DISCIPLINE, n. [L., to learn.]

1. Education; instruction; cultivation and improvement, comprehending instruction in arts, sciences, correct sentiments, morals and manners, and due subordination to authority.
2. Instruction and government, comprehending the communication of knowledge and the regulation of practice; as, military discipline, which includes instruction in manual exercise, evolutions and subordination.
3. Rule of government; method of regulating principles and practice; as, the discipline prescribed for the church.
4. Subjection to laws, rules, order, precepts or regulations; as, the troops are under excellent discipline; the passions should be kept under strict discipline.
5. Correction; chastisement; punishment intended to correct crimes or errors; as, the discipline of the strap. – Addison.
6. In ecclesiastical affairs, the execution of the laws by which the church is governed, and infliction of the penalties enjoined against offenders, who profess the religion of Jesus Christ. – Encyc.
7. Chastisement or bodily punishment inflicted on a delinquent in the Romish church; or that chastisement or external mortification which a religious person inflicts on himself. – Taylor. Encyc.

1. To instruct or educate; to inform the mind; to prepare by instructing in correct principles and habits; as, to discipline youth for a profession, or for future usefulness.
2. To instruct and govern; to teach rules and practice, and accustom to order and subordination; as, to discipline troops or an army.
3. To correct; to chastise; to punish.
4. To execute the laws of the church on offenders, with a view to bring them to repentance and reformation of life.
5. To advance and prepare by instruction. – Milton.

1. The treatment suited to a disciple or learner; education; development of the faculties by instruction and exercise; training, whether physical, mental, or moral.
   
   

   Wife and children are a kind of discipline of humanity. Bacon.

   Discipline aims at the removal of bad habits and the substitution of good ones, especially those of order, regularity, and obedience. C. J. Smith.

2. To educate] to develop by instruction and exercise; to train.
3. Training to act in accordance with established rules; accustoming to systematic and regular action; drill.
   
   

   Their wildness lose, and, quitting nature's part,
   Obey the rules and discipline of art. Dryden.

4. To accustom to regular and systematic action; to bring under control so as to act systematically; to train to act together under orders; to teach subordination to; to form a habit of obedience in; to drill.
   
   

   Ill armed, and worse disciplined. Clarendon.

   His mind . . . imperfectly disciplined by nature. Macaulay.

5. Subjection to rule; submissiveness to order and control; habit of obedience.
   
   

   The most perfect, who have their passions in the best discipline, are yet obliged to be constantly on their guard. Rogers.

6. To improve by corrective and penal methods; to chastise; to correct.
   
   

   Has he disciplined Aufidius soundly? Shak.

7. Severe training, corrective of faults; instruction by means of misfortune, suffering, punishment, etc.
   
   

   A sharp discipline of half a century had sufficed to educate us. Macaulay.

8. To inflict ecclesiastical censures and penalties upon.
   
   

   Syn. -- To train; form; teach; instruct; bring up; regulate; correct; chasten; chastise; punish.

9. Correction; chastisement; punishment inflicted by way of correction and training.
   
   

   Giving her the discipline of the strap. Addison.

10. The subject matter of instruction; a branch of knowledge.
    
    
    Bp. Wilkins.
11. The enforcement of methods of correction against one guilty of ecclesiastical offenses; reformatory or penal action toward a church member.
12. Self-inflicted and voluntary corporal punishment, as penance, or otherwise; specifically, a penitential scourge.
13. A system of essential rules and duties; as, the Romish or Anglican discipline.
    
    

    Syn. -- Education; instruction; training; culture; correction; chastisement; punishment.