Forms: 5 aqwere, acquere, 6 acquyre. [a. OFr. aquer-re, acquer-re:—L. acquīr-ĕre to get in addition; f. ac- = ad- to + quærĕre to seek. Refashioned in 6 after L.]
1. To gain, obtain, or get as one’s own, to gain the ownership of (by one’s own exertions or qualities).
c. 1435. Seven Sages (P.), 1080. Thanne the childe were gode of lore, Ȝyt he wolde aqwere more.
1483. Caxton, Cato, x viij. These fyue goodes acqueren the juste and good folke after their dethe.
1602. Shaks., Haml., III. ii. 8. In the verie … Whirle-winde of Passion, you must acquire, and beget a Temperance that may giue it Smoothnesse.
a. 1680. Butler, Rem. (1759), I. 173. For what w’acquire by Pains and Art Is only due t’our own Desert.
1769. Junius Lett., iii. 17. He has acquired nothing but honour in the field.
1847. Yeowell, Anc. Brit. Ch., ix. 93. But if the clergy thus acquired riches, they applied them to the noblest purposes.
b. Const. for (to or dative obj. obs.).
1601. Shaks., All’s Well, IV. iii. 80. The great dignitie that his valour hath here acquir’d for him.
1624. Gataker, Transubst., 144. Thereby to acquire judgement or condemnation to themselves.
1656. W. Montague, Accompl. Wom., 1. Such a kind of wit acquires us a command as powerful as pleasing.
1759. Robertson, Hist. Scot. (1817), I. II. 382. Another circumstance contributed to acquire the Regent such considerable influence.
2. To receive, or get as one’s own (without reference to the manner), to come into possession of.
1613. Shaks., Hen. VIII., II. iii. 9. Pompe, the which To leaue, a thousand fold more bitter, then ’Tis sweet at first t’acquire.
1758. Johnson, Idler, No. 9, ¶ 8. The Idler acquires weight by lying still.
1818. Accum, Chem. Tests, 167. The mixture will acquire an orange colour.
1862. Ruskin, Unto this Last, 130. If, in the exchange, one man is able to give what cost him little labour for what has cost the other much, he acquires a certain quantity of the produce of the other’s labour. And precisely what he acquires the other loses.
† 3. ‘To come to, to attain.’ J. Obs. rare.
1665. Glanville, Scepsis Sci., xi. 60. Motion cannot be perceived without the perception of its terms, viz. the parts of space which it immediately left, and those which it next acquires … Now the space left and acquir’d in such slow progressions is so inconsiderable that, etc.
¶ Confused with ENQUIRE and REQUIRE. See AD- 2.
1624. Heywood, Gunaikeion, II. 57. None at that age acquires after things unknown.
1553–87. Foxe, A. & M., II. 48/2 (1684). The Cardinal hath acquired, at the commandment of the Pope, three things of me to be observed.
