Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The capacity, quality, or fact of being patient.
  • noun Chiefly British The game solitaire.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The quality of being patient.
  • noun The character or habit of mind that enables one to suffer afflictions, calamity, provocation, or other evil, with a calm unruffled temper; endurance without murmuring or fretfulness; calmness; composure.
  • noun Quietness or calmness in waiting for something to happen; the cast or habit of mind that enables one to wait without discontent.
  • noun Forbearance; leniency; indulgence; long-suffering.
  • noun Constancy in labor or exertion; perseverance.
  • noun Sufferance; permission.
  • noun A plant, the patience dock. See dock
  • noun A card-game: same as solitaire.
  • noun Synonyms Patience, Fortitude., Endurance, Resignation. Patience is by derivation a virtue of suffering, but it is also equally an active virtue, as patience in industry, application, teaching. Passively, it is gentle, serene, self-possessed, without yielding its ground or repining; actively, it adds to so much of this spirit as may be appropriate to the situation a steady, watchful, untiring industry and faithfulness. Fortitude is the passive kind of patience, joined with notable courage. In endurance attention is directed to the fact of bearing labor, pain, contumely, etc., without direct implication as to the moral qualities required or shown. Resignation implies the voluntary submission of the will to a personal cause of affliction or loss; it is a high word, generally looking up to God as the controller of human life. Resignation is thus generally a submission or meekness, giving up or resigning personal desires to the will of God.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The state or quality of being patient; the power of suffering with fortitude; uncomplaining endurance of evils or wrongs, as toil, pain, poverty, insult, oppression, calamity, etc.
  • noun The act or power of calmly or contentedly waiting for something due or hoped for; forbearance.
  • noun Constancy in labor or application; perseverance.
  • noun obsolete Sufferance; permission.
  • noun (Bot.) A kind of dock (Rumex Patientia), less common in America than in Europe; monk's rhubarb.
  • noun (Card Playing) Solitaire.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun The quality of being patient.
  • noun UK solitaire (card game).

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a card game played by one person
  • noun good-natured tolerance of delay or incompetence

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Middle English pacience, from Old French pacience (modern: patience), from Latin patientia. Displaced native Middle English thuld, thuild ("patience") (from Old English þyld ("patience")), Middle English thole ("patience") (from Old Norse þol ("patience, endurance")), Middle English bilǣfing, bileaving ("patience, perseverance, remaining") (from Old English belǣfan ("to endure, survive")).

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Examples

  • "How long will the poor endure this religion -- this make-believe -- which preaches patience, _patience_! when it ought to be urging war?"

    Marcella Humphry Ward 1885

  • "You can't use the word patience in the city of Philadelphia, which I never used," Stefanski said before the game.

    www.startribune.com 2012

  • "You can't use the word patience in the city of Philadelphia, which I never used," Stefanski said before the game.

    The Seattle Times 2012

  • However, just when the patience is at the point of exhaustion, when one might leave the theater with a clear consience, the film comes to fitful life. ”

    Current Movie Reviews, Independent Movies - Film Threat 2008

  • Less bitter than my patience is the taste of aloes-juice;

    The Book of The Thousand Nights And A Night 2006

  • The congregation smiles at his use of the word patience, and some of us allow ourselves a small laugh.

    Water Witches Chris Bohjalian 1995

  • That's what I call patience, but I could see his point of view.

    Reach For Tomorrow Clarke, Arthur C. 1956

  • That's what I call patience, but I could see his point of view.

    Reach for Tomorrow Clarke, Arthur C. 1956

  • At six o'clock my patience is at end, and I am clamorously demanding more food, when they bring the long-expected notice.

    In Seven Stages: A Flying Trip Around the World 1891

  • The first kind of patience is the patience you need to solve puzzles, mysteries and other problems.

    games and me nathreee 2010

Comments

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  • Not a virtue that I possess!

    February 24, 2007

  • He who was living is now dead

    We who were living are now dying

    With a little patience

    T.S. Eliot, "The Waste Land".

    March 6, 2008

  • One of the two ships (the other was christened Deliverance) built from the timbers of the Sea Venture.

    March 21, 2008

  • This is definitely a quality I possess very little of!

    October 5, 2011