lightning Hear it!

lightning Definition

light·ning (līt′niŋ)

noun

  1. a flash of light in the sky caused by the discharge of atmospheric electricity from one cloud to another or between a cloud and the earth
  2. such a discharge of electricity

Etymology: ME lightninge < lightnen, to lighten

intransitive verb

to give off such a discharge

adjective

like lightning

lightning Synonyms

lightning

n.

electrical discharge, fulmination, streak of lightning, lightning flash, thunderball, thunderstroke, firebolt, thunderlight, thunderbolt, bolt, bolt from the blue; see also electricity 2.

Types of lightning include: ball, globular, chain, forked, heat, summer, sheet.

lightning Usage Examples

Converse of object

  • fork: His air of being on the point of shooting out forked lightning left him.
  • grease: Like greased lightning, Guy set to work, and within hours the navigation bar sported a link reading Chris is Great.
  • flash: There's plenty of blood, and flashing lightning as the corpse is hidden - but where?
  • attract: Keep away from solitary trees as they attract lightning.
  • watch: Unfortunately during the ascent we watched lightning in clouds below to the north, our summit.
  • prove: Proving the lightning does strike twice, Read then dismissed Gillmor when again a defensive shot spun back into the batsman's wicket.

Converse of subject

  • strike: You're more likely to be struck dead by lightning than you are to win the Lottery?
  • hit: Apparently a group of cavers were hit by ground lightning in the same area a few years ago.
  • kill: The number of people killed by lightning each year has varied markedly.
  • destroy: This one was built in the 13th century and used to have a spire, which was destroyed by lightning in the 17th century.

Adjective modifier

  • white: With a sharp crack a bolt of brilliant white lightning forked across the sky toward us.

Modifies a noun

  • bolt: Do you have any idea what the small light bulbs or the ' lightning bolt ' are for?
  • conductor: There are nearly always three lightning conductors sticking up at the top of the tower.
  • strike: Two of them were wearing a red lightning strike on the tail which made a nice change from the usual all over gray.
  • flash: An evil dark gray wall of rain with occasional lightning flashes was the lot.
  • rod: Living with a lightning rod for trouble has its advantages.
  • storm: You might infer " hmm, maybe lightning storm happened " .

Noun used with modifier

  • ball: A recent article in the New Scientist described a fresh theory for the phenomenon of ball lightning.
  • sheet: The day started with loud thunder ringing in my ears and sheet lightning flashes before by eyes.

Preposition: from

  • heaven: This is not about bolts of lightning from heaven, or arbitrary punishments.
lightning Quotes

And he said unto them, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven.

—Bible (NewTestament)

L'amour, croyait-elle, devait arriver tout a'   coup, avec de grands e¤  clats et des fulgurations. She believed that love should appear instantaneously, with the brilliance of a lightning storm.

—Flaubert, Gustave

It came by a lightning flash like knowledge from the gods.

—Wilson, Edward O(sborne)

As different as a moonbeam from lightning, or frost from fire.

—Bronte«  , EmilyJane

Tempt me no more; for I Have known the lightning's hour, The poet's inward pride, The certainty of power.

—Day-Lewis, Cecil

In the golden lightning Of the sunken sun O'er which clouds are brightening, Thou dost float and run Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun.

—Shelley, Percy Bysshe

Lightning rods have had it better than Nancy Reagan.

—NewYorkTimes

Wir tappen im Labyrinth unsers Lebenswandels und im Dunkel unserer Forschungen umher: helleAugenblicke erleuchten dabei wie Blitze unsernWeg. We grope about in the labyrinth of our life and in the obscurity of our investigations; bright moments illuminate our path like flashes of lightning.

—Schopenhauer, Arthur

   Mine eyeshave seen thegloryof the coming of the Lord: He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored. He hath loosed the fatal lightning of his terrible swift sword: His truth is marching on.

—Howe,JuliaWard

Mirth is short and transient, cheerfulness fixed and permanent† Mirth is like a flash of lightning that breaks through a gloom of clouds, and glitters for a moment: cheerfulness keeps up a kind of day-light in the mind, and fills it with a steady and perpetual serenity.

—Addison,Joseph

I did say yes O at lightning and lashed rod; Thou heardst me truer than tongue confess Thy terror,O Christ,O God.

—Hopkins, SirAnthony

I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismograph.

—Kesey, Ken Elton

Kean is original; but he copies from himself. His rapid descents from the hyper-tragic to the infra-colloquial, though sometimes productive of great effect, are often unreasonable. To see him act, is like reading Shakespeare by flashes of lightning.

—Coleridge, Samuel Taylor

Roughly speaking it was the sensation of being at the centre of an explosion† I fancy you would feel much the same if you were struck by lightning. I knew immediately that I was hit, but because of that seeming bang and flash, I thought it was a rifle nearby that had gone off accidentallyand shot me.

—Orwell, George pseudonym of  Eric Arthur Blair

A good poet is someone who manages, in a lifetime of standing out in thunderstorms, to be struck by lightning five or six times; a dozen or two dozen times and he is great.

—Jarrell, Randall

I asked you to be the thunder and lightning of Desert Storm.You were all of that and more.

—Schwarzkopf, H Norman

His love was passion's essence:öas a tree On fire by lightning, with ethereal flame Kindled he was, and blasted.

—Rochdale