Mode

Mode, mōd, n. manner of acting, doing, or existing: rule: custom: form: that which exists only as a quality of substance: a form of the verb, same as mood: in lace-making, a small decorative piece inserted in a pattern: the openwork between the solid parts of a pattern: a woman's mantle with a hood: (mus.) the method of dividing the octave for melodic purposes according to the position of its steps and half-steps.—adj. Mō′dal, relating to mode or form without reference to substance: consisting of mode only: (logic) indicating some mode of expression.—ns. Mō′dalism, the doctrine first set forth by Sabellius that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are not three distinct personalities, but only three different modes of manifestation; Mō′dalist, one who holds this theory.—adj. Modalist′ic.—n. Modal′ity, mode in its logical sense: (law) the quality of being limited by a condition.—adv. Mō′dally.—Greek modes, consisting each of two tetra-chords and one whole step; Gregorian, Medieval, or Ecclesiastical modes, derived from the above by Ambrose, Gregory the Great, &c., each of the seven natural sounds of the diatonic scale forming the keynote or final of a mode, which embraced that note and the seven above it. To each of these seven modes is attached another, in which the melody, while having the same final or keynote, instead of ascending to the octave above, ranges from the fourth below it to the fifth above. The former are called the authentic modes, the latter plagal; Major mode, a modern mode, consisting of two steps, a half-step, three steps, and a half-step; Minor mode, a modern mode, consisting of a step, a half-step, two steps, a half-step, and two steps. [Fr.,—L. modus.]