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Delicate   /dˈɛləkət/   Listen
adjective
Delicate  adj.  
1.
Addicted to pleasure; luxurious; voluptuous; alluring. (R.) "Dives, for his delicate life, to the devil went." "Haarlem is a very delicate town."
2.
Pleasing to the senses; refinedly agreeable; hence, adapted to please a nice or cultivated taste; nice; fine; elegant; as, a delicate dish; delicate flavor.
3.
Slight and shapely; lovely; graceful; as, "a delicate creature."
4.
Fine or slender; minute; not coarse; said of a thread, or the like; as, delicate cotton.
5.
Slight or smooth; light and yielding; said of texture; as, delicate lace or silk.
6.
Soft and fair; said of the skin or a surface; as, a delicate cheek; a delicate complexion.
7.
Light, or softly tinted; said of a color; as, a delicate blue.
8.
Refined; gentle; scrupulous not to trespass or offend; considerate; said of manners, conduct, or feelings; as, delicate behavior; delicate attentions; delicate thoughtfulness.
9.
Tender; not able to endure hardship; feeble; frail; effeminate; said of constitution, health, etc.; as, a delicate child; delicate health. "A delicate and tender prince."
10.
Requiring careful handling; not to be rudely or hastily dealt with; nice; critical; as, a delicate subject or question. "There are some things too delicate and too sacred to be handled rudely without injury to truth."
11.
Of exacting tastes and habits; dainty; fastidious.
12.
Nicely discriminating or perceptive; refinedly critical; sensitive; exquisite; as, a delicate taste; a delicate ear for music.
13.
Affected by slight causes; showing slight changes; as, a delicate thermometer.



noun
Delicate  n.  
1.
A choice dainty; a delicacy. (R.) "With abstinence all delicates he sees."
2.
A delicate, luxurious, or effeminate person. "All the vessels, then, which our delicates have, those I mean that would seem to be more fine in their houses than their neighbors, are only of the Corinth metal."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Delicate" Quotes from Famous Books



... feast one another many times, wherein they vse great diligence, especially in drinking one to another, insomuch that the better sort, least they might rudely commit some fault therein, does vse to reade certaine bookes written of duties and ceremonies apperteyning vnto banquets. To be delicate and fine, they put their meate into their mouthes with litle forkes, accounting it great rudenesse to touch it with their fingers: winter and sommer they drinke water as hot as they may possibly abide it. ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of - The English Nation, Vol. 11 • Richard Hakluyt

... listening to it with a pretty appearance of dreaminess. She was conscious of her charming attitude, of the line made by her slender upraised arm, and not unaware of the soft and almost transparent beauty the light of a glowing fire gives to delicate flesh. Nevertheless, she really tried, in a perhaps half-hearted way, to withdraw her personality into the mist. And this she did because she knew well that her mother, not she, was en rapport with ...
— The Way of Ambition • Robert Hichens

... Lohengrin the vividness of reality combined with the vanishing loveliness of a sweet dream. The idea of the swan, symbolizing the broad, shining river flowing from afar-off mysterious lands to the eternal sea, is given us in this phrase, as delicate and as firm, as unmistakable, as ever painter drew with his brush. Here we have, not indeed Montsalvat the domain of monks, but the land of ever-enduring dawn—a land that other poets have dreamed of, a land where hope could be subsisted on. From beginning to end Lohengrin, ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman

... fairy-land—seemed quite as strange as if Cinderella had stepped out of the storybook with the avowed purpose of remaining with them until her lost slipper was found. Leonard, big and strong as he was, felt and interpreted the delicate and thrilling organism of his child, and, as Amy turned toward him, he said, with ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe

... of peace—and all enrolled themselves in the "crack" companies. No wonder, when the very best blood of the state ran in the veins of the humblest private; when men of letters and culture and wealth refused any but "the post of honor," with musket on shoulder; when the most delicate fingers of their fairest worked the flags that floated over them, and the softest voices urged them to their devoir; no wonder, then, that high on the roll of fame are now written the names of the Mobile Cadets—of the Gulf City ...
— Four Years in Rebel Capitals - An Inside View of Life in the Southern Confederacy from Birth to Death • T. C. DeLeon


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