Definition of "kindliness" in 英语

noun

1. The state of feeling kindly towards someone or something, or the actions inspired thereby.

   • Elmo looked upon his only granddaughter with kindliness, and often relented to her demands for chocolate.
   • 1774, Henry Home, Lord Kames, Sketches of the History of Man, Edinburgh: A. Strahan & T. Cadell, 1788, Volume 3, Sketch 10, Public Police with respect to the Poor, pp. 98-99, Creatures loathsome by disease or nastiness, affect the air in a poor-house; and have little chance for life, without more care and kindliness than can be expected from servants, rendered callous by continual scenes of misery.

2. (archaic) Favourableness; mildness.

   • 1798, Edward Hasted, The History and Topographical Survey of the County of Kent, Canterbury: W. Bristow, 2nd edition, Volume 6, “Newington,” p. 42, […] great part of it […] was formerly planted with orchards of apples, cherries, and other kind of fruit, but these falling to decay, and the high price of hops yielding a more advantageous return, many of them were displanted, and hops raised in their stead, the scite of an old orchard, being particularly adapted for the purpose, which, with the kindliness of the soil for that plant, produced large crops of it […]
   • 1803, The Farmer’s Magazine, Edinburgh: Archibald Constable, Volume 4, No. 15, August 1803, Review of agricultural publications, “General View of the Agriculture of the Counties of Roxburgh and Selkirk,” p. 318, The one third of the sheep kept are of the short-bodied, black-faced, coarse-wooled kinds; which our author justly celebrates, as highly adapted for coarser pasture, from their hardiness and superior kindliness in feeding.

3. (obsolete) Naturalness.