Words · Meanings · Passages
Traherne Lexicon
A Reader’s Companion to Centuries of Meditations
471 entries · 0 subsidiary termsTerms beginning with F
1–26 of 26
Face
Face means the visible front or countenance of a person, and by extension an appearance through which something becomes present.
Centuries of Meditations
Fain
Fain can mean gladly or eagerly; with forms of be and an infinitive it can mean obliged or constrained.
Centuries of Meditations
Faith
Faith is trusting belief in divine truth and promise.
Centuries of Meditations
Fall
The Fall is humanity’s departure from its original relation to God through sin.
Centuries of Meditations
Falsehood
Falsehood is untruth, and in the relevant passage it carries the further sense of fraudulent pretence.
Centuries of Meditations
Fame
Fame can mean what is reported about a person or thing, as well as an established reputation for distinction.
Centuries of Meditations
Fancy
Fancy names the inventive imagination, especially when it gives freedom and ornament to language.
Centuries of Meditations
Fatal
Fatal can mean appointed by fate or inescapable, without implying death.
Centuries of Meditations
Father
Father may denote a human parent, God as the giver of creaturely and filial life, or specifically the first person of the Trinity.
Centuries of Meditations
Fear
Fear may be an expectation of harm or a reverent response to divine authority.
Centuries of Meditations
Felicity
Felicity names the full happiness or blessedness for which human life is made.
Centuries of Meditations
Fellowship
Fellowship is participation in something held in common and, by extension, company among those who share it.
Centuries of Meditations
Fidelity
Fidelity is steadfast faithfulness: love or allegiance maintained in conduct.
Centuries of Meditations
Fire
Fire can be literal heat and danger, but it is also a figure of ardour, illumination, purification, and an affection that continually communicates itself.
Centuries of Meditations
Firmament
Firmament names the sky or celestial expanse, especially in scriptural descriptions of the ordered heavens.
Centuries of Meditations
Flesh
Flesh names bodily substance or embodied human life.
Centuries of Meditations
Flowers
Flowers are the living ornaments and products of the earth.
Centuries of Meditations
Folly
Folly is a failure of sound judgement expressed in conduct.
Centuries of Meditations
Food
Food sustains embodied life and supplies a natural figure for what sustains the soul.
Centuries of Meditations
Force
Force is the strength with which something acts or moves another.
Centuries of Meditations
Forgiveness
Forgiveness is the remission of an offence or injury without a vindictive response.
Centuries of Meditations
Fortune and chance
Fortune here means a person’s material circumstances or outward lot.
Centuries of Meditations
Freedom
Freedom includes release from restriction, the power of voluntary choice, and the unbought character of a gift.
Centuries of Meditations
Friendship
Friendship is a relation of benevolent attachment in which persons seek and share one another’s good.
Centuries of Meditations
Fruit
Fruit is a living product and, figuratively, the outcome of an action, disposition, or power.
Centuries of Meditations
Fruition
Fruition means enjoyment or the having of a good in realised possession.
Centuries of Meditations
About this collection
October 2026
Centuries of Meditations · Thomas Traherne
About this collection and downloads
471 contextual articles from the complete Centuries of Meditations, with 410 numbered positions, including the editorial notice at II.88 and the unfinished Fifth Century ending at V.10.
A companion for reading
This lexicon accompanies Thomas Traherne's Centuries of Meditations in the Diotimos Editions annotated edition of 2026. Its 471 articles explain the book's characteristic words, recurrent images, scriptural figures and habits of argument. They range from everyday things, such as air, corn and water, to the governing ideas of felicity, enjoyment, love, infinity and possession. The scope is the complete work: four numbered Centuries followed by the unfinished Fifth. The numbering runs through 410 positions, but there are 409 actual meditations. At II.88 the Diotimos edition prints only an editorial notice: its explanatory note says that Traherne skipped that number, with no missing text. The Fifth Century ends at V.10.
Traherne repeatedly gives familiar words unfamiliar work. To enjoy is to enter into delighted possession; a want can disclose a capacity; a common thing can be a greater treasure than a rarity. These senses are best learned by returning to the passages where they operate. The lexicon therefore offers interpretation alongside lexical explanation. It does not replace continuous reading, and a cross-reference is an invitation to compare, not a claim that two words mean the same thing.
The articles are arranged alphabetically. Traherne wrote in English, so the line beneath each headword gives English forms and useful equivalents. Related forms and less prominent senses can be found through the lexical index. Longer articles make room for the distinctions that carry the argument; shorter ones explain a particular image, older usage or local difficulty.
How to read an entry
The word identifies the sense that matters here, including older uses that a modern reader might miss. In Traherne follows the word or idea through the Centuries. This is a reading of the cited passages, not a set of definitions attributed to Traherne. Some articles include additional named discussions where a central concept needs more space.
The places gives selected, annotated references. These are guides to fruitful reading, not exhaustive concordances. In this edition points out a lexical, spelling or editorial issue that affects interpretation. See also links to other articles. The source note attached to the forms line records the textual basis of the article. Headwords sometimes normalize an inflected form or name a clearly present idea; the article states the relation to the wording of the text.
Three indexes supplement the alphabetical sequence. The Lexical forms and aliases index helps readers find related English forms and expressions. The Passage index leads from a cited meditation to the articles that discuss it. The Thematic index groups connected readings without imposing a single system on the book. These indexes are linked in the digital editions.
References and textual conventions
References take the form I.3, meaning the First Century, meditation 3; V.10 is the last surviving meditation. Links lead to the corresponding meditation in the book. Century and meditation numbers remain the stable references across formats.
The underlying text is the Diotimos edition, which identifies Bertram Dobell's 1908 edition and its public-domain transcription as its copy-text and describes manuscript-based corrections. Its introduction, explanatory footnotes and other 2026 material are editorial apparatus, not Traherne's prose. An article that uses a modern explanatory note identifies it as such. Historical definitions here are contextual reading glosses; no independent dictionary, manuscript collation or scholarly edition is silently claimed as a source.
Short quotations retain the wording of the annotated edition. Its original capitalization can be rhetorically significant without making every capitalized word a technical term. Brackets and struck-through readings in the source belong to that edition's textual presentation and should not be confused with new words supplied by this lexicon. Biblical phrases and inherited images are discussed as Traherne deploys them; the articles do not turn an allusion into proof of a particular unmentioned source.