VIRTUOUS • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Virtuous

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/vˈərtʃuəs/ Listen

adjective

Virtuous adj.

Possessing or exhibiting virtue. Specifically:

(a)

Exhibiting manly courage and strength; valorous; valiant; brave. (Obs.) "Old Priam's son, amongst them all, was chiefly virtuous."

(b)

Having power or efficacy; powerfully operative; efficacious; potent. (Obs.) "Lifting up his virtuous staff on high, He smote the sea, which calméd was with speed." "Every virtuous plant and healing herb."

(c)

Having moral excellence; characterized by morality; upright; righteous; pure; as, a virtuous action. "The virtuous mind that ever walks attended By a strong siding champion, conscience."

Chaste; pure; applied especially to women. "Mistress Ford... the virtuous creature, that hath the jealous fool to her husband."

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Etymology of 'Virtuous'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Virtuous" Quotes from Famous Books

... Fanny Kemble: he pointed out, in conversation, that he never heard of any lady who ever dreamed that she was younger than she really was. We retain in our dreams even the identity of our age. It has been said—we think by Sir Thomas Browne—that some persons of virtuous and honorable principles will commit, as they fancy, actions in their dreams which they would shudder at in their waking moments; but we can not believe that the identity of moral goodness can be so perverted in the dreaming state. We can, ...

— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various

... which gave form to the aspirations and purposes of Peter Cooper. As an apprentice, he resolved to do something for the benefit of apprentices—to found some institution which should supplement the deficiencies of early education, furnishing to virtuous, industrious, and ambitious youths the means of progress, and attracting the thoughtless or indolent into the same ascending road. How this conception came to be both modified and realized will be seen in later pages. At this point it is sufficient to note that ...

— Peter Cooper - The Riverside Biographical Series, Number 4 • Rossiter W. Raymond

... loathsome than even the devil himself. The devil rebelled because he could not brook subjection to the Son of God, a failing which was noble compared with treachery to the Son of man. The hatred of Judas is not altogether virtuous. We compound thereby for our neglect of Jesus and His precepts: it is easier to establish our Christianity by cursing the wretched servant than by following his Master. The heinousness also of the crime in Gethsemane ...

— Pages from a Journal with Other Papers • Mark Rutherford

... no, she awoke—she returned to life, only to curse that life which was now covered with degradation. Alas! she had no one to whom she could fly, and under whose fostering kindness she might hide her shame; she had no refuge left—none but death, the last shelter of virtuous woman betrayed. She spurned with indignant pride the glittering offers of the miscreant who wrought her ruin. She recoiled with abhorrence from his loathsome caresses; cursed in bitter agony his unmanly deed, and brooded over her misfortune, until the loss of her reason followed the ...

— Gomez Arias - The Moors of the Alpujarras, A Spanish Historical Romance. • Joaquin Telesforo de Trueba y Cosio

... turnpike. "Air ye going now and have every damned officer swearing at you? What do they care if your foot's cut and your back aches? and you couldn't come no sooner. I ain't a-going." Steve's eyes filled with tears. He felt sublimely virtuous; a martyr from the first. "What does anybody there care for me! They wouldn't care if I dropped dead right in line. Well, I ain't a-going to gratify them! What's war, anyhow? It's a trap to catch decent ...

— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston

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