Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Constraint

Con·straint′ (kŏn·strānt′), n. [OF. constrainte, F. constrainte.] The act of constraining, or the state of being constrained; that which compels to, or restrains from, action; compulsion; restraint; necessity.

Long imprisonment and hard constraint. Spenser.

Not by constraint, but by my choice, I came. Dryden.

Syn. — Compulsion; violence; necessity; urgency. — Constraint, Compulsion. Constraint implies strong binding force; as, the constraint of necessity; the constraint of fear. Compulsion implies the exertion of some urgent impelling force; as, driven by compulsion. The former prevents us from acting agreeably to our wishes; the latter forces us to act contrary to our will. Compulsion is always produced by some active agent; a constraint may be laid upon us by the forms of civil society, or by other outward circumstances. Crabb.

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty.