A tree thrives and flourishes in a kindly . . .
soil. --Bp. Horne.
2. To be prosperous; to increase in wealth, honor, comfort,
happiness, or whatever is desirable; to thrive; to be
prominent and influental; specifically, of authors,
painters, etc., to be in a state of activity or
production.
When all the workers of iniquity do flourish. --Ps.
xcii 7
Bad men as frequently prosper and flourish, and that
by the means of their wickedness. --Nelson.
We say Of those that held their heads above the
crowd, They flourished then or then. --Tennyson.
3. To use florid language; to indulge in rhetorical figures
and lofty expressions; to be flowery.
They dilate . . . and flourish long on little
incidents. --J. Watts.
4. To make bold and sweeping, fanciful, or wanton movements,
by way of ornament, parade, bravado, etc.; to play with
fantastic and irregular motion.
Impetuous spread The stream, and smoking flourished
o'er his head. --Pope.
5. To make ornamental strokes with the pen; to write
graceful, decorative figures.
6. To execute an irregular or fanciful strain of music, by
way of ornament or prelude.
Why do the emperor's trumpets flourish thus? --Shak.
7. To boast; to vaunt; to brag. --Pope.
2. To embellish with the flowers of diction; to adorn with
rhetorical figures; to grace with ostentatious eloquence;
to set off with a parade of words. [Obs.]
Sith that the justice of your title to him Doth
flourish the deceit. --Shak.
3. To move in bold or irregular figures; to swing about in
circles or vibrations by way of show or triumph; to
brandish.
And flourishes his blade in spite of me. --Shak.
4. To develop; to make thrive; to expand. [Obs.]
Bottoms of thread . . . which with a good needle,
perhaps may be flourished into large works. --Bacon.
The Roman monarchy, in her highest flourish, never
had the like. --Howell.
2. Decoration; ornament; beauty.
The flourish of his sober youth Was the pride of
naked truth. --Crashaw.
3. Something made or performed in a fanciful, wanton, or
vaunting manner, by way of ostentation, to excite
admiration, etc.; ostentatious embellishment; ambitious
copiousness or amplification; parade of words and figures;
show; as, a flourish of rhetoric or of wit.
He lards with flourishes his long harangue.
--Dryden.
4. A fanciful stroke of the pen or graver; a merely
decorative figure.
The neat characters and flourishes of a Bible
curiously printed. --Boyle.
5. A fantastic or decorative musical passage; a strain of
triumph or bravado, not forming part of a regular musical
composition; a cal; a fanfare.
A flourish, trumpets! strike alarum, drums! --Shak.
6. The waving of a weapon or other thing; a brandishing; as,
the flourish of a sword.