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The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 (gcide)

Naturalism \Nat"u*ral*ism\, n. [Cf. F. naturalisme.]
1. A state of nature; conformity to nature.
[1913 Webster]

2. (Metaph.) The doctrine of those who deny a supernatural
agency in the miracles and revelations recorded in the
Bible, and in spiritual influences; also, any system of
philosophy which refers the phenomena of nature to a blind
force or forces acting necessarily or according to fixed
laws, excluding origination or direction by one
intelligent will.
[1913 Webster]

3. The theory that art or literature should conform to
nature; realism; also, the quality, rendering, or
expression of art or literature executed according to this
theory.
[Webster 1913 Suppl.]

4. Specifically: The principles and characteristics professed
or represented by a 19th-century school of realistic
writers, notably by Zola and Maupassant, who aimed to give
a literal transcription of reality, and laid special
stress on the analytic study of character, and on the
scientific and experimental nature of their observation of
life.
[Webster 1913 Suppl.]