in Grammar, an elegant turn or manner of expression, peculiarly belonging to this or that occasion, this or that art, this or that language. Thus we say, an Italian phrase, an eastern phrase, a poetical phrase, a rhetorical phrase. Phrase is sometimes also used for a short sentence or small circuit of words constructed together. In this sense, Father Buffier divides phrases into complete and incomplete. Phrases are complete where there is a noun and a verb, each in its proper function; that is, where the noun expresses a subject, and the verb the thing affirmed of it. Incomplete phrases are those where the noun and the verb together only perform the office of a noun, and consist of several words, which, without affirming anything, might be expressed by a single term. Thus, that which is true, is an incomplete phrase, and might be expressed in one word, truth; and again, that which is true satisfies the mind, might be converted into truth satisfies the mind.