01 n. Regular arrangement; any methodical or established succession or harmonious relation; method; system
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Right arrangement; a normal, correct, or fit condition; as, the house is in order; the machinery is out of order.
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The customary mode of procedure; established system, as in the conduct of debates or the transaction of business; usage; custom; fashion.“And, pregnant with his grander thought, Brought the old order into doubt.” — Emerson.
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Conformity with law or decorum; freedom from disturbance; general tranquillity; public quiet; as, to preserve order in a community or an assembly.
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That which prescribes a method of procedure; a rule or regulation made by competent authority; as, the rules and orders of the senate.“The church hath authority to establish that for an order at one time which at another time it may abolish.” — Hooker.
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A command; a mandate; a precept; a direction.“Upon this new fright, an order was made by both houses for disarming all the papists in England.” — Clarendon.
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Hence: A commission to purchase, sell, or supply goods; a direction, in writing, to pay money, to furnish supplies, to admit to a building, a place of entertainment, or the like; as, orders for blankets are large.“In those days were pit orders -- beshrew the uncomfortable manager who abolished them.” — Lamb.
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A number of things or persons arranged in a fixed or suitable place, or relative position; a rank; a row; a grade; especially, a rank or class in society; a group or division of men in the same social or other position; also, a distinct character, kind, or sort; as, the higher or lower orders of society; talent of a high order.“They are in equal order to their several ends.” — Jer. Taylor.“Various orders various ensigns bear.” — Granville.“Which, to his order of mind, must have seemed little short of crime.” — Hawthorne.
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A body of persons having some common honorary distinction or rule of obligation; esp., a body of religious persons or aggregate of convents living under a common rule; as, the Order of the Bath; the Franciscan order.“Find a barefoot brother out, One of our order, to associate me.” — Shak.“The venerable order of the Knights Templars.” — Sir W. Scott.
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An ecclesiastical grade or rank, as of deacon, priest, or bishop; the office of the Christian ministry; -- often used in the plural; as, to take orders, or to take holy orders, that is, to enter some grade of the ministry.
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The disposition of a column and its component parts, and of the entablature resting upon it, in classical architecture; hence (as the column and entablature are the characteristic features of classical architecture) a style or manner of architectural designing.(Arch.)
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An assemblage of genera having certain important characters in common; as, the Carnivora and Insectivora are orders of Mammalia.(Nat. Hist.)
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The placing of words and members in a sentence in such a manner as to contribute to force and beauty or clearness of expression.(Rhet.)
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Rank; degree; thus, the order of a curve or surface is the same as the degree of its equation.(Math.)“The best knowledge is that which is of greatest use in order to our eternal happiness.” — Tillotson.“Whiles I take order for mine own affairs.” — Shak.
Syn.
Arrangement; management. See Direction.