Definition of "oppugn"

oppugn

/əˈpjuːn/

verb
third-person singular simple present oppugns, present participle oppugning, simple past and past participle oppugned
1. (transitive, rare) To contradict or controvert; to oppose; to challenge or question the truth or validity of a given statement.
  Quotations
  If nothing can oppugne love, And virtue invious ways can prove, What may not he confide to do That brings both love and virtue too?
  1662, [Samuel Butler], “[The First Part of Hudibras]”, in Hudibras. The First and Second Parts. […], London: […] John Martyn and Henry Herringman, […], published 1678; republished in A[lfred] R[ayney] Waller, editor, Hudibras: Written in the Time of the Late Wars, Cambridge: University Press, 1905
  It is for the same reason, that is, because 'tis all comprehended in Slawkenbergius, that I say nothing likewise of Scroderus (Andrea) who all the world knows, set himself to oppugn Prignitz with great violence, ---- proving it in his own way, first logically, and then by a series of stubborn facts
  1761, Laurence Sterne, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, volume III, London: R. and J. Dodsley, page 180