Definition of "beast" []

• An animal other than a human, especially a large four-footed mammal. (noun)
• New England & Southern U.S. A large domestic animal, especially a horse or bull. (noun)
• Animal nature as opposed to intellect or spirit: "So far the beast in us has insisted upon having its full say” ( William Dean Howells). (noun)
• A brutal, contemptible person. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "The symbol of a beast considered merely _as a beast_, could not, in the nature of the case, signify anything more than a temporal kingdom or political empire."
• "Deep in the nature of all these noble races there lurks unmistakably the beast of prey, the _blond beast_, lustfully roving in search of booty and victory."
• "And _a brute beast _ -- whose fellow I had contemptuously destroyed -- _a brute beast_ to work out for _me_ -- for me a man, fashioned in the image of the High God -- so much of insufferable wo!"