Descending

Etymology

From French descendre, Latin descendere, descensum; de- + scandere (meaning to climb).

Intransitive verb

1. To pass from a higher to a lower place; to move downwards; to come or go down in any way, as by falling, flowing, walking, etc.; to plunge; to fall; to incline downward

   The rain descended, and the floods came. Matthew vii. 25.

   We will here descend to matters of later date. Fuller.

2. To enter mentally; to retire. [Poetic]

   [He] with holiest meditations fed, Into himself descended. Milton.

3. To make an attack, or incursion, as if from a vantage ground; to come suddenly and with violence; -- with on or upon.

   And on the suitors let thy wrath descend. Pope.

4. To come down to a lower, less fortunate, humbler, less virtuous, or worse, state or station; to lower or abase one's self; as, he descended from his high estate.
5. To pass from the more general or important to the particular or less important matters to be considered.
6. To come down, as from a source, original, or stock; to be derived; to proceed by generation or by transmission; to fall or pass by inheritance; as, the beggar may descend from a prince; a crown descends to the heir.
7. (Anat.) To move toward the south, or to the southward.
8. (Mus.) To fall in pitch; to pass from a higher to a lower tone.

Transitive verb

1. To go down upon or along; to pass from a higher to a lower part of; as, they descended the river in boats; to descend a ladder.

   But never tears his cheek descended. Byron.

Antonyms

• ascending

from Webster [F. descendre, L. descendere, descensum; de- + scandere to climb. See Scan.]

1. To pass from a higher to a lower place; to move downwards; to come or go down in any way, as by falling, flowing, walking, etc.; to plunge; to fall; to incline downward; -- the opposite of ascend.

The rain descended, and the floods came. Matt. vii. 25. We will here descend to matters of later date. Fuller. 2. To enter mentally; to retire. [Poetic]

[He] with holiest meditations fed, Into himself descended. Milton. 3. To make an attack, or incursion, as if from a vantage ground; to come suddenly and with violence; -- with on or upon.

And on the suitors let thy wrath descend. Pope. 4. To come down to a lower, less fortunate, humbler, less virtuous, or worse, state or station; to lower or abase one's self; as, he descended from his high estate.

5. To pass from the more general or important to the particular or less important matters to be considered.

6. To come down, as from a source, original, or stock; to be derived; to proceed by generation or by transmission; to fall or pass by inheritance; as, the beggar may descend from a prince; a crown descends to the heir.

7. (Anat.) To move toward the south, or to the southward.

8. (Mus.) To fall in pitch; to pass from a higher to a lower tone.

De*scend" (?), v. t. To go down upon or along; to pass from a higher to a lower part of; as, they descended the river in boats; to descend a ladder.

But never tears his cheek descended. Byron.

Displaying 1 result(s) from the 1828 edition:

DESCEND, v.i. [L. To climb.]

1. To move or pass from a higher to a lower place; to move, come or go downwards; to fall; to sink; to run or flow down; applicable to any kind of motion or of body. We descend on the feet, on wheels, or by falling. A torrent descends from a mountain.

The rains descended, and the floods came. Matt. 7.

2. To go down, or to enter.

He shall descend into battle and perish. Sam. 26.

3. To come suddenly; to fall violently.

And on the suitors let thy wrath descend.

4. To go in; to enter.

He, with honest meditations fed, into himself descended.

5. To rush; to invade, as an enemy.

The Grecian fleet descending on the town.

6. To proceed from a source or original; to be derived. The beggar may descend from a prince, and the prince, from a beggar.

7. To proceed, as from father to son; to pass from a preceding possessor, in the order of lineage, or according to the laws of succession or inheritance. Thus, an inheritance descends to the son or next of kin; a crown descends to the heir.

8. To pass from general to particular considerations; as, having explained the general subject, we will descend to particulars.

9. To come down from an elevated or honorable station; in a figurative sense. Flavius is an honorable man; he cannot descend to acts of meanness.

10. In music, to fall in sound; to pass from any note to another less acute or shrill, or from sharp to flat. DESCEND, v.t. To walk, move or pass downwards on a declivity; as, to descend a hill; to descend an inclined plain. [But this may be considered as elliptical; on or along being understood.][1]

Quotation

Descending Sons of God have high and divine origins. They are dedicated to the descending ministry of service on the worlds and systems of time and space, there to facilitate the progress in the Paradise climb of the lowly creatures of evolutionary origin--the ascending sons of God. Of the numerous orders of descending Sons, seven will be depicted in these narratives. Those Sons who come forth from the Deities on the central Isle of Light and Life are called the Paradise Sons of God and embrace the following three orders:

1. Creator Sons--the Michaels.

2. Magisterial Sons--the Avonals.

3. Trinity Teacher Sons--the Daynals.

The remaining four orders of descending sonship are known as the Local Universe Sons of God:

4. Melchizedek Sons.

5. Vorondadek Sons.

6. Lanonandek Sons.

7. The Life Carriers.

Melchizedeks are the joint offspring of a local universe Creator Son, Creative Spirit, and Father Melchizedek. Both Vorondadeks and Lanonandeks are brought into being by a Creator Son and his Creative Spirit associate. Vorondadeks are best known as the Most Highs, the Constellation Fathers; Lanonandeks as System Sovereigns and as Planetary Princes. The threefold order of Life Carriers is brought into being by a Creator Son and Creative Spirit associated Page 224 with one of the three Ancients of Days of the superuniverse of jurisdiction. But the natures and activities of these Local Universe Sons of God are more properly portrayed in those papers dealing with the affairs of the local creations.

The Paradise Sons of God are of threefold origin: The primary or Creator Sons are brought into being by the Universal Father and the Eternal Son; the secondary or Magisterial Sons are children of the Eternal Son and the Infinite Spirit; the Trinity Teacher Sons are the offspring of the Father, Son, and Spirit. From the standpoint of service, worship, and supplication the Paradise Sons are as one; their spirit is one, and their work is identical in quality and completeness.

As the Paradise orders of Days proved to be divine administrators, so have the orders of Paradise Sons revealed themselves as divine ministers--creators, servers, bestowers, judges, teachers, and truth revealers. They range the universe of universes from the shores of the eternal Isle to the inhabited worlds of time and space, performing manifold services in the central and superuniverses not disclosed in these narratives. They are variously organized, dependent on the nature and whereabouts of their service, but in a local universe both Magisterial and Teacher Sons serve under the direction of the Creator Son who presides over that domain.

The Creator Sons seem to possess a spiritual endowment centering in their persons, which they control and which they can bestow, as did your own Creator Son when he poured out his spirit upon all mortal flesh on Urantia. Each Creator Son is endowed with this spiritual drawing power in his own realm; he is personally conscious of every act and emotion of every descending Son of God serving in his domain. Here is a divine reflection, a local universe duplication, of that absolute spiritual drawing power of the Eternal Son which enables him to reach out to make and maintain contact with all his Paradise Sons, no matter where they may be in all the universe of universes.

The Paradise Creator Sons serve not only as Sons in their descending ministrations of service and bestowal, but when they have completed their bestowal careers, each functions as a universe Father in his own creation, while the other Sons of God continue the service of bestowal and spiritual uplifting designed to win the planets, one by one, to the willing recognition of the loving rule of the Universal Father, culminating in creature consecration to the will of the Paradise Father and in planetary loyalty to the universe sovereignty of his Creator Son.

In a sevenfold Creator Son, Creator and creature are forever blended in understanding, sympathetic, and merciful association. The entire order of Michael, the Creator Sons, is so unique that the consideration of their natures and activities will be reserved to the next paper in this series, while this narrative will be chiefly concerned with the two remaining orders of Paradise sonship: the Magisterial Sons and the Trinity Teacher Sons.[2]