Beneficent
[bɪ'nefɪs(ə)nt] or [bɪ'nɛfɪsnt]
Definition
(adj.) doing or producing good; 'the most beneficent regime in history' .
(adj.) generous in assistance to the poor; 'a benevolent contributor'; 'eleemosynary relief'; 'philanthropic contributions' .
Edited by Jacqueline--From WordNet
Definition
(a.) Doing or producing good; performing acts of kindness and charity; characterized by beneficence.
Inputed by Bess
Synonyms and Antonyms
SYN:Bountiful, benevolent, benignant
ANT:Hard, uncommiserating, griping, unbeneficent, illiberal, oppressive, cruel
Checked by Alyson
Examples
- The beneficent effect of their activities on the health and general welfare of the masses of the people bears witness to the sanity and worth of the culture th at prompted these activities. Walter Libby. An Introduction to the History of Science.
- With this beneficent wish, Mr. Snagsby coughs a cough of dismal resignation and submits himself to hear what the visitor has to communicate. Charles Dickens. Bleak House.
- Thriftless gives, not from a beneficent pleasure in giving, but from a lazy delight in spending. William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- There, at least, is one method of sexual expression which may have positively beneficent results. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
- Nobody has yet invented a mechanically beneficent sovereign. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
- On its beneficent side it promises a new professional interest in work, self-education, and the co-operative management of industry. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
- The invention of mechanical puddlers, hereinafter referred to, consisting chiefly of rotating furnaces, were among the beneficent developments of the nineteenth century. William Henry Doolittle. Inventions in the Century.
- At such a moment this gift of despoiled Italy to the world was a noble revenge, setting in motion incalculable beneficent forces and agencies. Frank Lewis Dyer. Edison, His Life and Inventions.
- How many lives have been saved, and how far advanced has become the knowledge of the human body and its painful diseases, by this beneficent remedy! William Henry Doolittle. Inventions in the Century.
- To serve the people means to provide it with services--with clean streets and water, with education, with opportunity, with beneficent channels for its desires, with moral equivalents for evil. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
- His gentleman is not the battlefield of wants and prohibitions; in him impulses flow freely through beneficent channels. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
- What never occurred to them was that it might find a good, a positively beneficent method. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
- How entirely compatible that way of living then was with the most useful and beneficent activities his life shows. H. G. Wells. The Outline of History_Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind.
- Sleeping thus under the beneficent eye of heaven, can evil visit thee, O Earth, or grief cradle to their graves thy luckless children? Mary Shelley. The Last Man.
Checked by Alyson