Chapter Attach to Attempt of A by Webster's Dictionary (1913 Edition)

1. To come or arrive, by motion, growth, bodily exertion, or efforts toward a place, object, state, etc.; to reach.

If by any means they might attain to Phenice.
Acts xxvii. 12.

Nor nearer might the dogs attain.
Sir W. Scott.

To see your trees attain to the dignity of timber.
Cowper.

Few boroughs had as yet attained to power such as this.
J. R. Green.

2. To come or arrive, by an effort of mind.

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I can not attain unto it.
Ps. cxxxix. 6.

Attain
(At*tain"), n. Attainment. [Obs.]

Attainability
(At*tain`a*bil"i*ty) n. The quality of being attainable; attainableness.

Attainable
(At*tain"a*ble) a.

1. Capable of being attained or reached by efforts of the mind or body; capable of being compassed or accomplished by efforts directed to the object.

The highest pitch of perfection attainable in this life.
Addison.

2. Obtainable. [Obs.]

General Howe would not permit the purchase of those articles [clothes and blankets] in Philadelphia, and they were not attainable in the country.
Marshall.

Attainableness
(At*tain"a*ble*ness), n. The quality of being attainable; attainability.

Attainder
(At*tain"der) n. [OF. ataindre, ateindre, to accuse, convict. Attainder is often erroneously referred to F. teindre tie stain. See Attaint, Attain.]

1. The act of attainting, or the state of being attainted; the extinction of the civil rights and capacities of a person, consequent upon sentence of death or outlawry; as, an act of attainder. Abbott.

Formerly attainder was the inseparable consequence of a judicial or legislative sentence for treason or felony, and involved the forfeiture of all the real and personal property of the condemned person, and such "corruption of blood" that he could neither receive nor transmit by inheritance, nor could he sue or testify in any court, or claim any legal protection or rights. In England attainders are now abolished, and in the United States the Constitution provides that no bill of attainder shall be passed; and no attainder of treason (in consequence of a judicial sentence) shall work corruption of blood or forfeiture, except during the life of the person attainted.

2. A stain or staining; state of being in dishonor or condemnation. [Obs.]

He lived from all attainder of suspect.
Shak.

Bill of attainder, a bill brought into, or passed by, a legislative body, condemning a person to death or outlawry, and attainder, without judicial sentence.

Attainment
(At*tain"ment) n.