Ad‐van″tage (?; 61, 48), n. [OE. avantage, avauntage, F. avantage, fr. avant before. See Advance, and cf. Vantage.] 1. Any condition, circumstance, opportunity, or means, particularly favorable to success, or to any desired end; benefit; as, the enemy had the advantage of a more elevated position.
Give me advantage of some brief discourse.
Shak.
The advantages of a close alliance.
Macaulay.
2. Superiority; mastery; — with of or over.
Lest Satan should get an advantage of us.
2 Cor. ii. 11.
3. Superiority of state, or that which gives it; benefit; gain; profit; as, the advantage of a good constitution.
4. Interest of money; increase; overplus (as the thirteenth in the baker's dozen).
And with advantage means to pay thy love.
Shak.
Advantage ground, vantage ground. Clarendon. — To have the advantage of (any one), to have a personal knowledge of one who does not have a reciprocal knowledge. “You have the advantage of me; I don't remember ever to have had the honor.” Sheridan. — To take advantage of, to profit by; (often used in a bad sense) to overreach, to outwit.
Syn. — Advantage, Advantageous, Benefit, Beneficial. We speak of a thing as a benefit, or as beneficial, when it is simply productive of good; as, the benefits of early discipline; the beneficial effects of adversity. We speak of a thing as an advantage, or as advantageous, when it affords us the means of getting forward, and places us on a “vantage ground” for further effort. Hence, there is a difference between the benefits and the advantages of early education; between a beneficial and an advantageous investment of money.