Noah Webster's New International Dictionary of the English Language 1. (a.) Inferior in bulk, degree, importance, etc.; less; smaller; of little account; as, minor divisions of a body. 2. (a.) Less by a semitone in interval or difference of pitch; as, a minor third. 3. (n.) A person of either sex who has not attained the age at which full civil rights are accorded; an infant; in England and the United States, one under twenty-one years of age. 4. (n.) The minor term, that is, the subject of the conclusion; also, the minor premise, that is, that premise which contains the minor term; in hypothetical syllogisms, the categorical premise. It is the second proposition of a regular syllogism, as in the following: Every act of injustice partakes of meanness; to take money from another by gaming is an act of injustice; therefore, the taking of money from another by gaming partakes of meanness. 5. (n.) A Minorite; a Franciscan friar.
|