Chapter Moly to Monkey Spoons of M by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

three points to denote three ounces.
   The Sextans, the head of Mercury, and two points to denote two ounces.
   Bowed money. Bent coin, given as a pledge of love.

“Taking forth a bowed groat and an old penny bowed he gave it [sic] her.”- Coney-catching. (Time, Elizabeth.)

Money makes the Mare to go (See Mare .)

Monimia in Otway's tragedy of The Orphan. Sir Walter Scott says, “More tears have been shed for the sorrows of Monimia, than for those of Juliet and Desdemona.”

Monism The doctrine of the oneness of mind and matter, God and the universe. It ignores all that is supernatural, and the dualism of mind and matter, God and creation; and, as this is the case, of course, there can be no opposition between God and the world, as unity cannot be in opposition to itself. Monism teaches that “all are but parts of one stupendous whole, whose body nature is, and God the soul;” hence, whatever is, only conforms to the cosmical laws of the universal ALL.
   Haeckel, of Jena, in 1866, revived this theory, and explains it thus: “Monism (the correlative of Dualism) denotes a unitary conception, in opposition to a supernatural one. Mind can never exist without matter, nor matter without mind.” As God is the same “yesterday, to-day, and for ever,” creation must be the same, or God would not be unchangeable.

Monitor So the Romans called the nursery teacher. The Military Monitor was an officer to tell young soldiers of the faults committed against the service. The House Monitor was a slave to call the family of a morning, etc.
   Monitor. An ironclad with a flat deck, sharp stern, and one or more movable turrets.

Monk in printing, is a black smear or blotch made by leaving too much ink on the part. Caxton set up his printing-press in the scriptorium of Westminster Abbey; and the associations of this place gave rise to the slang expressions monk and friar for black and white defects. (See Friar, Chapel .)
   Give a man a monk (French, “Luy bailler le moyne).” To do one a mischief. Rabelais says that Grangousier (after the battle of Picrochole) asked “what was become of Friar John;” to which Gargantua replied, “No doubt the enemy has the monk,” alluding to the pugnacious feats of this wonderful churchman, who knocked men down like ninepins. (Rabelais: Gargantua and Pantagruel, book i. 45.)

Monk Lewis Matthew Gregory Lewis is so called from his novel entitled The Monk. (1773-1818.)

Monk listening to a Bird (See Felix, Hildesheim .)

Monk of Westminster Richard of Cirencester, the historian. (Fourteenth century.)

Monkey (A). 500. (See Marygold .)

Monkey = the Devil; an imp of mischief. Hence, a meddlesome child is spoken to as “you little monkey;” and is called “a regular imp,” or “imp of mischief.” The allusion is to the old drawings of devils, with long tails and monkey ugliness.
   To get (or have) one's monkey up. To be riled. Here the allusion is also to the devil or evil spirit in man; he will be “in a devil of a temper.” Even taken literally, monkeys are extremely irritable and easily provoked.

Monkey in sailor language, is the vessel which contains the full allowance of grog. Halliwell (Archaic Dictionary) has-

“Moncorn, `Beere corne, barley bygge, or moncorne.' ”- (1552.)

   To suck the monkey. Sailors call the vessel which contains their full allowance of grog “a monkey.” Hence, to “suck the monkey” is surreptitiously to suck liquor from a cask through a straw. Again, when the milk has been taken from a cocoanut, and rum has been substituted, “sucking the monkey” means drinking this rum. Probably “monkey” in all such cases is a corruption of moncorn (ale or beer). (See Marryat's Peter Simple.) (See Monkey Spoons.)

Monkey Board The step behind an omnibus on which the conductor stands, or rather skips about like a monkey.