Verb

(es)

To make smaller.

* {{quote-magazine, date=2012-12-14

, author=Simon Jenkins, authorlink=Simon Jenkins, volume=188, issue=2, page=23 , date=2012-12-21, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= We mustn't overreact to North Korea boys' toys , passage=The threat of terrorism to the British lies in the overreaction to it of British governments. Each one in turn clicks up the ratchet of surveillance, intrusion and security. Each one diminishes liberty.}}

To become smaller.

* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-07-20, volume=408, issue=8845, magazine=(The Economist)

, title= Old soldiers? , passage=Whether modern, industrial man is less or more warlike than his hunter-gatherer ancestors is impossible to determine.

To lessen the authority or dignity of; to put down; to degrade; to abase; to weaken.

* Robynson (More's Utopia)

This doth nothing diminish their opinion.

* Bible, Ezekiel xxix. 15

I will diminish them, that they shall no more rule over the nations.

* Milton

O thou at whose sight all the stars / Hide their diminished heads.

To taper.

To disappear gradually.

To take away; to subtract.

* Bible, Deuteronomy iv. 2

Neither shall ye diminish aught from it.

(music) To reduce a perfect or minor interval by a semitone.

Verb

(declin)

To move downwards, to fall, to drop.

To become weaker or worse.

To bend downward; to bring down; to depress; to cause to bend, or fall.

* Thomson

in melancholy deep, with head declined

* Spenser

And now fair Phoebus gan decline in haste / His weary wagon to the western vale.

To cause to decrease or diminish.

* Beaumont and Fletcher

You have declined his means.

* Burton

He knoweth his error, but will not seek to decline it.

To turn or bend aside; to deviate; to stray; to withdraw.

a line that declines from straightness

conduct that declines from sound morals

* Bible, Psalms cxix. 157

Yet do I not decline from thy testimonies.

To refuse, forbear.

* Massinger

Could I decline this dreadful hour?

* , chapter=7

, title= The Mirror and the Lamp , passage=“[…] This is Mr. Churchill, who, as you are aware, is good enough to come to us for his diaconate, and, as we hope, for much longer; and being a gentleman of independent means, he declines to take any payment.” Saying this Walden rubbed his hands together and smiled contentedly.}}

To inflect for case, number and sometimes gender.

* Ascham

after the first declining of a noun and a verb

(by extension) To run through from first to last; to repeat like a schoolboy declining a noun.

(Shakespeare)

(American football) To reject a penalty against the opposing team, usually because the result of accepting it would benefit the non-penalized team less than the preceding play.

The team chose to decline the fifteen-yard penalty because their receiver had caught the ball for a thirty-yard gain.