honesty meaning: definition, etymology and quotations

honesty

noun

UK /ˈɒn.ɪ.sti/ · US /ˈɑ.nɪ.sti/

Etymology From Middle English honeste (“honour, integrity”), from Old French honesté (compare modern French honnêteté). By surface analysis, honest + -y. Displaced native Old English sōþfæstnes and non-native Middle English prodonomee, from Old French prodomie. The plant is named so after the visibility of the seeds through the translucent pods.

The act, quality, or condition of being honest.

academic / artistic / emotional / intellectual honesty
brutal / devastating / searing honesty

4 more examples

There’s no trust, / No faith, no honesty in men; all perjured, / All forsworn, all naught, all dissemblers.c. 1591–1595 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Romeo and Ivliet”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene ii]:
1787, George Colman, Junior, Inkle and Yarico, London: G.G.J. & J. Robinson, Act 2, p. 45, O give me your plain dealing Fellows Who never from honesty shrink; Not thinking on all they shou’d tell us, But telling us all that they think.
[…] Are you honest, boy? / Then be not spendthrift of your honesty, / But keep it to yourself; in Padua / Men think that honesty is ostentatious, so / It is not of the fashion.1891, Oscar Wilde, The Duchess of Padua:
To those who knew her and to the greatly enlarged circle who were electrified by her last poems and sudden death, she had come to signify the specific honesties and risks of the poet’s condition.1965, George Steiner, “Dying is an Art”, in Language and Silence: Essays on Language, Literature and the Inhuman, New York: Atheneum, published 1986, page 295:

Obsolete Honor; decency, propriety.

Have ye no wit, manners, nor honesty, but to gabble like tinkers at this time of night?c. 1601–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Twelfe Night, or What You Will”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iii]:
Fellovves in armes faithfull and valiant, / I thanke you for your paines and honeſties, […]1607 February 12 (first performance; Gregorian calendar), [Barnabe Barnes], The Divils Charter: A Tragædie Conteining the Life and Death of Pope Alexander the Sixt. […], London: […] G[eorge] E[ld] for Iohn Wright, […], published 1607, →OCLC, Act V, scene i, signature K, recto:

1 more example

[…] that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 1 Timothy 2:2:

Obsolete Chastity.

[…] spend all I have; only give me so much of your time in exchange of it, as to lay an amiable siege to the honesty of this Ford’s wife […]c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merry Wiues of Windsor”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene ii]:
c. 1625, John Fletcher, The Fair Maid of the Inn, Act V, Scene 1, in Alexander Dyce (editor), The Works of Beaumont and Fletcher, New York: Appleton, 1890, Volume 2, p. 669, […] Oh, these vild women, That are so ill preservers of men’s honours, They cannot govern their own honesties!

Any of various crucifers in the genus Lunaria, several of which are grown as ornamentals, particularly annual honesty (Lunaria annua).

Various measures were taken to avoid it, most popular being the suspension of certain herbs and tree branches over the doorways of dwellings and stables. Commonly used greenery were tansy, honesty, garlic, St. John's Wort, mountain ash, roadside verbena.1940, Rosetta E. Clarkson, Green Enchantments: The Magic Spell of Gardens, The Macmillan Company, page 271:
She thought a minute, then stepped nimbly back into her cottage; and what she came out with at last was, a sprig of dry leaves, round as shillings, white as paper, quivering on a few thin stalks that looked ready to snap. / It was honesty.2002, Sarah Waters, chapter 6, in Fingersmith, London: Virago, →ISBN, part 1, page 156:

Antonyms: dishonesty
Derived terms: annual honesty, honesty bar, honesty box, honesty is the best policy, honesty jar, in all honesty, intellectual honesty, maiden's honesty, overhonesty, unhonesty