Definition of "actuate"

Wings, which others were contriving to actuate by the perpetual motion.

November 6, 1750, Samuel Johnson, The Rambler No. 67

I walk always with my right hand closed round the india-rubber ball which I have in my trouser pocket. The pressing of this ball actuates a detonator inside the flask I carry in my pocket. It's the principle of the pneumatic instantaneous shutter for a camera lens.

1906 January–October, Joseph Conrad, chapter IV, in The Secret Agent: A Simple Tale, London: Methuen & Co., […], published 1907; The Secret Agent: A Simple Tale (Collection of British Authors; 3995), copyright edition, Leipzig: Bernhard Tauchnitz, 1907, pages 68–69

A man in a fit of anger, is actuated in a very different manner from one who only thinks of that emotion.

1748, David Hume, Enquiries concerning the human understanding and concerning the principles of moral, 2. ed., London, Oxford University Press, 1973. § 11.

Men of the greatest abilities are most fired with ambition; and, on the contrary, mean and narrow minds are the least actuated by it.

1712 January 2 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison; Richard Steele et al.], “SATURDAY, December 22, 1711”, in The Spectator, number 255; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume III, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853