remissness
(rɪˈmɪsnɪs)
[f. remiss a. + -ness.]
The quality of being remiss.
1. Carelessness, negligence; laxity.
| 1570 Foxe A. & M. (ed. 2) 2040/1 He litle regarding their inconstancie and remisnes in Gods cause or quarel. 1598 Barret Theor. Warres iv. i. 98 The disorders of souldiers do many times grow through remissnesse..of officers. 1615 G. Sandys Trav. 7 Encouraged to villanies by the remisnesse of their lawes. 1644 Milton Areop. (Arb.) 51 Impunity and remissenes, for certain are the bane of a Commonwealth. 1685 Evelyn Diary 2 Oct., The Reformed Churches in Christendom, now weaken'd and neere ruin'd thro' our remissenesse. 1728 Morgan Algiers II. v. 316 The order [of Knights] rather dreads the Remissness and wonted Luke⁓warmness of the Catholic Potentates. 1760–2 Goldsm. Cit. W. xl[i], The remissness of behaviour in almost all the worshippers..struck me with surprize. 1838 Thirlwall Greece xlii. V. 225 This remissness of the Athenians encouraged Charidemus openly to renounce the treaty. |
† b. Relaxation; ease. Obs. rare.
| 1651 Hobbes Leviath. i. viii. 34 In profest remissnesse of mind..a man may play with the sounds..of words. 1754 Fielding Jonathan Wild iii. xiv, None but the weak and honest can indulge themselves in remissness or repose. |
† 2. Weakening, diminution, decrease or lack of force or intensity. Obs.
| 1608 Willet Hexapla Exod. 259 Nor yet do I consent to them, that thinke Moses still continued his prayers, but that this remisnes was only in his strength. 1659 Stanley Hist. Philos. xiii. (1701) 624/2 The shortness makes amends for the greatness [of the pain], the remissness for its length. 1669 W. Simpson Hydrol. Chym. 315 According to the intenseness or remisness of the air. 1711 Addison Spect. No. 249 ¶5 Laughter..slackens and unbraces the Mind, weakens the Faculties, and causes a kind of Remissness and Dissolution in all the Powers of the Soul. |