▪ I. intention, n.
(ɪnˈtɛnʃən)
Forms: α. 4–6 entencion, (-cy-, -one, -oun(e), 5–6 -tion, (-oun), 5 -sioun, 6 -syon. β. 5–6 intencion, (-cy-, -one, -oun(e), 5– intention.
[a. OF. en-, intencion, -ciun, -tion, -{cced}on stretching, intensity, will, thought, opinion, etc. (12th c. in Hatz.-Darm.), ad. L. intentiōn-em stretching, straining, effort, attention, application, design, purpose, etc., n. of action from intendĕre to intend. A doublet of intension; see note to intent a.]
I. General senses.
† 1. The action of straining or directing the mind or attention to something; mental application or effort; attention, intent observation or regard; endeavour. Obs. (but cf. 7 b).
| c 1400 Rom. Rose 4701 Now sette wel thyn entencioun, To here of love discripcioun. c 1450 tr. De Imitatione iii. xxx. 99 Neuere to relesse þe soule fro intencion of heuenly þinges. 1481 Caxton Myrr. i. iv. 12 Therfore he [God] gaf to hym [man] witte and reson to haue entencion to hym. 1526 Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W. 1531) 160 Attencion or intencyon for our purpose here is onely the attendaunce study & diligence y{supt} man or woman gyueth to theyr dede. 1599 B. Jonson Cynthia's Rev. i. v, My soule (Like one that lookes on ill⁓affected eyes) Is hurt with mere intention on their follies. 1647 Sprigge Anglia Rediv. i. ii. (1854) 9 Which petition the king refusing, he pressed with that instance and intention..till at last he tendered the same upon the pommel of his saddle. 1651 Fuller's Abel Rediv., Bolton 589 Being advised by Phisitians..to break off the strong intention of his study, he rejected their counsell. 1690 Locke Hum. Und. ii. xix. §1 When the Mind with great Earnestness, and of Choice, fixes its View on any Idea..it is that we call Intention or Study. 1749 G. Lavington Enthus. Methodists (1754) I. ii. 39 Disease caused perhaps by..deep Intention of Thought. |
† 2. The action or faculty of understanding; way of understanding (something); the notion one has of anything. Also, the mind or mental faculties generally; cf. intent n. 4. Obs.
| 1340 Hampole Pr. Consc. 4521 Þe Iewes and cristen men..Sal þan thurgh even entencion Assent in Crist als a religion. 1390 Gower Conf. II. 77 Resonable entencion, The which out of the soule groweth And the vertue fro vice knoweth. 1483 Caxton G. de la tour L iv b, I wylle answere after myn aduys and intencion. 1500–20 Dunbar Poems ix. 114, I synnit in consaiving thochtis jolie, Vp to the hevin extolling myne ententioun. 1526 Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W. 1531) 161 b, Ye the idyot may haue..his entencyon fully set to desyre the lyfe eternall. |
† 3. The way in which anything is to be understood; meaning, significance, import. Obs. or blending with 5.
| 1387–8 T. Usk Test. Love iii. ii. (Skeat) I. 140 For necessary & necessite been wordes of mokel intencion. 1638 F. Junius Paint. of Ancients 310 That from thence gathering the full intention of the conceit, wee might..rightly apprehend the whole argument. 1668 Culpepper & Cole Barthol. Anat. i. iii. 6 If we will beleive Galen..Whose Intention Rodeletius interprets to be, that the Fat doth only releive famished persons. [1871 B. Taylor Faust (1875) I. Notes 230 The intention of the passage was sufficiently clear. 1885 S. Cox Expos. Ser. i. ii. 22 The story of every man has a religious intention and significance.] |
4. The action of intending or purposing; volition which one is minded to carry out; purpose. † of intention, on purpose, intentionally (obs.).
| c 1375 Sc. Leg. Saints, Placidas 229 Of his synnis repentyng, As man of gud entencione. 1430 Lydg. St. Margaret 381 Men supposyng..There was closed grete tresour and rychesse, Brak the vessel, of entencyoun. 1552 Abp. Hamilton Catech. (1884) 29 We suld keip the commands of God with ane rycht intencioun. 1601 R. Johnson Kingd. & Commw. (1603) 264 There is not that disposition and good intention, which ought to be betwixt so neere a couple. 1645 Sir H. Slingsby Diary (1836) 166 Having it once in his intention to go to Bristol. a 1780 Johnson in Boswell an. 1753, [At one time, Johnson said to Beauclerk] You never open your mouth but with intention to give pain. 1841 Lane Arab. Nts. I. 59 Our actions are judged good or evil, according to our intention. 1887 Fowler Princ. Mor. ii. v, Intention, as distinguished from motive, on the one side, and the action itself, on the other, may be defined as the volition immediately preceding the overt act. |
5. a. That which is intended or purposed; a purpose, design.
| 1375 Barbour Bruce x. 527 It wes his entencioune Till put him in-to auenture. c 1430 Pilgr. Lyf Manhode iii. xxxii. (1869) 153 It is wel..myn entencioun þat þou make me þer of collacioun. 1654 Whitlock Zootomia 203 It is a saying among Divines, that Hell is full of good Intentions, and Meanings. 1748 F. Smith Voy. Disc. I. 118 It was not the Intention that the Ships should go higher up. 17.. Johnson in Boswell Apr. an. 1775, Sir, Hell is paved with good intentions. 1771 Wesley Serm. ii. ii. §9 ‘Hell is paved’ saith one ‘with good intentions’. 1818 Cruise Digest (ed. 2) V. 167 Sir W. Blackstone thought the deed of uses sufficient evidence of the intention of the parties. |
b. colloq. in pl. Purposes in respect of a proposal of marriage.
| [1751 Smollett Per. Pic. IV. ii.] 1796 Jane Austen Pride & Prej. xxxiv, Colonel Fitzwilliam had made it clear that he had no intentions at all, and..she did not mean to be unhappy about him. 1852 Punch 27 Mar. (Cartoon), Mr. Bull. Now, Sir, don't let us have any more Derby Dilly Dallying. What are your Intentions towards Miss Britannia? 1884 Flor. Marryat Under the Lilies xxxiii, ‘Why! I'm just about to ask you your intentions!’ ‘Don't! please! For I am married.’ |
6. a. Ultimate purpose; the aim of an action; † that for which anything is intended (obs.).
| c 1410 Hoccleve Mother of God 52 Cryst of thee hath deyned for to take Flessh and eek blood for this entencioun Vp on a crois to die for our sake. 1484 Caxton Fables of æsop ii. iii, To consydere and loke wel to what entention the yeft is gyuen. 1556 Aurelio & Isab. (1608) E iij, To none other intension, than onele to begille them. 1652 French Yorksh. Spa iv. 48 It..serves as effectually..for most intensions that almost any Physick is prescribed for. 1773 Reid Aristotle's Log. ii. §2 (1788) 25 The intention of the categories is to muster every object under ten heads. 1878 Morley Crit. Misc. Ser. i. Carlyle 201 One thing to estimate the intention and sincerity of a movement, when it first stirred the hearts of men, and another thing to pass sentence upon it in the days of its degradation. |
b. In literary criticism: the aim or design which a critic detects in a writer's work.
| 1946 Wimsatt & Beardsley in Sewanee Rev. LIV. 469 Intention has obvious affinities for the author's attitude toward his work, the way he felt, what made him write. 1959 Times Lit. Suppl. 20 Feb. 97/1 Intention, in Mr. Wimsatt's use of the word, does not mean what it means in Dr. Richards's distinction between sense, tone, feeling, and intention... It means what we might have reason to think that the author thought he was up to. |
7. † a. Stretching, tension: = intension 1. Obs.
| 1580 Lyly Euphues (Arb.) 383 As Musitians tune their strings who..either by intention, or remission, frame them to a pleasant consent. 1616 Rich Cabinet 123 So doe we vnbend bowes..lest continuall intention should boow the bowe, or breake the string. 1654 Gataker Disc. Apol. 57 By intention of speech a vein opening in my Lungs caused such a flux of blood. |
b. Straining, bending, forcible application or direction (of the mind, eye, thoughts, etc.). (Akin to 1, but with more of the notion of tension as in 7.)
| 1638 F. Junius Paint. of Ancients 206 We shall doe well to breath our selves now and then..by unbending the intention of our thoughts. 1659 Gentl. Calling iv. §13 Not being able to endure so much seriousness and intention of mind. a 1716 South Twelve Serm. (1744) X. 326 The toil and labour, and racking intention of the brain. 1862 Thoreau Excurs., Autumnal Tints (1863) 262 It required a different intention of the eye in the same locality, to see different plants. |
† 8. Intensification: = intention 3. Obs.
| 1603 Holland Plutarch's Mor. 69 Morall vertue..tempereth the remission and intention..of the passions. 1638 F. Junius Paint. of Ancients 276 Brightnesse may bee sayd to bee nothing else but an intention of Light. 1758 J. S. Le Dran's Observ. Surg. (1771) Dict., Typus, is the Order of Fevers consisting of Intention and Remission. |
† 9. Inclination, tendency. Obs.
| 1594 Plat Jewell-ho. ii. 35 If it continew longe in a pewter sawcer, it hath an intention towardes ceruse. |
II. Specific uses.
10. Surg. and Med. a. An aim or purpose in a healing process; hence, a plan or method of treatment. [med.L. curationis intentio, transl. ὁ τῆς ἰάσεως σκοπός Galen (ed. Kühn I. 385).] arch.
| c 1400 Lanfranc's Cirurg. 18 Al þe entencioun of a surgian, how diuers þat it be, it is on [of] þre maners, þe first is vndoynge of þat, þat is hool, þe secunde to hele þat, þat is broke, þe .iij. is remeuynge of þat, þat is to myche. 1541 R. Copland Guydon's Formul., etc. S j, In the cure of colde apostemes be iij intencyons. The fyrste is to egall the mater antecedent. The seconde is the conioynt mater. And y⊇ thyrde is to correct y⊇ accydentes. 1701 T. Fuller (title) Pharmacopœia Extemporanea; or, a body of Select Medicines, answering most intentions of cure. 1727–41 Chambers Cycl., Intention or Intension, in medicine, that judgment, or method of cure, which a physician forms to himself from a due examination of symptoms. 1822–34 Good's Study Med. (ed. 4) IV. 378 Some of the indications of the disease, however, have given rise to a much bolder intention. |
b. spec. in first intention, the healing of a lesion or fracture by the immediate re-union of the severed parts, without granulation; second intention, the healing of a wound by granulation after suppuration.
| 1543 Traheron Vigo's Chirurg. (1586) 130 b, Solution of continuitie in the flesh may be restored by the waie of the first intention. 1767 Gooch Treat. Wounds I. 130 The first intention belongs to incised wounds, and is performed, by bringing their lips, as much as possible, into contact..The second intention is accomplished, by promoting digestion, and regeneration of the loss of substance. 1813 J. Thomson Lect. Inflam. 125 The first [mode] is by adhesion without granulation; this Galen termed re-union by the first intention; the second is re-union by granulation..re-union by the seond intention. 1859 J. Brown Rab & F. ii. (1862) 26 The wound healed ‘by the first intention’. |
11. Logic. The direction or application of the mind to an object; a conception formed by directing the mind to some object; a general concept. first intentions, primary conceptions of things, formed by the first or direct application of the mind to the things themselves; e.g. the concepts of a tree, an oak. second intentions, secondary conceptions formed by the application of thought to first intentions in their relations to each other; e.g. the concepts of genus, species, variety, property, accident, difference, identity.
The introduction of these terms is due to the early Latin translation of Avicenna, in which the Arabic maﻋqūlāt ‘perceptions, notions’, pl. of maﻋqūl ‘what is perceived by the intellect, intelligible, known’, is rendered by intentiones. Thus tr. Avicenna Metaph. I, 2 (Prantl II. 321) Subjectum vero logicæ, sicut scisti, sunt intentiones intellectæ secundo [al-maﻋqūlāt al-þāniyah], quæ apponuntur intentionibus primo intellectis [al-maﻋqūlāt al-ūlāy], secundum quod per eas pervenitur de cognito ad incognitum. Hence in Albertus Magnus (1193–1280) Metaph. I; I, 1 (Opp. ed. Jammy, Lugd. 1651, III. 3/1) Scientiæ logicæ non considerant ens et partem entis aliquam, sed intentiones secundas circa res per sermonem positas, per quas viæ habentur veniendi de noto ad ignotum. Pacius (Aristot. Organ., 1584) identifies intentio with notio ‘notion’: ‘prima notio seu prima intentio’.
| 1550 Bale Image Both Ch. ii. Pref. 2 b, Subtiltees, seconde intencyons, intrinsecall moodes. 1551 Robinson tr. More's Utopia ii. vi. (1895) 185 Our newe Logiciens..were neuer yet able to fynde out the seconde intentyons; in so muche that none of them all coulde euer see man hymselfe in commen, as they call hym. 1638 Rouse Heav. Acad. ii. 15 For things of the second intention, to discern them we ascend above Sense unto Reason, and see them with our Understandings. 1646 Sir T. Browne Pseud. Ep. i. iii. 9 Not attaining the..second intention of the words. 1852 Mansel Notes Aldrich's Logic (ed. 2) 20 First Intentions, as conceptions of things, are predicable of the individuals conceived under them..Second Intentions are not so predicable..When Genus is said to be predicable of Species, it is not meant that we can predicate the one second Intention of the other, so as to say, ‘Species is Genus’; but that the first intention ‘animal’ is predicable of the first intention ‘man’; the relation of the one to the other being expressed by the second intentions ‘genus’ and ‘species’. For this reason, Logic was said [by Avicenna] to treat of second intentions applied to first. 1864 Bowen Logic v. 112. |
12. Theol. a. One of the three things necessary, according to the Schoolmen, to the effectual administration and validity of a Sacrament, the two others being matter and form: see quots.
| 1690 Shadewell Am. Bigot v. ad fin., I vill pronounce de Words of de maarriage without intention, and den it is no marriage. 1726 Ayliffe Parergon 103 The doctrine of the Schools is, That a Sacrament requires Matter, Form, and Intention. Ibid., I am at a loss to know what the Intention of a Sacrament is, unless it be what the Church requires to be done therein, according to the Council of Florence. 1842–71 Hook Ch. Dict. 397 The following is the eleventh canon of the Council of Trent:—‘If any shall say that there is not required in the ministers while they perform and confer the sacraments, at least the intention of doing what the Church does, let him be accursed’. 1869 Haddan Apost. Success. viii. (1879) 267 Popes like Alexander VIII. may tell us..that a minister invalidates a rite by withdrawing his interior intention from it,..soberer schoolmen..limit the required intention to nothing more at the least than a virtual intention to do as the Church does. |
b. R.C. Ch. special or particular intention, a special purpose or end for which mass is celebrated, prayers are offered up, etc. as the spiritual welfare of some person, etc.
| 1849 Rock Ch. of Fathers I. i. 76 Like ourselves, the Anglo-Saxons often celebrated mass for a particular intention. 1886 Echo 30 Nov., In the Communion Service a ‘special intention’ was made known by the introduction of words implying that the ‘sacrifice was received in memory’ of the dead. 1890 Louisa Dobrée Stories Sacram., Blanche's Baptism 20, I gave you all my intentions at Mass that morning, and said the Te Deum for you. 1895 Catholic Mag. July 184 Our Mother General..gives us the intention for the next day's Communion. 1966 New Statesman 22 Apr. 608/1 The text of the Mass itself, with its special intention in capitals. |
13. Roman Law. (See quot.)
| 1880 Muirhead Gaius iv. §41 The clauses of a formula are these,—the demonstration, the intention, the adjudication, and the condemnation..The intention is the clause in which the pursuer embodies his demand; for example, thus: ‘Should it appear that Numerius Negidius ought to give ten thousand sesterces to Aulus Agerius’. |
† 14. Rhet. Intensification of force or meaning; the use of a word to such an end. (L. intentio, Aul. Gell.; Gr. ἐπίτασις, Dion. Hal.) Obs.
| 1678 Phillips (ed. 4), Intention,..in Rhetorick it is the repetition of the same word in a contrary sense, as Una salus victis nullam sperare salutem. |
15. Special Comb.: intention movement [tr. G. intentionsbewegung (O. Heinroth)], a movement or action on the part of an animal which itself performs no function except to reveal or signal that a further movement or action may follow or is contemplated; intention tremor, a tremor which is manifested when a voluntary action is performed.
| [1910 O. Heinroth in Jrnl. für Ornith. LVIII. 122 Eine Modifikation des eigentlichen Locktones, wie sie kurz vor dem Auffliegen hervorgebracht und dann mit den oben beschriebenen Intentionsbewegungen verbunden wird, ist ein langes und fein ausklingendes ‘Hu’.] 1950 K. Z. Lorenz in Symposia Soc. Exper. Biol. IV. 242 We know of two phyletically distinct ways, by which non-social, mechanically effective endogenous activities may develop into social releasers: in one case the so-called ‘intention movement’ (Intentionsbewegung, Heinroth), in the other the so-called ‘displacement activities’. Ibid. 243 Intention movements..are..very reliable indicators for the present ‘mood’ of an animal. 1953 N. Tinbergen Herring Gull's World xvii. 153 A bird may rapidly change from pecking to the intention-movement of brooding. 1961 A. J. Berger Bird Study v. 136 The first intention movement preceding walking or hopping often is a ‘bow’. |
| 1887 Vickery & Knapp tr. A. von Strümpell's Textbk. Med. 593 The tremor in multiple sclerosis comes on only with intended movements, ‘intention tremor’. 1969 Times 8 Feb. 4/1 All but one suffered from defects in their nervous systems. The commonest of these seems to have been intention tremors, which are tremors occurring when a voluntary movement is made. |
▪ II. † inˈtention, v. Obs. rare—0.
[f. prec., after It. intenzionare, f. intenzione: cf. F. intentionner (1690 in Hatz.-Darm.).]
To have an intention.
| 1611 Florio, Intentionare, to intention. |