diligence
from
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006)
diligence
n 1: conscientiousness in paying proper attention to a task;
giving the degree of care required in a given situation
2: persevering determination to perform a task; "his diligence
won him quick promotions"; "frugality and industry are still
regarded as virtues" [syn: {diligence}, {industriousness},
{industry}]
3: a diligent effort; "it is a job requiring serious
application" [syn: {application}, {diligence}]
from
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48
Diligence \Dil"i*gence\, n. [F. diligence, L. diligentia.]
1. The quality of being diligent; carefulness; careful
attention; -- the opposite of negligence.
[1913 Webster]
2. Interested and persevering application; devoted and
painstaking effort to accomplish what is undertaken;
assiduity in service.
[1913 Webster]
That which ordinary men are fit for, I am qualified
in; and the best of me is diligence. --Shak.
[1913 Webster]
3. (Scots Law) Process by which persons, lands, or effects
are seized for debt; process for enforcing the attendance
of witnesses or the production of writings.
[1913 Webster]
{To do one's diligence}, {give diligence}, {use diligence},
to exert one's self; to make interested and earnest
endeavor.
[1913 Webster]
And each of them doth all his diligence
To do unto the fest['e] reverence. --Chaucer.
Syn: Attention; industry; assiduity; sedulousness;
earnestness; constancy; heed; heedfulness; care;
caution. -- {Diligence}, {Industry}. Industry has the
wider sense of the two, implying an habitual devotion to
labor for some valuable end, as knowledge, property,
etc. Diligence denotes earnest application to some
specific object or pursuit, which more or less directly
has a strong hold on one's interests or feelings. A man
may be diligent for a time, or in seeking some favorite
end, without meriting the title of industrious. Such was
the case with Fox, while Burke was eminent not only for
diligence, but industry; he was always at work, and
always looking out for some new field of mental effort.
[1913 Webster]
The sweat of industry would dry and die,
But for the end it works to. --Shak.
[1913 Webster]
Diligence and accuracy are the only merits which
an historical writer ascribe to himself. --Gibbon.
[1913 Webster]
from
Bouvier's Law Dictionary, Revised 6th Ed (1856)
DILIGENCE. In Scotland, there are certain forms of law, whereby a creditor
endeavors to make good his payment, either by affecting the person of his
debtor, or by securing the subjects belonging to him from alienation, or by
carrying the property of these subjects to himself. They are either real or
personal.
2. Real diligence is that which is proper to heritable or real rights,.
and of this kind there are two sorts: 1. Inhibitions. 2. Adjudication, which
the law has substituted in the place of apprising.
3. Personal diligence is that by which the person of the debtor may be
secured, or his personal estate affected. Ersk. Pr. L. Scotl. B. 2, t. 11,
s. 1.
from
Bouvier's Law Dictionary, Revised 6th Ed (1856)
DILIGENCE, contracts. The doing things in proper time.
2. It may be divided into three degrees, namely: ordinary diligence,
extraordinary diligence, and slight diligence. It is the reverse of
negligence. (q.v.) Under that article is shown what degree of negligence,
or want of diligence, will make a party to a contract responsible to the
other. Vide Story, Bailm. Index h.t.; Ayl. Pand. 113 1 Miles, Rep. 40.
from
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0
92 Moby Thesaurus words for "diligence":
advertence, advertency, alertness, application, ardor, assiduity,
assiduousness, attention, attention span, attentiveness, awareness,
bookishness, bulldog tenacity, care, concentration, consciousness,
consideration, constancy, dogged perseverance, doggedness, ear,
earnestness, endurance, energeticalness, energy, engrossment,
fervor, fidelity, heed, heedfulness, indefatigability,
industriousness, industry, insistence, insistency, intentiveness,
intentness, laboriousness, loyalty, mindfulness, note, notice,
observance, observation, obstinacy, pains, painstaking,
painstakingness, patience, patience of Job, permanence,
perseverance, persistence, persistency, pertinaciousness,
pertinacity, plodding, plugging, preoccupation, regard,
regardfulness, relentlessness, remark, resolution, respect,
scholarliness, scholarship, sedulity, sedulousness,
single-mindedness, singleness of purpose, slogging, stability,
stamina, staying power, steadfastness, steadiness,
stick-to-itiveness, strenuousness, stubbornness, studiousness,
tenaciousness, tenacity, thoroughgoingness, thoroughness, thought,
tirelessness, unremittingness, unsparingness, unswerving attention,
vehemence, zealousness
[email protected]