Definition of "person"

THE favourable reception the Orrery has met with from Perſons of the firſt diſtinction, and from Gentlemen and Ladies in general, has induced me to add to it ſeveral new improvements in order to give it a degree of Perfection; and diſtinguiſh it from others; which by Piracy, or Imitation, may be introduced to the Public.

1784, William Jones, The Description and Use of a New Portable Orrery, &c., PREFACE

“A very welcome, kind, useful present, that means to the parish. By the way, Hopkins, let this go no further. We don't want the tale running round that a rich person has arrived. Churchill, my dear fellow, we have such greedy sharks, and wolves in lamb's clothing. […]”

1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, page 85

[…] when the young Ladies laughed at her for it, ſhe replied that it was not his perſon that ſhe did embrace and reverence, but the divine beauty of his Soule.

1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Printed by John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, partition 3, section 1, member 2, subsection 3, page 347

The Captain, inclining his military person, sat sideways to be closer and kinder […].

1897 October 16, Henry James, chapter XVI, in What Maisie Knew, Chicago, Ill., New York, N.Y.: Herbert S. Stone & Co., page 188

At first blush it seemed that what was striking about him rested on the fact that his dress was exotic, his person foreign.

1978, Lawrence Durrell, Livia, Faber & Faber 1992 (Avignon Quintet), page 418

Meanwhile, the dazed Sullivan, dressed like a bum with no identification on his person, is arrested and put to work on a brutal Southern chain gang.

2004, The New York Times

[E]very Person wilfully, openly, lewdly, and obscenely exposing his Person in any Street, Road, or public Highway, or in the View thereof, or in any Place of public Resort, with Intent to insult any Female ... and being subsequently convicted of the Offence for which he or she shall have been so apprehended, shall be deemed a Rogue and Vagabond, within the true Intent and Meaning of this Act ...

1824, Vagrancy Act 1824 (5 Geo. 4. c. 83, United Kingdom), section 4

True corms, composed of united personae […] usually arise by gemmation, […] yet in sponges and corals occasionally by fusion of several originally distinct persons.

1884, Patrick Geddes, “Morphology”, in Encyclopædia Britannica, volume 16

Or let us person him like some wretched itinerary Judge.

1644, J[ohn] M[ilton], The Doctrine or Discipline of Divorce: […], 2nd edition, London: [s.n.], book

We had hit the iceberg, and it was time to person the lifeboats.

2007, Brian R. Brenner, Don't Throw This Away!: The Civil Engineering Life, page 40

We went so far as to stop in a hotel on the way out of Speyer — to ask for directions — but the teenaged girl personing the desk there seemed to be such an idiot […]

2008, William Guy, Something Sensational, page 337