Past \Past\, a. [From Pass, v.]
   Of or pertaining to a former time or state; neither present
   nor future; gone by; elapsed; ended; spent; as, past
   troubles; past offences. "Past ages." --Milton.
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   Past master. See under Master.
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	Past \Past\, n.
   A former time or state; a state of things gone by. "The past,
   at least, is secure." --D. Webster.
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         The present is only intelligible in the light of the
         past, often a very remote past indeed.   --Trench.
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	Past \Past\, prep.
   1. Beyond, in position, or degree; further than; beyond the
      reach or influence of. "Who being past feeling." --Eph.
      iv. 19. "Galled past endurance." --Macaulay.
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            Until we be past thy borders.         --Num. xxi.
                                                  22.
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            Love, when once past government, is consequently
            past shame.                           --L'Estrange.
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   2. Beyond, in time; after; as, past the hour.
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            Is it not past two o'clock?           --Shak.
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   3. Above; exceeding; more than. [R.]
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            Not past three quarters of a mile.    --Shak.
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            Bows not past three quarters of a yard long.
                                                  --Spenser.
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	Past \Past\ (p[.a]st), adv.
   By; beyond; as, he ran past.
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         The alarum of drums swept past.          --Longfellow.
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	past
     adj 1: earlier than the present time; no longer current; "time
            past"; "his youth is past"; "this past Thursday"; "the
            past year" [ant: present(a), future]
     2: of a person who has held and relinquished a position or
        office; "a retiring member of the board" [syn: past(a),
        preceding(a), retiring(a)]
     3: a verb tense or other construction referring to events or
        states that existed at some previous time; "past
        participle"
     n 1: the time that has elapsed; "forget the past" [syn: past
          times, yesteryear, yore] [ant: future]
     2: a earlier period in someone's life (especially one that they
        have reason to keep secret); "reporters dug into the
        candidate's past"
     3: a verb tense that expresses actions or states in the past
        [syn: past tense]
     adv : so as to pass a given point; "every hour a train goes past"
           [syn: by]

	

	142 Moby Thesaurus words for "past":
   above, above and beyond, across, after, ago, ancient, antecedent,
   anterior, antiquated, antique, antiquity, aorist, aoristic,
   background, before, behind, beyond, biography, blown over, by,
   bygone, bygone days, bypast, career, chronology, close by,
   continuity, dated, days beyond recall, days gone by, days of old,
   days of yore, dead, dead and buried, dead and gone, deceased,
   defunct, departed, disused, done, duration, durative, duree, early,
   elapsed, erstwhile, existence, expired, extinct, finished, fore,
   foregoing, foretime, forgotten, former, former times, future,
   future perfect, gone, gone glimmering, gone out, gone-by, has-been,
   heretofore, historical present, history, immemorial, imperfect,
   in excess of, irrecoverable, lang syne, lapsed, last, lastingness,
   late, later than, life, lifetime, nearby, no more, obsolete, old,
   old times, olden, olden times, on, once, onetime, out,
   out of style, out of use, outside, outworn, over, over and above,
   passe, passed, passed away, past perfect, perfect, perfective,
   period, pluperfect, point tense, precedent, prehistoric, present,
   present perfect, preterit, preteritive, previous, primeval,
   primitive, prior, progressive tense, psychological time, quondam,
   recent, run out, since, sometime, space, space-time, subsequent to,
   tense, term, the future, the past, the present, then, tide, time,
   timebinding, too deep for, vanished, while, whilom, without,
   wound up, yesterday, yesteryear, yore

	

	PAST, n.  That part of Eternity with some small fraction of which we
have a slight and regrettable acquaintance.  A moving line called the
Present parts it from an imaginary period known as the Future.  These
two grand divisions of Eternity, of which the one is continually
effacing the other, are entirely unlike.  The one is dark with sorrow
and disappointment, the other bright with prosperity and joy.  The
Past is the region of sobs, the Future is the realm of song.  In the
one crouches Memory, clad in sackcloth and ashes, mumbling penitential
prayer; in the sunshine of the other Hope flies with a free wing,
beckoning to temples of success and bowers of ease.  Yet the Past is
the Future of yesterday, the Future is the Past of to-morrow.  They
are one -- the knowledge and the dream.