To do one's best

do do (d[=oo]), v. t. or auxiliary. [imp. {did} (d[i^]d); p. p. {done} (d[u^]n); p. pr. & vb. n. {Doing} (d[=oo]"[i^]ng). This verb, when transitive, is formed in the indicative, present tense, thus: I do, thou doest (d[=oo]"[e^]st) or dost (d[u^]st), he does (d[u^]z), doeth (d[=oo]"[e^]th), or doth (d[u^]th); when auxiliary, the second person is, thou dost. As an independent verb, dost is obsolete or rare, except in poetry. ``What dost thou in this world?'' --Milton. The form doeth is a verb unlimited, doth, formerly so used, now being the auxiliary form. The second pers, sing., imperfect tense, is didst (d[i^]dst), formerly didest (d[i^]d"[e^]st).] [AS. d[=o]n; akin to D. doen, OS. duan, OHG. tuon, G. thun, Lith. deti, OSlav. d[=e]ti, OIr. d['e]nim I do, Gr. tiqe`nai to put, Skr. dh[=a], and to E. suffix -dom, and prob. to L. facere to do, E. fact, and perh. to L. -dere in some compounds, as addere to add, credere to trust. [root]65. Cf. {Deed}, {Deem}, {Doom}, {Fact}, {Creed}, {Theme}.] 1. To place; to put. [Obs.] --Tale of a Usurer (about 1330). [1913 Webster]

2. To cause; to make; -- with an infinitive. [Obs.] [1913 Webster]

My lord Abbot of Westminster did do shewe to me late certain evidences. --W. Caxton. [1913 Webster]

I shall . . . your cloister do make. --Piers Plowman. [1913 Webster]

A fatal plague which many did to die. --Spenser. [1913 Webster]

We do you to wit [i. e., We make you to know] of the grace of God bestowed on the churches of Macedonia. --2 Cor. viii. 1.

Note: We have lost the idiom shown by the citations (do used like the French faire or laisser), in which the verb in the infinitive apparently, but not really, has a passive signification, i. e., cause . . . to be made. [1913 Webster]

3. To bring about; to produce, as an effect or result; to effect; to achieve. [1913 Webster]

The neglecting it may do much danger. --Shak. [1913 Webster]

He waved indifferently 'twixt doing them neither good not harm. --Shak. [1913 Webster]

4. To perform, as an action; to execute; to transact to carry out in action; as, to do a good or a bad act; do our duty; to do what I can. [1913 Webster]

Six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work. --Ex. xx. 9. [1913 Webster]

We did not do these things. --Ld. Lytton. [1913 Webster]

You can not do wrong without suffering wrong. --Emerson. Hence: To do homage, honor, favor, justice, etc., to render homage, honor, etc. [1913 Webster]

5. To bring to an end by action; to perform completely; to finish; to accomplish; -- a sense conveyed by the construction, which is that of the past participle done. ``Ere summer half be done.'' ``I have done weeping.'' --Shak. [1913 Webster]

6. To make ready for an object, purpose, or use, as food by cooking; to cook completely or sufficiently; as, the meat is done on one side only. [1913 Webster]

7. To put or bring into a form, state, or condition, especially in the phrases, to do death, to put to death; to slay; to do away (often do away with), to put away; to remove; to do on, to put on; to don; to do off, to take off, as dress; to doff; to do into, to put into the form of; to translate or transform into, as a text. [1913 Webster]

Done to death by slanderous tongues. -- Shak. [1913 Webster]

The ground of the difficulty is done away. -- Paley. [1913 Webster]

Suspicions regarding his loyalty were entirely done away. --Thackeray. [1913 Webster]

To do on our own harness, that we may not; but we must do on the armor of God. -- Latimer. [1913 Webster]

Then Jason rose and did on him a fair Blue woolen tunic. -- W. Morris (Jason). [1913 Webster]

Though the former legal pollution be now done off, yet there is a spiritual contagion in idolatry as much to be shunned. --Milton. [1913 Webster]

It [``Pilgrim's Progress''] has been done into verse: it has been done into modern English. -- Macaulay. [1913 Webster]

8. To cheat; to gull; to overreach. [Colloq.] [1913 Webster]

He was not be done, at his time of life, by frivolous offers of a compromise that might have secured him seventy-five per cent. -- De Quincey. [1913 Webster]

9. To see or inspect; to explore; as, to do all the points of interest. [Colloq.] [1913 Webster]

10. (Stock Exchange) To cash or to advance money for, as a bill or note. [1913 Webster]

11. To perform work upon, about, for, or at, by way of caring for, looking after, preparing, cleaning, keeping in order, or the like.

The sergeants seem to do themselves pretty well. --Harper's Mag. [Webster 1913 Suppl.]

12. To deal with for good and all; to finish up; to undo; to ruin; to do for. [Colloq. or Slang]

Sometimes they lie in wait in these dark streets, and fracture his skull, . . . or break his arm, or cut the sinew of his wrist; and that they call doing him. --Charles Reade. [Webster 1913 Suppl.]

Note: (a) Do and did are much employed as auxiliaries, the verb to which they are joined being an infinitive. As an auxiliary the verb do has no participle. ``I do set my bow in the cloud.'' --Gen. ix. 13. [Now archaic or rare except for emphatic assertion.] [1913 Webster]

Rarely . . . did the wrongs of individuals to the knowledge of the public. -- Macaulay. (b) They are often used in emphatic construction. ``You don't say so, Mr. Jobson. -- but I do say so.'' --Sir W. Scott. ``I did love him, but scorn him now.'' --Latham. (c) In negative and interrogative constructions, do and did are in common use. I do not wish to see them; what do you think? Did C[ae]sar cross the Tiber? He did not. ``Do you love me?'' --Shak. (d) Do, as an auxiliary, is supposed to have been first used before imperatives. It expresses entreaty or earnest request; as, do help me. In the imperative mood, but not in the indicative, it may be used with the verb to be; as, do be quiet. Do, did, and done often stand as a general substitute or representative verb, and thus save the repetition of the principal verb. ``To live and die is all we have to do.'' --Denham. In the case of do and did as auxiliaries, the sense may be completed by the infinitive (without to) of the verb represented. ``When beauty lived and died as flowers do now.'' --Shak. ``I . . . chose my wife as she did her wedding gown.'' --Goldsmith. [1913 Webster]

My brightest hopes giving dark fears a being. As the light does the shadow. -- Longfellow. In unemphatic affirmative sentences do is, for the most part, archaic or poetical; as, ``This just reproach their virtue does excite.'' --Dryden. [1913 Webster]

{To do one's best}, {To do one's diligence} (and the like), to exert one's self; to put forth one's best or most or most diligent efforts. ``We will . . . do our best to gain their assent.'' --Jowett (Thucyd.).

{To do one's business}, to ruin one. [Colloq.] --Wycherley.

{To do one shame}, to cause one shame. [Obs.]

{To do over}. (a) To make over; to perform a second time. (b) To cover; to spread; to smear. ``Boats . . . sewed together and done over with a kind of slimy stuff like rosin.'' --De Foe.

{To do to death}, to put to death. (See 7.) [Obs.]

{To do up}. (a) To put up; to raise. [Obs.] --Chaucer. (b) To pack together and envelop; to pack up. (c) To accomplish thoroughly. [Colloq.] (d) To starch and iron. ``A rich gown of velvet, and a ruff done up with the famous yellow starch.'' --Hawthorne.

{To do way}, to put away; to lay aside. [Obs.] --Chaucer.

{To do with}, to dispose of; to make use of; to employ; -- usually preceded by what. ``Men are many times brought to that extremity, that were it not for God they would not know what to do with themselves.'' --Tillotson.

{To have to do with}, to have concern, business or intercourse with; to deal with. When preceded by what, the notion is usually implied that the affair does not concern the person denoted by the subject of have. ``Philology has to do with language in its fullest sense.'' --Earle. ``What have I to do with you, ye sons of Zeruiah? --2 Sam. xvi. 10. [1913 Webster]