virtue
see also: Virtue
Pronunciation Noun
Virtue
Proper noun
This text is extracted from the Wiktionary and it is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license | Terms and conditions | Privacy policy 0.002
see also: Virtue
Pronunciation Noun
virtue
- (uncountable) Accordance with moral principles; conformity of behaviour or thought with the strictures of morality; good moral conduct. [from 13th c.]
- Without virtue, there is no freedom.
- 1749, Henry Fielding, Tom Jones, XV.1:
- There are a set of religious, or rather moral, writers, who teach that virtue is the certain road to happiness, and vice to misery, in this world.
- A particular manifestation of moral excellence in a person; an admirable quality. [from 13th c.]
- 1766, Laurence Sterne, Sermon XLIV:
- Some men are modest, and seem to take pains to hide their virtues; and, from a natural distance and reserve in their tempers, scarce suffer their good qualities to be known […] .
- 1766, Laurence Sterne, Sermon XLIV:
- Specifically, each of several qualities held to be particularly important, including the four cardinal virtues, the three theological virtues, or the seven virtues opposed to the seven deadly sins. [from 14th c.]
- An inherently advantageous or excellent quality of something or someone; a favourable point, an advantage. [from 14th c.]
- 1719, Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe:
- There were divers other plants, which I had no notion of or understanding about, that might, perhaps, have virtues of their own, which I could not find out.
- 2011, The Guardian, Letter, 14 Mar 2011
- One virtue of the present coalition government's attack on access to education could be to reopen the questions raised so pertinently by Robinson in the 1960s […] .
- 1719, Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe:
- A creature embodying divine power, specifically one of the orders of heavenly beings, traditionally ranked above angels and below archangels. [from 14th c.]
- 1667, John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book X:
- Thrones, Dominations, Princedoms, Virtues, Powers; / For in possession such, not only of right, / I call ye, and declare ye now […] .
- 1667, John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book X:
- (uncountable) Specifically, moral conduct in sexual behaviour, especially of women; chastity. [from 17th c.]
- (obsolete) The inherent power of a god, or other supernatural being. [13th–19th c.]
- The inherent power or efficacy of something (now only in phrases). [from 13th c.]
- 1801, Robert Southey, Thalaba the Destroyer:
- There was a virtue in the wave;
His limbs, that, stiff with toil,
Dragg’d heavy, from the copious draught receiv’d
Lightness and supple strength.
- There was a virtue in the wave;
- 2011, "The autumn of the patriarchs", The Economist, 17 Feb 2011:
- many Egyptians still worry that the Brotherhood, by virtue of discipline and experience, would hold an unfair advantage if elections were held too soon.
- 1801, Robert Southey, Thalaba the Destroyer:
- douth qual obsolete, thew
- See Thesaurus:goodness
- French: vertu
- German: Keuschheit
- Italian: virtù
- Portuguese: virtude
- Russian: доброде́тель
- Spanish: virtud
- Italian: virtù
Virtue
Proper noun
This text is extracted from the Wiktionary and it is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license | Terms and conditions | Privacy policy 0.002