continue

To proceed with (doing an activity); to prolong (an activity).

Noun

  1. An option allowing the player to resume play after game over, when all lives have been lost, while retaining their progress.
    • So if you died battling the green monster inside the cave—and you had run out of lives—maybe a continue would be available. - 2008, Jeannie Novak, Luis Levy, Play the Game: The Parent's Guide to Video Games, →ISBN, page...
    • Moreover, where three lives and a sparse availability of extra life-giving '1-Ups' marked the 1991 experience, the iPod player is offered an unlimited number of continues with which to progress through the gameworld. -...

Origin

From Middle English continuen, from Old French continuer, from Latin continuāre. Displaced native Middle English thurghwonen, from Old English þurhwunian.

Forms

continues

Verb

  1. To proceed with (doing an activity); to prolong (an activity).
    • Shall I continue speaking, or will you just interrupt me again?
    • Do you want me to continue to unload these?
    • Firstly, I continue to base most species treatments on personally collected material, rather than on herbarium plants. - 1992, Rudolf M[athias] Schuster, The Hepaticae and Anthocerotae of North America: East of the...

    Synonyms: extend run

  2. To make last; to prolong.
    • Can you account him wise or discreet that would willingly have his health, and yet will do nothing that should procure or continue it? - , New York, 2001, p.74
    • Gino was distracted. She knew why; he wanted a son. He could talk and think of nothing else. His one desire was to become the father of a man like himself, and it held him with a grip he only partially understood, for...
  3. To retain (someone or something) in a given state, position, etc.
    • […] dip the mouth of it within the second glass and remove your finger; continue it in that posture for a time, and it will unmingle the wine from the water […] - 1627 (indicated as 1626), Francis [Bacon], “(please...
    • The schools were very much the brainchild of Bertin, and although the latter was ousted from the post of Controller-General by Choiseul in 1763, he was continued by the king as a fifth secretary of state […]. - 2002,...
  4. To remain in a given place or condition; to remain in connection with; to abide; to stay.
    • Here to continue, and build up here / A growing empire. - 1667, John Milton, “Book II”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd...
    • They continue with me now three days, and have nothing to eat. - 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Matthew xv:32:
    • He then passed by the fellow, who still continued in the posture in which he fell, and entered the room where Northerton, as he had heard, was confined. - 1749, Henry Fielding, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling,...
  5. To resume.
    • When will the concert continue?
  6. To adjourn, prorogue, put off.
    • This meeting has been continued to the thirteenth of July.
  7. To make a continuation bet.

Forms

continues continuing continued no-table-tags glossary continue continuest continuedst continueth -

Synonyms

carry on crack on go on with keep keep on keep up proceed with sustain retain go on proceed resume

Antonyms

terminate stop discontinue

Related

contain continent continental continual continuity continuous continuum

Derived

continuable continual continually continuant continuation continuative continuatively continued fraction continuedly continued on page 94 continued page 94 continue on one's merry way continuing education continuingly continuing resolution continuity continuous continuously continuum discontinue miscontinue noncontinuing recontinue to be continued