HUMANITY • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Humanity

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/hjumˈænɪti/ /jumˈænɪti/ Listen

noun

Humanity n. (pl. humanities)

1.

The quality of being human; the peculiar nature of man, by which he is distinguished from other beings.

2.

Mankind collectively; the human race. "But hearing oftentimes The still, and music humanity." "It is a debt we owe to humanity."

3.

The quality of being humane; the kind feelings, dispositions, and sympathies of man; especially, a disposition to relieve persons or animals in distress, and to treat all creatures with kindness and tenderness. "The common offices of humanity and friendship."

4.

Mental cultivation; liberal education; instruction in classical and polite literature. "Polished with humanity and the study of witty science."

5.

pl. (With definite article) The branches of polite or elegant learning; as language, rhetoric, poetry, and the ancient classics; belles-letters. Note: The cultivation of the languages, literature, history, and archaeology of Greece and Rome, were very commonly called literae humaniores, or, in English, the humanities,... by way of opposition to the literae divinae, or divinity.

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Etymology of 'Humanity'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Humanity" Quotes from Famous Books

... would also most likely lead to reprisals; and, if this process were repeated, the war would probably degenerate into the antiquated system of 'cross-raiding,' discarded centuries ago, not at all for reasons of humanity, but because it became certain that war could be more effectually waged in other ways. The nation in command of the sea may resort to raiding to expedite the formal submission of an already defeated enemy, as Russia did when at war with Sweden in 1719; but in such a case the other ...

— Sea-Power and Other Studies • Admiral Sir Cyprian Bridge

... and expand at the expense of other less meritorious peoples finds its justification in the conviction that we are of all people the most noble and the most pure, destined before others to work for the highest development of humanity.' ...

— The Major • Ralph Connor

... patience taking the same direction as our desires, noble though they may be. . . . Do not dwell upon the personality of those who pass away and of those who are left; such things are weighed only in the scales of men. We should gauge in ourselves the enormous value of what is better and greater than humanity.' In truth, death is impotent because it too is illusory, and 'nothing is ever lost.' So this young Frenchman, who has yet never forgone the language of his Christianity, rediscovers amid the terrors of war the stoicism of Marcus Aurelius—that virtue which is 'neither patience ...

— Letters of a Soldier - 1914-1915 • Anonymous

... dislike anything you should write against Lord Byron, for I have a thorough aversion to his character, and a very moderate admiration of his genius; he is great in so little a way. To be a poet is to be the man; not a petty portion of occasional low passion worked up into a permanent form of humanity. Shakspeare has thrust such rubbishly feelings into a corner—the dark dusky heart of Don John, in the 'Much Ado about Nothing.' The fact is, I have not seen your 'Expostulatory Epistle' to him. I was not aware, till your question, ...

— Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey • Joseph Cottle

... it has not taught the lesson of the "survival of the fittest," but rather the survival of the strongest. That the strongest is not always the "fittest" needs [6] no commentary. That the fit should survive is the genetic law of nature, and it has been strictly obeyed by biology and humanity when these sciences have adhered to, and have been under the jurisdiction of the ...

— The Eugenic Marriage, Volume I. (of IV.) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague, M.D.

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