3. To walk slowly, gravely, or resolutely. Home the swain retreats, His flock before him stepping to the fold. Thomson.
4. Fig.: To move mentally; to go in imagination. They are stepping almost three thousand years back into the remotest antiquity. Pope. To step aside, to walk a little distance from the rest; to retire from company. — To step forth, to move or come forth. — To step in or into. (a) To walk or advance into a place or state, or to advance suddenly in. Whosoever then first, after the troubling of the water, stepped in, was made whole of whatsoever disease he had. John v. 4. (b) To enter for a short time; as, I just stepped into the house. (c) To obtain possession without trouble; to enter upon easily or suddenly; as, to step into an estate. — To step out. (a) (Mil.) To increase the length, but not the rapidity, of the step, extending it to thirty-tree inches. (b) To go out for a short distance or a short time. — To step short (Mil.), to diminish the length or rapidity of the step according to the established rules.
STEP
Step, v. t.
1. To set, as the foot.
2. (Naut.)
Defn: To fix the foot of (a mast) in its step; to erect. To step off, to measure by steps, or paces; hence, to divide, as a space, or to form a series of marks, by successive measurements, as with dividers.
STEP
Step, n. Etym: [AS. stæpe. See Step, v. i.]
1. An advance or movement made by one removal of the foot; a pace.
2. A rest, or one of a set of rests, for the foot in ascending or descending, as a stair, or a round of a ladder. The breadth of every single step or stair should be never less than one foot. Sir H. Wotton.
3. The space passed over by one movement of the foot in walking or running; as, one step is generally about three feet, but may be more or less. Used also figuratively of any kind of progress; as, he improved step by step, or by steps. To derive two or three general principles of motion from phenomena, and afterwards to tell us how the properties and actions of all corporeal things follow from those manifest principles, would be a very great step in philosophy. Sir I. Newton.