virtue
Americannoun
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moral excellence; goodness; righteousness.
- Antonyms:
- vice
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conformity of one's life and conduct to moral and ethical principles; uprightness; rectitude.
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chastity; virginity.
to lose one's virtue.
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a particular moral excellence.
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a good or admirable quality or property.
the virtue of knowing one's weaknesses.
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effective force; power or potency.
a charm with the virtue of removing warts.
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virtues, an order of angels.
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manly excellence; valor.
idioms
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make a virtue of necessity, to make the best of a difficult or unsatisfactory situation.
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by / in virtue of, by reason of; because of.
to act by virtue of one's legitimate authority.
noun
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the quality or practice of moral excellence or righteousness
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a particular moral excellence
the virtue of tolerance
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any of the cardinal virtues (prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance) or theological virtues (faith, hope, and charity)
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any admirable quality, feature, or trait
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chastity, esp in women
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archaic an effective, active, or inherent power or force
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on account of or by reason of
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to acquiesce in doing something unpleasant with a show of grace because one must do it in any case
Related Words
See goodness.
Other Word Forms
- nonvirtue noun
- virtueless adjective
- virtuelessness noun
Etymology
Origin of virtue
First recorded in 1175–1225; alteration (with i from Latin ) of Middle English vertu, from Anglo-French, Old French from Latin virtūt-, stem of virtūs “maleness, worth, virtue,” equivalent to vir “man” + -tūs, abstract noun suffix; virile
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Ed Crane had an endearing cranky streak, and up to his final days he’d send us email missives with an article attached, reminding us not to forget the virtues of liberty.
In every era it has had strengths and weaknesses, virtues and faults.
Foreign flavor can be the thing to spice up any portfolio, but don’t ignore the virtues of home comforts.
From Barron's
The French aphorist François de La Rochefoucauld remarked that “hypocrisy is the tribute vice pays to virtue.”
They see in him the virtues that made their city free and prosperous—and the courage it took for him to risk arrest and prison rather than abandon his principles or flee abroad.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
