Test to Testudinarious
Test
(Test) n. [OE. test test, or cupel, potsherd, F. têt, from L. testum an earthen vessel; akin to testa
a piece of burned clay, an earthen pot, a potsherd, perhaps for tersta, and akin to torrere to patch,
terra earth but cf. Zend tasta cup. Cf. Test a shell, Testaceous, Tester a covering, a coin, Testy,
Tête-à- tête.]
1. (Metal.) A cupel or cupelling hearth in which precious metals are melted for trial and refinement.
Our ingots, tests, and many mo.
Chaucer. 2. Examination or trial by the cupel; hence, any critical examination or decisive trial; as, to put a man's
assertions to a test. "Bring me to the test." Shak.
3. Means of trial; as, absence is a test of love.
Each test every light her muse will bear.
Dryden. 4. That with which anything is compared for proof of its genuineness; a touchstone; a standard.
Life, force, and beauty must to all impart,
At once the source, and end, and test of art.
Pope. 5. Discriminative characteristic; standard of judgment; ground of admission or exclusion.
Our test excludes your tribe from benefit.
Dryden. 6. Judgment; distinction; discrimination.
Who would excel, when few can make a test
Betwixt indifferent writing and the best?
Dryden. 7. (Chem.) A reaction employed to recognize or distinguish any particular substance or constituent of
a compound, as the production of some characteristic precipitate; also, the reagent employed to produce
such reaction; thus, the ordinary test for sulphuric acid is the production of a white insoluble precipitate
of barium sulphate by means of some soluble barium salt.
Test act (Eng. Law), an act of the English Parliament prescribing a form of oath and declaration against
transubstantiation, which all officers, civil and military, were formerly obliged to take within six months
after their admission to office. They were obliged also to receive the sacrament according to the usage
of the Church of England. Blackstone. — Test object (Optics), an object which tests the power or
quality of a microscope or telescope, by requiring a certain degree of excellence in the instrument to
determine its existence or its peculiar texture or markings. — Test paper. (a) (Chem.) Paper prepared
for use in testing for certain substances by being saturated with a reagent which changes color in some
specific way when acted upon by those substances; thus, litmus paper is turned red by acids, and blue
by alkalies, turmeric paper is turned brown by alkalies, etc. (b) (Law) An instrument admitted as a
standard or comparison of handwriting in those jurisdictions in which comparison of hands is permitted
as a mode of proving handwriting. — Test tube. (Chem.) (a) A simple tube of thin glass, closed at
one end, for heating solutions and for performing ordinary reactions. (b) A graduated tube.
Syn. — Criterion; standard; experience; proof; experiment; trial. — Test, Trial. Trial is the wider term;
test is a searching and decisive trial. It is derived from the Latin testa which term was early applied to
the fining pot, or crucible, in which metals are melted for trial and refinement. Hence the peculiar force
of the word, as indicating a trial or criterion of the most decisive kind.
I leave him to your gracious acceptance, whose trial shall better publish his commediation.
Shak.
Thy virtue, prince, has stood the test of fortune,
Like purest gold, that tortured in the furnace,
Comes out
more bright, and brings forth all its weight.
Addison.
