resolve, to dissolve, melt; ‘O! that this too too solid flesh would melt, Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew’, Hamlet, i. 2. 130; to free from uncertainty, Meas. for M. iii. 1. 193; iv. 2. 226; to satisfy, Beaumont and Fl., Laws of Candy, iv. 1 (Antinous).
respasses, raspberries. Herrick, To the most fair Mistris A. Soame, 20. For resp-es-es, rasp-es-es, a double plural. ‘Rasp’ is in prov. use in various parts of the British Isles (EDD.). See Nares.
respective, careful; ‘You should have been respective’, Merch. Ven. v. 1. 156; worthy of respect, Two Gent. iv. 4. 200; respectively, respectfully, with due respect, Timon, iii. 1. 8; Middleton, Five Gallants, ii. 1.
resplendish, to shine. Sir T. Elyot, Governour, bk. iii, c. 2, § 3. OF. resplendir. See Croft’s note.
rest, a musket-rest; ‘His rest? why, has he a forked head?’, B. Jonson, Ev. Man out of Humour, iv. 4 (Puntarvolo); because the musket-rest was semicircular; ‘Like a musket on a rest’, Middleton, Roaring Girl, iv. 2 (Mis. O.).
rest, ‘in primero, the stakes kept in reserve, which were agreed upon at the beginning of the game, and upon the loss of which the game terminated; the venture of such stakes’ (NED.); ‘The money he had duly won upon a rest’, Cotton, Espernon, i. 4. 156; fig., ‘When I cannot live any longer, I will do as I may: That is my rest’, Hen. V, ii. 1. 17 (Corporal Nym means, this is what I stand to win or lose). Phr. to set up one’s rest, ‘to venture one’s final stake or reserve’ (NED.); hence, fig., to take a decisive resolution, to be determined, ‘I have set up my rest to run away’, Merch. Ven. ii. 2. 110; ‘He that sets up his rest to do more exploits’, Com. Errors, iv. 3. 27; Middleton, Span. Gipsy, iv. 3 (Alvarez); to place one’s fixed aim in something, ‘He seems to set up his rest in this plenty, and the neatness of his house’, Pepys, Diary, Jan. 19, 1663. See Nares.
rest, to ‘arrest’. B. Jonson, Every Man in Hum. iv. 11. 4 (Brainworm); ‘I reste as a sergente dothe a prisoner or his goodes, je arreste’, Palsgrave. In common Scottish use, see EDD. (s.v. Rest, vb.2 3).
rest, a ‘wrest’, a pin for winding up the strings of a harp, &c. Skelton, Magnyfycence, 137; wrest, to wind up, id., Colyn Cloute, 492.
rest-balk, a ridge of land left unploughed between two furrows. Fitzherbert, Husbandry, § 4. 4.
resty, inert, loath to move, sluggish, Tr. and Cr. i. 3. 263; Cymbeline, iii. 6. 34; resty stiff, Edward III, iii. 3. 161. The same word as ‘restive’ (‘restiff’). Anglo-F. restif (Ch. Rol., 1256). See Trench, Select Glossary; and Dict. (s.v. Restive).