Meaning

Habitual laziness or sloth..

Definitions by Sense

1. Habitual laziness or sloth.
2. (pathology) Lack of pain in a tumour.
3. (obsolete) A state in which one feels no pain or is indifferent to it; a lack of any feeling.
4. (obsolete) A state of repose in which neither pain nor pleasure is experienced.

Example Sentences

After having applied my mind with more than ordinary attention to my studies, it is my usual custom to relax and unbend it in the conversation of such as are rather easy than shining companions. […] This is the particular use I make of a set of heavy honest men, with whom I have passed many hours with much indolence, though not with great pleasure. Their conversation is a kind of preparative for sleep: […]

The sacred indolence of the monks was devoutly embraced by a servile and effeminate age; but if superstition had not afforded a decent retreat, the same vices would have tempted the unworthy Romans to desert, from baser motives, the standard of the republic.

He [Samuel Johnson] ſeemed to learn by intuition; for though indolence and procraſtination vvere inherent in his conſtitution, vvhenever he made an exertion he did more than any one elſe.

It is indolence Mr. Bertram, indeed. Indolence and love of ease—a want of all laudable ambition, of taste for good company, or of inclination to take the trouble of being agreeable, which make men Clergymen.

To the man himself [Samuel Taylor Coleridge] Nature had given, in high measure, the seeds of a noble endowment; […] but imbedded in such weak laxity of character, in such indolences and esuriences as had made strange work with it.

Heedless of the rights of fellows and founders' bequests, of sleepy dignities and established indolences, they re-established long-dormant lectures in the colleges.

[T]here is an incessant and ever-flowing current of human affairs towards the worse, consisting of all the follies, all the vices, all the negligences, indolences, and supinenesses of mankind; which is only controlled, and kept from sweeping all before it, by the exertions which some persons constantly, and others by fits, put forth in the direction of good and worthy objects.

There are others who have let their reputations become incrusted or blighted with indolences, or self-indulgence, or errors that are not errors unto death. These should not think to put away the tarnished name; but rather, by some new life and better efforts, to raise it from ignominy until it shows clean again.

Word Forms

• indolences

Synonyms for indolence

Antonyms for indolence

Related Words

When Should You Use Indolence?

Use indolence when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.

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