DEBILITY • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Debility

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/dəbˈɪləti/ Listen

noun

Debility n. The state of being weak; weakness; feebleness; languor. "The inconveniences of too strong a perspiration, which are debility, faintness, and sometimes sudden death."

Synonyms: Debility, Infirmity, Imbecility. An infirmity belongs, for the most part, to particular members, and is often temporary, as of the eyes, etc. Debility is more general, and while it lasts impairs the ordinary functions of nature. Imbecility attaches to the whole frame, and renders it more or less powerless. Debility may be constitutional or may be the result or superinduced causes; Imbecility is always constitutional; infirmity is accidental, and results from sickness or a decay of the frame. These words, in their figurative uses, have the same distinctions; we speak of infirmity of will, debility of body, and an Imbecility which affects the whole man; but Imbecility is often used with specific reference to feebleness of mind.

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Etymology of 'Debility'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Debility" Quotes from Famous Books

... Lucia, this year droop; Three zodiacs filled more, I shall stoop; Let crutches then provided be To shore up my debility. Then, while thou laugh'st, I'll sighing cry, "A ruin, underpropp'd, am I". Don will I then my beadsman's gown, And when so feeble I am grown, As my weak shoulders cannot bear The burden of a grasshopper, Yet ...

— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick

... advance today. The head is right, at least," but the doctor looked anxious and spoke low as he said, "I am not satisfied about her yet. That want of power over the limbs, is more than the mere shock and debility, as it seems to me, though Ward thinks otherwise, and I trust he is right, but I cannot tell yet as to the spine. If this should not soon mend I shall have Fleet to see her. He was a fellow-student of mine very clever, and I have more faith in him than in ...

— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge

... small quantities, bruised to a pulp, may be very advantageously used in fevers attended with debility."—DARWIN'S ...

— The Cook's Oracle; and Housekeeper's Manual • William Kitchiner

... Taylor had tasted the first public failure of his powers, the latter wrote: "To my ever dearest Mr. Barron say, if you please, that I miss him more than I regret him—that I acquiesce in his retirement from Norwich, because I could ill brook his observation of my increasing debility of mind." This chosen companion of William Taylor must himself have been no ordinary man; and he was the friend besides of Borrow, whom I find him helping in his Latin. But he had no desire for popular distinction, lived privately, ...

— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson

... Controller-General."—"You have a spite against him," said Madame, "because he would not grant what you asked"—"That is true," said he, "but though that might possibly incline me to tell a disagreeable truth, it would not make me invent one. He is losing his intellects from debility. He affects gallantry at his age, and I perceive the connection in his ideas is becoming feeble and irregular."—The King laughed; but three months afterwards he came to Madame, saying, "Sechelles gives evident proofs of dotage in the Council. We must ...

— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 2 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe

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