Wind generated in the stomach or other cavities of the body; flatulence.

FLAT'WISE, adjective or adverb [from flat.] With the flat side downward or next to another object; not edgewise.