STICK, noun [G. This word is connected with the verb to stick with stock, stack, and other words having the like elements. The primary sense of the root is to thrust, to shoot, and to set.]

1. The small shoot or branch of a tree or shrub, cut off; a rod; also, a staff; as, to strike one with a stick

2. Any stem of a tree, of any size, cut for fuel or timber. It is applied in America to any long and slender piece of timber, round or square, from the smallest size to the largest, used in the frames of buildings; as a stick of timber for a post, a beam or a rafter.

3. Many instruments, long and slender, are called sticks; as the composing stick of printers.

4. A thrust with a pointed instrument that penetrates a body; a stab.

STICK of eels, the number of twenty five eels. A bind contains ten sticks.

STICK, verb transitive preterit tense and participle passive stuck. [G., to sting or prick, to stick to adhere.]

1. To pierce; to stab; to cause to enter, as a pointed instrument; hence, to kill by piercing; as, to stick a beast in slaughter. [A common use of the word.]

2. To thrust in; to fasten or cause to remain by piercing; as, to stick a pin on the sleeve.

3. To fasten; to attach by causing to adhere to the surface; as, to stick on a patch or plaster; to stick on a thing with paste or glue.

4. To set; to fix in; as, to stick card teeth.

5. To set with something pointed; as, to stick cards.

6. To fix on a pointed instrument; as, to stick an apple on a fork.

STICK, verb intransitive

1. To adhere; to hold to by cleaving to the surface, as by tenacity or attraction; as, glue sticks to the fingers; paste sticks to the wall, and causes paper to stick

I will cause the fish of thy rivers to stick to thy scales. Ezekiel 29:4.

2. To be united; to be inseparable; to cling fast to, as something reproachful.

If on your fame our sex a blot has thrown, twill ever stick through malice of your own.

3. To rest with the memory; to abide.

4. To stop; to be impeded by adhesion or obstruction; as, the carriage sticks in the mire.

5. To stop; to be arrested in a course.

My faltering tongue sticks at the sound.

6. To stop; to hesitate. He sticks at no difficulty; he sticks at the commission of no crime; he sticks at nothing.

7. To adhere; to remain; to resist efforts to remove.

I had most need of blessing, and amen stuck in my throat.

8. To cause difficulties or scruples; to cause to hesitate.

This is the difficulty that sticks with the most reasonable--

9. To be stopped or hindered from proceeding; as, a bill passed the senate, but stuck in the house of representatives.

They never doubted the commons; but heard all stuck in the lords house.

10. To be embarrassed or puzzled.

They will stick long at part of a demonstration, for want of perceiving the connection between two ideals.

11. To adhere closely in friendship and affection.

There is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother. Proverbs 18:24.

To stick to, to adhere closely; to be constant; to be firm; to be persevering; as, to stick to a party or cause.

The advantage will be on our side, if we stick to its essentials.

To stick by,

1. To adhere closely; to be constant; to be firm in supporting.

We are your only friends; stick by us, and we will stick by you.

2. To be troublesome by adhering.

I am satisfied to trifle away my time, rather than let it stick by me.

To stick upon, to dwell upon; not to forsake.

If the matter be knotty, the mind must stop and buckle to it, and stick upon it with labor and thought. [Not elegant.]

To stick out, to project; to be prominent.

His bones that were not seen, stick out. Job 33:21.