2. To perform actions; to fulfill functions; to put forth
energy; to move, as opposed to remaining at rest; to carry
into effect a determination of the will.
He hangs between, in doubt to act or rest. --Pope.
3. To behave or conduct, as in morals, private duties, or
public offices; to bear or deport one's self; as, we know
not why he has acted so.
4. To perform on the stage; to represent a character.
To show the world how Garrick did not act. --Cowper.
{To act as} or {for}, to do the work of; to serve as.
{To act on}, to regulate one's conduct according to.
{To act up to}, to equal in action; to fulfill in practice;
as, he has acted up to his engagement or his advantages.
That best portion of a good man's life, His little,
nameless, unremembered acts Of kindness and of love.
--Wordsworth.
Hence, in specific uses:
(a) The result of public deliberation; the decision or
determination of a legislative body, council, court of
justice, etc.; a decree, edit, law, judgment, resolve,
award; as, an act of Parliament, or of Congress.
(b) A formal solemn writing, expressing that something has
been done. --Abbott.
(c) A performance of part of a play; one of the principal
divisions of a play or dramatic work in which a
certain definite part of the action is completed.
(d) A thesis maintained in public, in some English
universities, by a candidate for a degree, or to show
the proficiency of a student.
2. A state of reality or real existence as opposed to a
possibility or possible existence. [Obs.]
The seeds of plants are not at first in act, but in
possibility, what they afterward grow to be.
--Hooker.
3. Process of doing; action. In act, in the very doing; on
the point of (doing). ``In act to shoot.'' --Dryden.
This woman was taken . . . in the very act. --John
viii. 4.
{Act of attainder}. (Law) See {Attainder}.
{Act of bankruptcy} (Law), an act of a debtor which renders
him liable to be adjudged a bankrupt.
{Act of faith}. (Ch. Hist.) See {Auto-da-F['e]}.
{Act of God} (Law), an inevitable accident; such
extraordinary interruption of the usual course of events
as is not to be looked for in advance, and against which
ordinary prudence could not guard.
{Act of grace}, an expression often used to designate an act
declaring pardon or amnesty to numerous offenders, as at
the beginning of a new reign.
{Act of indemnity}, a statute passed for the protection of
those who have committed some illegal act subjecting them
to penalties. --Abbott.
{Act in pais}, a thing done out of court (anciently, in the
country), and not a matter of record.
Self-love, the spring of motion, acts the soul.
--Pope.
2. To perform; to execute; to do. [Archaic]
That we act our temporal affairs with a desire no
greater than our necessity. --Jer. Taylor.
Industry doth beget by producing good habits, and
facility of acting things expedient for us to do.
--Barrow.
Uplifted hands that at convenient times Could act
extortion and the worst of crimes. --Cowper.
3. To perform, as an actor; to represent dramatically on the
stage.
4. To assume the office or character of; to play; to
personate; as, to act the hero.
5. To feign or counterfeit; to simulate.
With acted fear the villain thus pursued. --Dryden.
{To act a part}, to sustain the part of one of the characters
in a play; hence, to simulate; to dissemble.
{To act the part of}, to take the character of; to fulfill
the duties of.