diligently, adv.
(ˈdɪlɪdʒəntlɪ)
[f. diligent a. + -ly2.]
In a diligent manner; with diligence. a. With steady application; assiduously, industriously; not idly or lazily; † with dispatch.
| 1340 Ayenb. 208 Huo þet zecþ diligentliche. 1382 Wyclif 2 Chron. xix. 11 Takith coumfort and doith diligently, and the Lord schal ben with ȝou in goodis. 1477 Earl Rivers (Caxton) Dictes 128 If he be pouer to laboure dylygentely. 1530 Tindale Answ. to More i. xxvi. Wks. (1573) 287/2 The Jewes studyed the scripture the deligenterly. c 1540 Boorde The boke for to Lerne C ij b, They..serue god the holy dayes..more dylygentlyer, than to do theyr worke. 1568 Grafton Chron. II. 822 That all thinges..shoulde be spedily and diligently done. 1612 T. Taylor Comm. Titus i. 6 Study to doe thy owne dutie diligently. 1752 Johnson Rambler No. 207 ¶8 When we have diligently laboured for any purpose. 1870 Anderson Missions Amer. Bd. III. iv. 53 Applying himself diligently..to natural and theological science. 1894 J. T. Fowler Adamnan Introd. 70 Columba laboured diligently among the Picts. |
† b. Attentively, carefully, heedfully. Obs.
| c 1391 Chaucer Astrol. ii. §17 Espie diligently whan this..sterre passeth any-thing the sowth westward. 1483 Caxton Gold. Leg. 72/1 Beholdyng hym dylygently in the clere lyght. 1559 W. Cuningham Cosmogr. Glasse 139 Marking diligentlye that the Center of the second Circle, be in the line of sighte. 1656 Ridgley Pract. Physick 87 It must be diligently distinguished from an Imposthume. 1695 Ld. Preston Boeth. v. 226 It hath not yet been diligently and thorowly determined. |