harden

harden
    v 1: become hard or harder; "The wax hardened" [syn: {harden},
         {indurate}] [ant: {soften}]
    2: make hard or harder; "The cold hardened the butter" [syn:
       {harden}, {indurate}] [ant: {soften}]
    3: harden by reheating and cooling in oil; "temper steel" [syn:
       {temper}, {harden}]
    4: make fit; "This trip will season even the hardiest traveller"
       [syn: {season}, {harden}]
    5: cause to accept or become hardened to; habituate; "He was
       inured to the cold" [syn: {inure}, {harden}, {indurate}]
    

Harden \Hard"en\ (h[aum]rd"'n), v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Hardened}
   (-'nd); p. pr. & vb. n. {Hardening} (-'n*[i^]ng).] [OE.
   hardnen, hardenen.]
   1. To make hard or harder; to make firm or compact; to
      indurate; as, to harden clay or iron.
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   2. To accustom by labor or suffering to endure with
      constancy; to strengthen; to stiffen; to inure; also, to
      confirm in wickedness or shame; to make unimpressionable.
      "Harden not your heart." --Ps. xcv. 8.
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            I would harden myself in sorrow.      --Job vi. 10.
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Harden \Hard"en\, v. i.
   1. To become hard or harder; to acquire solidity, or more
      compactness; as, mortar hardens by drying.
      [1913 Webster]

            The deliberate judgment of those who knew him [A.
            Lincoln] has hardened into tradition. --The Century.
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   2. To become confirmed or strengthened, in either a good or a
      bad sense.
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            They, hardened more by what might most reclaim.
                                                  --Milton.
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Hurden \Hur"den\, n. [From {Hurds}.]
   A coarse kind of linen; -- called also {harden}. [Prov. Eng.]
   [1913 Webster]
    

80 Moby Thesaurus words for "harden":
      acclimate, acclimatize, accommodate, accustom, adapt, adjust,
      anneal, be tough, beef up, brace, brace up, break, break in,
      brutalize, buttress, cake, calcify, callous, case harden,
      caseharden, compact, concrete, condition, confirm, conform,
      congeal, consolidate, cornify, crystallize, densify, domesticate,
      domesticize, dry, endure, establish, familiarize, firm, fix,
      fortify, fossilize, freeze, gentle, gird, habituate, hang tough,
      housebreak, indurate, intensify, inure, invigorate, lapidify,
      lithify, naturalize, nerve, orient, orientate, ossify, petrify,
      prop, refresh, reinforce, reinvigorate, restrengthen, season, set,
      shore up, solidify, steel, stiffen, strengthen, support, sustain,
      tame, temper, toughen, train, turn to stone, undergird, vitrify,
      wont