\Mus"cu*lar\, a. [Cf. F. musculaire. See {Muscle}.]
1. Of or pertaining to a muscle, or to a system of muscles;
   consisting of, or constituting, a muscle or muscles; as,
   muscular fiber.
         Great muscular strength, accompanied by much
         awkwardness.                          --Macaulay.
2. Performed by, or dependent on, a muscle or the muscles.
   ``The muscular motion.'' --Arbuthnot.
3. Well furnished with muscles; having well-developed
   muscles; brawny; hence, strong; powerful; vigorous; as, a
   muscular body or arm.
{Muscular Christian}, one who believes in a part of religious
   duty to maintain a healthful and vigorous physical state.
   --T. Hughes.
{Muscular CHristianity}.
   (a) The practice and opinion of those Christians who
       believe that it is a part of religious duty to
       maintain a vigorous condition of the body, and who
       therefore approve of athletic sports and exercises as
       conductive to good health, good morals, and right
       feelings in religious matters. --T. Hughes.
   (b) An active, robust, and cheerful Christian life, as
       opposed to a meditative and gloomy one. --C. Kingsley.
{Muscular excitability} (Physiol.), that property in virtue
   of which a muscle shortens, when it is stimulated;
   irritability.
{Muscular sense} (Physiol.), muscular sensibility; the sense
   by which we obtain knowledge of the condition of our
   muscles and to what extent they are contracted, also of
   the position of the various parts of our bodies and the
   resistance offering by external objects.