ideality


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i·de·al·i·ty

 (ī′dē-ăl′ĭ-tē)
n. pl. i·de·al·i·ties
1. The state or quality of being ideal.
2. Existence in idea only.
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

i•de•al•i•ty

(ˌaɪ diˈæl ɪ ti)

n., pl. -ties.
1. ideal quality or character.
2. capacity to idealize.
3. Philos. existence only in idea and not in reality.
Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary, © 2010 K Dictionaries Ltd. Copyright 2005, 1997, 1991 by Random House, Inc. All rights reserved.
ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:
Noun1.ideality - the quality of being ideal
quality - an essential and distinguishing attribute of something or someone; "the quality of mercy is not strained"--Shakespeare
Based on WordNet 3.0, Farlex clipart collection. © 2003-2012 Princeton University, Farlex Inc.
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References in classic literature ?
This quaintness is, in fact, a very powerful adjunct to ideality, but in the case in question it arises independently of the author's will, and is altogether apart from his intention.
"The Lord never made either year face or head for X What good can your bumps of ideality, comparison, self-esteem, conscientiousness, do you here?
An excited and highly distempered ideality threw a sulphureous lustre over all.
The antique volume which I had taken up was the "Mad Trist" of Sir Launcelot Canning; but I had called it a favourite of Usher's more in sad jest than in earnest; for, in truth, there is little in its uncouth and unimaginative prolixity which could have had interest for the lofty and spiritual ideality of my friend.
And, therefore, to this man,--whose whole poor and impalpable enjoyment of existence heretofore, and until both his heart and fancy died within him, had been a dream,--whose images of women had more and more lost their warmth and substance, and been frozen, like the pictures of secluded artists, into the chillest ideality,--to him, this little figure of the cheeriest household life was just what he required to bring him back into the breathing world.
Why to the man of untutored ideality, who happens to be but loosely acquainted with the peculiar character of the day, does the bare mention of Whitsuntide marshal in the fancy such long, dreary, speechless processions of slow-pacing pilgrims, downcast and hooded with new-fallen snow?
We in our madness have separated the two, and have invented a realism that is vulgar, an ideality that is void.
A freezing politeness, a strict fidelity to government principles, a profound contempt for theories and theorists, a deep-seated hatred of ideality, -- these were the elements of private and public life displayed by M.
The court, in the inside, had evidently been arranged to gratify a picturesque and voluptuous ideality. Wide galleries ran all around the four sides, whose Moorish arches, slender pillars, and arabesque ornaments, carried the mind back, as in a dream, to the reign of oriental romance in Spain.
In respect of ideality, reverence, wonder, and other such phrenological attributes, it is no worse off than it used to be.
At such times I could not help remarking and admiring (although from his rich ideality I had been prepared to expect it) a peculiar analytic ability in Dupin.
Ascending from a heaven understood as a "racial utopia" where Indians souls acquire and play with language (82), the ideality of both the male and female specters schooled their audiences in Christian values by frontloading the moral failings of the State in American-Indian negotiation and warfare.