STUMBLE, v.i. [This word is probably from a root that signifies to stop or to strike, and may be allied to stammer.] 1. To trip in walking or moving in any way upon the legs; to strike the foot so as to fall, or to endanger a fall; applied to any animal. A man may stumble, as well as a horse.The way of the wicked is as darkness; they know not at what they stumble. Proverbs 4.2. To err; to slide into a crime or an error.He that loveth his brother, abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him. 1 John 2.3. To strike upon without design; to fall on; to light on by chance. Men often stumble upon valuable discoveries.Ovid stumbled by some inadvertence upon Livia in a bath.STUMBLE, v.t. 1. To obstruct in progress; to cause to trip or stop.2. To confound; to puzzle; to put to a nonplus; to perplex.One thing more stumbles me in the very foundation of this hypothesis.STUMBLE, n. 1. A trip in walking or running.2. A blunder; a failure.One stumble is enough to deface the character of an honorable life.
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