librate

present singular third person librates · participle present librating · participle past librated · past librated

1. intransitiveTo oscillate (like the beam of a balance).

   Their parts all librate on too nice a beam.

   1796, William Cliffton, The Group

   1 more example

   The currently observed orbital resonances at the 2:1 mean motion commensurabilities involving Io-Europa and Europa-Ganymede are such that the resonance variables #92;theta#95;1#61;#92;lambda#95;1-2#92;lambda#95;2#43;#92;omega#95;1 and #92;theta#95;3#61;#92;lambda#95;2-2#92;lambda#95;3#43;#92;omega#95;2 librate about 0° and #92;theta#95;2#61;#92;lambda#95;1-2#92;lambda#95;2#43;#92;omega#95;2 librates about 180°, all with small amplitude.

   2002 October 18, S. J. Peale, Man Hoi Lee, “A Primordial Origin of the Laplace Relation Among the Galilean Satellites”, in Science, volume 298, number 5593, →DOI, page 594

2. figurativelyintransitiveTo waver or deliberate between two opposing thoughts or choices.

   But she winds about him coil after coil of her glittering rhetoric, in which reason holds its own as it librates with specious feeling.

   1924, Herbert Weir Smyth, “VI. Orestea. I: Agamemnon”, in Aeschylean Tragedy, page 168

3. intransitiveTo be poised; to balance oneself.

   Her playful Sea-horse […] His watery way with waving volutes wins, / Or listening librates on unmoving fins.

   1791, Erasmus Darwin, The Economy of Vegetation, J. Johnson, page 138

4. obsoletetransitiveTo place in a balance; to weigh.

plural librates

1. historicalA piece of land having a value of one pound per year.