Instigate vs. Stop

(transitive) to incite; to bring about by urging or encouraging

Example: ‘to instigate a riot’;

(transitive) to goad or urge (a person) forward, especially to wicked actions; to provoke

Example: ‘to instigate someone to a crime’;

To goad or urge forward; to set on; to provoke; to incite; - used chiefly with reference to evil actions; as, to instigate one to a crime.

Example: ‘He hath only instigated his blackest agents to the very extent of their malignity.’;

provoke or stir up;

Example: ‘incite a riot’; ‘set off great unrest among the people’;

serve as the inciting cause of;

Example: ‘She prompted me to call my relatives’;

(intransitive) To cease moving.

Example: ‘I stopped at the traffic lights.’;

(intransitive) To not continue.

Example: ‘The riots stopped when police moved in.’; ‘Soon the rain will stop.’;

(transitive) To cause (something) to cease moving or progressing.

Example: ‘The sight of the armed men stopped him in his tracks.’; ‘This guy is a fraudster. I need to stop the cheque I wrote him.’;

(transitive) To cause (something) to come to an end.

Example: ‘The referees stopped the fight.’;

(transitive) To close or block an opening.

Example: ‘He stopped the wound with gauze.’;

To adjust the aperture of a camera lens.

Example: ‘To achieve maximum depth of field, he stopped down to an f-stop of 22.’;

(intransitive) To stay; to spend a short time; to reside or tarry temporarily.

Example: ‘to stop with a friend’; ‘He stopped for two weeks at the inn.’; ‘He stopped at his friend's house before continuing with his drive.’;

(music) To regulate the sounds of (musical strings, etc.) by pressing them against the fingerboard with the finger, or otherwise shortening the vibrating part.

(obsolete) To punctuate.

(nautical) To make fast; to stopper.

A (usually marked) place where buses, trams or trains halt to let passengers get on and off, usually smaller than a station.

Example: ‘Related terms: halt, station.’; ‘They agreed to meet at the bus stop.’;

An action of stopping; interruption of travel.

Example: ‘That stop was not planned.’;

That which stops, impedes, or obstructs; an obstacle; an impediment.

A device intended to block the path of a moving object

Example: ‘door stop’;

(engineering) A device, or piece, as a pin, block, pawl, etc., for arresting or limiting motion, or for determining the position to which another part shall be brought.

(architecture) A member, plain or moulded, formed of a separate piece and fixed to a jamb, against which a door or window shuts.

(linguistics) A consonant sound in which the passage of air through the mouth is temporarily blocked by the lips, tongue, or glottis.

A symbol used for purposes of punctuation and representing a pause or separating clauses, particularly a full stop, comma, colon or semicolon.

(music) A knob or pin used to regulate the flow of air in an organ.

Example: ‘The organ is loudest when all the stops are pulled.’;

(tennis) A very short shot which touches the ground close behind the net and is intended to bounce as little as possible.

(zoology) The depression in a dog’s face between the skull and the nasal bones.

Example: ‘The stop in a bulldog's face is very marked.’;

(photography) An f-stop.

The diaphragm used in optical instruments to cut off the marginal portions of a beam of light passing through lenses.

A small well-bucket; a milk-pail.

Prone to halting or hesitation.

Example: ‘He’s stop still.’;

(physics) Being or relating to the squark that is the superpartner of a top quark.

To close, as an aperture, by filling or by obstructing; as, to stop the ears; hence, to stanch, as a wound.

To obstruct; to render impassable; as, to stop a way, road, or passage.

To arrest the progress of; to hinder; to impede; to shut in; as, to stop a traveler; to stop the course of a stream, or a flow of blood.

To hinder from acting or moving; to prevent the effect or efficiency of; to cause to cease; to repress; to restrain; to suppress; to interrupt; to suspend; as, to stop the execution of a decree, the progress of vice, the approaches of old age or infirmity.

Example: ‘Whose disposition all the world well knowsWill not be rubbed nor stopped.’;

To regulate the sounds of, as musical strings, by pressing them against the finger board with the finger, or by shortening in any way the vibrating part.

To point, as a composition; to punctuate.

Example: ‘If his sentences were properly stopped.’;

To make fast; to stopper.

To cease to go on; to halt, or stand still; to come to a stop.

Example: ‘He bites his lip, and starts;Stops on a sudden, looks upon the ground;Then lays his finger on his temple: straitSprings out into fast gait; then stops again.’;

To cease from any motion, or course of action.

Example: ‘Stop, while ye may, suspend your mad career!’;

To spend a short time; to reside temporarily; to stay; to tarry; as, to stop with a friend.

Example: ‘By stopping at home till the money was gone.’;

The act of stopping, or the state of being stopped; hindrance of progress or of action; cessation; repression; interruption; check; obstruction.

Example: ‘It is doubtful . . . whether it contributed anything to the stop of the infection.’; ‘Occult qualities put a stop to the improvement of natural philosophy.’; ‘It is a great step toward the mastery of our desires to give this stop to them.’;

That which stops, impedes, or obstructs; as obstacle; an impediment; an obstruction.

Example: ‘A fatal stop traversed their headlong course.’; ‘So melancholy a prospect should inspire us with zeal to oppose some stop to the rising torrent.’;

A device, or piece, as a pin, block, pawl, etc., for arresting or limiting motion, or for determining the position to which another part shall be brought.

The closing of an aperture in the air passage, or pressure of the finger upon the string, of an instrument of music, so as to modify the tone; hence, any contrivance by which the sounds of a musical instrument are regulated.

Example: ‘The organ sound a time survives the stop.’;

In the organ, one of the knobs or handles at each side of the organist, by which he can draw on or shut off any register or row of pipes; the register itself; as, the vox humana stop.

A member, plain or molded, formed of a separate piece and fixed to a jamb, against which a door or window shuts. This takes the place, or answers the purpose, of a rebate. Also, a pin or block to prevent a drawer from sliding too far.

A point or mark in writing or printing intended to distinguish the sentences, parts of a sentence, or clauses; a mark of punctuation. See Punctuation.

The diaphragm used in optical instruments to cut off the marginal portions of a beam of light passing through lenses.

The depression in the face of a dog between the skull and the nasal bones. It is conspicuous in the bulldog, pug, and some other breeds.

Some part of the articulating organs, as the lips, or the tongue and palate, closed (a) so as to cut off the passage of breath or voice through the mouth and the nose (distinguished as a lip-stop, or a front-stop, etc., as in p, t, d, etc.), or (b) so as to obstruct, but not entirely cut off, the passage, as in l, n, etc.; also, any of the consonants so formed.

the event of something ending;

Example: ‘it came to a stop at the bottom of the hill’;

the act of stopping something;

Example: ‘the third baseman made some remarkable stops’; ‘his stoppage of the flow resulted in a flood’;

a brief stay in the course of a journey;

Example: ‘they made a stopover to visit their friends’;

the state of inactivity following an interruption;

Example: ‘the negotiations were in arrest’; ‘held them in check’; ‘during the halt he got some lunch’; ‘the momentary stay enabled him to escape the blow’; ‘he spent the entire stop in his seat’;

a spot where something halts or pauses;

Example: ‘his next stop is Atlanta’;

a consonant produced by stopping the flow of air at some point and suddenly releasing it;

Example: ‘his stop consonants are too aspirated’;

a punctuation mark (.) placed at the end of a declarative sentence to indicate a full stop or after abbreviations;

Example: ‘in England they call a period a stop’;

(music) a knob on an organ that is pulled to change the sound quality from the organ pipes;

Example: ‘the organist pulled out all the stops’;

a mechanical device in a camera that controls size of aperture of the lens;

Example: ‘the new cameras adjust the diaphragm automatically’;

a restraint that checks the motion of something;

Example: ‘he used a book as a stop to hold the door open’;

an obstruction in a pipe or tube;

Example: ‘we had to call a plumber to clear out the blockage in the drainpipe’;

come to a halt, stop moving;

Example: ‘the car stopped’; ‘She stopped in front of a store window’;

put an end to a state or an activity;

Example: ‘Quit teasing your little brother’;

stop from happening or developing;

Example: ‘Block his election’; ‘Halt the process’;

interrupt a trip;

Example: ‘we stopped at Aunt Mary's house’; ‘they stopped for three days in Florence’;

cause to stop;

Example: ‘stop a car’; ‘stop the thief’;

prevent completion;

Example: ‘stop the project’; ‘break off the negociations’;

hold back, as of a danger or an enemy; check the expansion or influence of;

Example: ‘Arrest the downward trend’; ‘Check the growth of communism in Sout East Asia’; ‘Contain the rebel movement’; ‘Turn back the tide of communism’;

seize on its way;

Example: ‘The fighter plane was ordered to intercept an aircraft that had entered the country's airspace’;

have an end, in a temporal, spatial, or quantitative sense; either spatial or metaphorical;

Example: ‘the bronchioles terminate in a capillary bed’; ‘Your rights stop where you infringe upon the rights of other’; ‘My property ends by the bushes’; ‘The symphony ends in a pianissimo’;

render unsuitable for passage;

Example: ‘block the way’; ‘barricade the streets’; ‘stop the busy road’;

stop and wait, as if awaiting further instructions or developments;

Example: ‘Hold on a moment!’;

(of an event, action, or process) come to an end; cease to happen

Example: ‘his laughter stopped as quickly as it had begun’; ‘the rain had stopped and the clouds had cleared’;

cease to perform a specified action or have a specified experience

Example: ‘she stopped giggling’; ‘he stopped work for tea’;

abandon a specified practice or habit

Example: ‘I've stopped eating meat’;

stop moving or operating

Example: ‘my watch has stopped’; ‘he stopped to look at the view’;

(of a bus or train) call at a designated place to pick up or set down passengers

Example: ‘main-line trains stop at platform 7’;

stay somewhere for a short time

Example: ‘you'll have to stop the night’;

cause (an action, process, or event) to come to an end

Example: ‘this harassment has got to be stopped’;

prevent (an action or event) from happening

Example: ‘a security guard was killed trying to stop a raid’;

prevent or dissuade (someone) from continuing in an activity or achieving an aim

Example: ‘a campaign is under way to stop the bombers’;

prevent (someone or something) from performing a specified action or undergoing a specified experience

Example: ‘you can't stop me from getting what I want’; ‘several attempts were made to stop him giving evidence’;

cause or order to cease moving or operating

Example: ‘he stopped his car by the house’; ‘police were given powers to stop and search suspects’;

be hit by (a bullet).

instruct a bank to withhold payment on (a cheque)

Example: ‘he grew nervous about the deal and asked his bank manager to stop the cheque’;

refuse to supply as usual; withhold or deduct

Example: ‘they stopped the strikers' wages’;

defeat (an opponent) by a knockout

Example: ‘he was stopped in the sixth by Tyson’;

pinch back (a plant).

block or close up (a hole or leak)

Example: ‘the stile has been stopped up’; ‘he tried to stop the hole with the heel of his boot’;

put a filling in (a tooth).

block the mouth of (a fox's earth) prior to a hunt.

plug the upper end of (an organ pipe), giving a note an octave lower.

obtain the required pitch from (the string of a violin or similar instrument) by pressing at the appropriate point with the finger.

make (a rope) fast with a stopper.

be or behave in a particular way

Example: ‘‘Why was she so?’ ‘I don't know, you know how dem old people stop.’’;

remain in a particular state or condition

Example: ‘he said I mustn't stop barefooted, so I had to buy a pair of new shoes’;

a cessation of movement or operation

Example: ‘there were constant stops and changes of pace’; ‘all business came to a stop’;

a break or halt during a journey

Example: ‘allow an hour or so for driving and as long as you like for stops’; ‘the flight landed for a refuelling stop’;

a place designated for a bus or train to halt and pick up or set down passengers

Example: ‘the bus was pulling up at her stop’;

an object or part of a mechanism which is used to prevent something from moving

Example: ‘the shelves have special stops to prevent them from being pulled out too far’;

a punctuation mark, especially a full stop.

used in telegrams to indicate a full stop

Example: ‘MEET YOU AT THE AIRPORT STOP’;

a consonant produced with complete closure of the vocal tract

Example: ‘a bilabial stop’; ‘stop consonants’;

a high card that prevents the opponents from establishing a particular suit; a control

Example: ‘if West bids 3♥ now, this will show a heart stop’;

a short length of rope used to secure something; a stopper.

a set of organ pipes of a particular tone and range of pitch.

a knob, lever, or similar device in an organ or harpsichord which brings into play a set of pipes or strings of a particular tone and range of pitch.

the effective diameter of a lens.

a device for reducing the effective diameter of a lens.

a unit of change of relative aperture or exposure (with a reduction of one stop equivalent to halving it).