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The act of refining, or the state of being refined; as, the refinement or metals; refinement of ideas. The more bodies are of kin to spirit in subtilty and refinement, the more diffusive are they. Norris. From the civil war to this time, I doubt whether the corruptions in our language have not equaled its refinements.…

Excessive refinement.

g. Augustan age of any national literature, the period of its highest state of purity and refinement; -- so called because the reign of Augustus Cæsar was the golden age of Roman literature. Thus the reign of Louis XIV. (b. 1638) has been called the Augustan age of French literature, and that of Queen Anne (b. 1664) th…

ng to, or resembling, an uncivilized person or people; barbarous; barbarian; destitute of refinement. "Wild, barbaric music." Sir W. Scott.

The act of civilizing, or the state of being civilized; national culture; refinement. Our manners, our civilization, and all the good things connected with manners, and with civilization, have, in this European world of ours, depended for ages upon two principles -- . . . the spirit of a gentleman, and spirit of religi…

Having a coarse grain or texture, as wood; hence, wanting in refinement.

Destitute of refinement; rude; unpolished; rustic; not urbane; as, country manners.

The state of being cultivated; advancement in physical, intellectual, or moral condition; refinement; culture. Italy . . . was but imperfectly reduced to cultivation before the irruption of the barbarians. Hallam.

vement; enlightenment and discipline acquired by mental and moral training; civilization; refinement in manners and taste. What the Greeks expressed by their humanitas, we less happily try to express by the more artificial word culture. J. C. Shairp. The list of all the items of the general life of a people represents…

Nice propriety of manners or conduct; susceptibility or tenderness of feeling; refinement; fastidiousness; and hence, in an exaggerated sense, effeminacy; as, great delicacy of behavior; delicacy in doing a kindness; delicacy of character that unfits for earnest action. You know your mother's delicacy in this point. Co…

act or process of producing or refining with labor; improvement by successive operations; refinement.

e of what deforms or impresses unpleasantly; grace given by art or practice; fine polish; refinement; -- said of manners, language, style, form, architecture, etc. That grace that elegance affords. Drayton. The endearing elegance of female friendship. Johnson. A trait of native elegance, seldom seen in the masculine ch…

Very choice, and hence, pleasing to good taste; characterized by grace, propriety, and refinement, and the absence of every thing offensive; exciting admiration and approbation by symmetry, completeness, freedom from blemish, and the like; graceful; tasteful and highly attractive; as, elegant manners; elegant style of…

es of some kind; amusement. Theatrical entertainments conducted with greater elegance and refinement. Prescott.

An affectation of excessive elegance and refinement of language; high-flown diction.

One who affects excessive refinement and elegance of language; -- applied esp. to a class of writers, in the age of Elizabeth, whose productions are marked by affected conceits and high-flown diction.

To affect excessive refinement in language; to be overnice in expression.

The refinement or subtilization of a body, or the increasing of its virtue or principal property.

Coarseness; simplicity; want of refinement; as, the homeliness of manners, or language. Addison.

indelicate; want of delicacy, or of a nice sense of, or regard for, purity, propriety, or refinement in manners, language, etc.; rudeness; coarseness; also, that which is offensive to refined taste or purity of mind. The indelicacy of English comedy. Blair. Your papers would be chargeable with worse than indelicacy; th…