Verb

(en-verb)

To make clear or bright by freeing from feculent matter; to defecate; to fine; -- said of liquids, as wine or syrup.

* (rfdate) Ure:

Boiled and clarified .

To make clear; to free from obscurities; to brighten or illuminate.

* (rfdate) South:

To clarify his reason, and to rectify his will.

(ergative) To grow or become clear or transparent; to become free from feculent impurities, as wine or other liquid under clarification.

* Leave the wine for 24 hours and it will clarify .

(ergative) To grow clear or bright; to clear up.

(obsolete) To glorify.

Verb

(en verb)

To make plain, manifest, or intelligible; to clear of obscurity; to illustrate the meaning of.

*

The boy became volubly friendly and bubbling over with unexpected humour and high spirits. He tried to persuade Cicely to stay away from the ball-room for a fourth dance. Nobody would miss them, he explained .

* {{quote-magazine, date=2012-03

, author=, volume=100, issue=2, page=106 , magazine=(American Scientist) , title= Pixels or Perish , passage=Drawings and pictures are more than mere ornaments in scientific discourse. Blackboard sketches, geological maps, diagrams of molecular structure, astronomical photographs, MRI images, the many varieties of statistical charts and graphs: These pictorial devices are indispensable tools for presenting evidence, for explaining a theory, for telling a story.}}

To give a valid excuse for some past behavior.

* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-07, author=David Simpson

, volume=188, issue=26, page=36, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= Fantasy of navigation , passage=It is tempting to speculate about the incentives or compulsions that might explain why anyone would take to the skies in [the] basket [of a balloon]: perhaps out of a desire to escape the gravity of this world or to get a preview of the next; […].}}

(obsolete) To make flat, smooth out.

(obsolete) To unfold or make visible.

* (John Evelyn) (1620-1706)

The horse-chestnut isready to explain its leaf.