[UP- 2. Cf. next.]
1. The fact of being raised or elevated.
a. 1845. Willis, David’s Grief for Child, 28. His brow Had the inspired up-lift of the king’s.
1890. Stanley, Darkest Africa, I. xvi. 413. There was uniform uplift and subsidence of the constantly twirling spear blades.
b. spec. An elevation or rise in level, esp. of a portion of the earth’s surface.
1853. Kane, Grinnell Exp., xvii. (1856), 128. The false horizon, which I had selected as an index of the uplift. Ibid. (1856), Arct. Expl., II. vii. 82. Indicative of secular uplift of coast.
1878. Whittier, Seeking Waterfall, xix. The grand uplift of mountain lines.
1882. U.S. Rep. Prec. Met., 619. The assumption of an uplift or elevation of the Sierra Nevada.
2. fig. An elevating effect, result, or influence in the sphere of morality, emotion, physical condition, etc.
In very common use after 1890.
1873. Holland, A. Bonnic., i. 22. But it is impossible that he could know what an uplift he gave to the life to which he ministered.
1885. ‘E. F. Byrrne’ (Emma Frances Brooke), Entangled, II. II. viii. 255. This uplift of the heart … towards a sterner and more austere allegiance to duty.
1889. Lancet, 28 Sept., 661/1. The rapidity of the uplift in health in many of the cases.
1893. K. L. Bates, Eng. Relig. Drama, 195. The uplift and the glory of conception melted and were gone.
