Decency
['diːs(ə)nsɪ] or ['disnsi]
Definition
(noun.) the quality of being polite and respectable.
(noun.) the quality of conforming to standards of propriety and morality.
Typist: Pearl--From WordNet
Definition
(n.) The quality or state of being decent, suitable, or becoming, in words or behavior; propriety of form in social intercourse, in actions, or in discourse; proper formality; becoming ceremony; seemliness; hence, freedom from obscenity or indecorum; modesty.
(n.) That which is proper or becoming.
Edited by Christine
Synonyms and Synonymous
n. [1]. Propriety, decorum, proper formality.[2]. Modesty, delicacy, purity.
Edited by Jonathan
Synonyms and Antonyms
SYN:Modesty, propriety,[See DECORUM]
Edited by Alexander
Examples
- I must indeed, I said; for when just now I repeated the offer of serving him for a deacon, he expressed himself shocked at my want of decency. Charlotte Bronte. Jane Eyre.
- It is really too great a violation of decency, honour, and interest, for him to be guilty of. Jane Austen. Pride and Prejudice.
- What shall I do wi' a woman's clothes in MY bedroom, and not lose my decency! Thomas Hardy. The Return of the Native.
- Brummell talked to Julia while he looked at me; and as soon as he could manage it with decency, he contrived to place himself by my side. Harriette Wilson. The Memoirs of Harriette Wilson.
- That British love of decency will work miracles. Charlotte Bronte. Shirley.
- No regard will be paid to truth, morals, or decency, in the doctrines inculcated. Adam Smith. An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations.
- And with good right may they go before us--forget not, said the Prior Aymer, the superior decency and decorum of their manners. Walter Scott. Ivanhoe.
- Ah-- Mrs. Archer murmured, in a tone that implied: She had that decency. Edith Wharton. The Age of Innocence.
- But after all, one can have a little human decency. D. H. Lawrence. Women in Love .
- But, however, if you have no sense of decency, I have. Charles Dickens. Little Dorrit.
- Wars that were unmeaning catastrophes swept down upon any little gleam of prosperity or decency to which this or that community clambered. H. G. Wells. The Outline of History_Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind.
- The remarks I made were certainly, as I conceive, what every female with the least decency or delicacy must have made, _en pareil cas. Harriette Wilson. The Memoirs of Harriette Wilson.
- They preserve decency and civility in the highest degrees, but are altogether ignorant of ceremony. Jonathan Swift. Gulliver's Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World.
- Why, it's a pity you can't be bullied into some sense and decency. D. H. Lawrence. Women in Love .
- Having frequent occasions to hold public councils, they have acquired great order and decency in conducting them. Benjamin Franklin. Memoirs of Benjamin Franklin.
- One can preserve the decencies, even to one's enemies: for one's own sake. D. H. Lawrence. Women in Love .
- The apologists of business also justified a rupture with human decencies. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
Inputed by Elizabeth