To be one's own man

Man Man (m[a^]n), n.; pl. {Men} (m[e^]n). [AS. mann, man, monn, mon; akin to OS., D., & OHG. man, G. mann, Icel. ma[eth]r, for mannr, Dan. Mand, Sw. man, Goth. manna, Skr. manu, manus, and perh. to Skr. man to think, and E. mind. [root]104. Cf. {Minx} a pert girl.] 1. A human being; -- opposed to {beast}. [1913 Webster]

These men went about wide, and man found they none, But fair country, and wild beast many [a] one. --R. of Glouc. [1913 Webster]

The king is but a man, as I am; the violet smells to him as it doth to me. --Shak. [1913 Webster]

'Tain't a fit night out for man nor beast! --W. C. Fields [PJC]

2. Especially: An adult male person; a grown-up male person, as distinguished from a woman or a child. [1913 Webster]

When I became a man, I put away childish things. --I Cor. xiii. 11. [1913 Webster]

Ceneus, a woman once, and once a man. --Dryden. [1913 Webster]

3. The human race; mankind. [1913 Webster]

And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness, and let them have dominion. --Gen. i. 26. [1913 Webster]

The proper study of mankind is man. --Pope. [1913 Webster]

4. The male portion of the human race. [1913 Webster]

Woman has, in general, much stronger propensity than man to the discharge of parental duties. --Cowper. [1913 Webster]

5. One possessing in a high degree the distinctive qualities of manhood; one having manly excellence of any kind. --Shak. [1913 Webster]

This was the noblest Roman of them all . . . the elements So mixed in him that Nature might stand up And say to all the world ``This was a man!'' --Shak. [1913 Webster]

6. An adult male servant; also, a vassal; a subject. [1913 Webster]

Like master, like man. --Old Proverb. [1913 Webster]

The vassal, or tenant, kneeling, ungirt, uncovered, and holding up his hands between those of his lord, professed that he did become his man from that day forth, of life, limb, and earthly honor. --Blackstone. [1913 Webster]

7. A term of familiar address at one time implying on the part of the speaker some degree of authority, impatience, or haste; as, Come, man, we 've no time to lose! In the latter half of the 20th century it became used in a broader sense as simply a familiar and informal form of address, but is not used in business or formal situations; as, hey, man! You want to go to a movie tonight?. [Informal] [1913 Webster +PJC]

8. A married man; a husband; -- correlative to wife. [1913 Webster]

I pronounce that they are man and wife. --Book of Com. Prayer. [1913 Webster]

every wife ought to answer for her man. --Addison. [1913 Webster]

9. One, or any one, indefinitely; -- a modified survival of the Saxon use of man, or mon, as an indefinite pronoun. [1913 Webster]

A man can not make him laugh. --Shak. [1913 Webster]

A man would expect to find some antiquities; but all they have to show of this nature is an old rostrum of a Roman ship. --Addison. [1913 Webster]

10. One of the piece with which certain games, as chess or draughts, are played. [1913 Webster]

Note: Man is often used as a prefix in composition, or as a separate adjective, its sense being usually self-explaining; as, man child, man eater or maneater, man-eating, man hater or manhater, man-hating, manhunter, man-hunting, mankiller, man-killing, man midwife, man pleaser, man servant, man-shaped, manslayer, manstealer, man-stealing, manthief, man worship, etc. Man is also used as a suffix to denote a person of the male sex having a business which pertains to the thing spoken of in the qualifying part of the compound; ashman, butterman, laundryman, lumberman, milkman, fireman, repairman, showman, waterman, woodman. Where the combination is not familiar, or where some specific meaning of the compound is to be avoided, man is used as a separate substantive in the foregoing sense; as, apple man, cloth man, coal man, hardware man, wood man (as distinguished from woodman). [1913 Webster]

{Man ape} (Zo["o]l.), a anthropoid ape, as the gorilla.

{Man at arms}, a designation of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries for a soldier fully armed.

{Man engine}, a mechanical lift for raising or lowering people through considerable distances; specifically (Mining), a contrivance by which miners ascend or descend in a shaft. It consists of a series of landings in the shaft and an equal number of shelves on a vertical rod which has an up and down motion equal to the distance between the successive landings. A man steps from a landing to a shelf and is lifted or lowered to the next landing, upon which he them steps, and so on, traveling by successive stages.

{Man Friday}, a person wholly subservient to the will of another, like Robinson Crusoe's servant Friday.

{Man of straw}, a puppet; one who is controlled by others; also, one who is not responsible pecuniarily.

{Man-of-the earth} (Bot.), a twining plant ({Ipom[oe]a pandurata}) with leaves and flowers much like those of the morning-glory, but having an immense tuberous farinaceous root.

{Man of sin} (Script.), one who is the embodiment of evil, whose coming is represented (--2 Thess. ii. 3) as preceding the second coming of Christ. [A Hebraistic expression]

{Man of war}. (a) A warrior; a soldier. --Shak. (b) (Naut.) See in the Vocabulary. (c) See {Portuguese man-of-war} under {man-of-war} and also see {Physalia}.

{Man-stopping bullet} (Mil.), a bullet which will produce a sufficient shock to stop a soldier advancing in a charge; specif., a small-caliber bullet so modified as to expand when striking the human body, producing a severe wound which is also difficult to treat medically. Types of bullets called {hollow-nosed bullets}, {soft-nosed bullets} and {hollow-point bullets} are classed as man-stopping. The {dumdum bullet} or {dumdum} is another well-known variety. Such bullets were originally designed for wars with savage tribes.

{To be one's own man}, to have command of one's self; not to be subject to another. [1913 Webster +PJC]