the quality of being patient, as the bearing of provocation, annoyance, misfortune, or pain, without complaint, loss of temper, irritation, or the like.
2.
an ability or willingness to suppress restlessness or annoyance when confronted with delay: to have patience with a slow learner.
3.
quiet, steady perseverance; even-tempered care; diligence: to work with patience.
Also called patience dock.a European dock, Rumex patientia, of the buckwheat family, whose leaves are often used as a vegetable.
6.
Obsolete. leave; permission; sufference.
[Origin: 1175–1225; ME pacience < OF < L patientia.See patient, -ence]
—Synonyms 1. composure, stability, self-possession; submissiveness, sufferance. Patience, endurance, fortitude, stoicism imply qualities of calmness, stability, and persistent courage in trying circumstances. Patience may denote calm, self-possessed, and unrepining bearing of pain, misfortune, annoyance, or delay; or painstaking and untiring industry or (less often) application in the doing of somehing: to bear afflictions with patience. Endurance denotes the ability to bear exertion, hardship, or suffering (without implication of moral qualities required or shown): Running in a marathon requires great endurance. Fortitude implies not only patience but courage and strength of character in the midst of pain, affliction, or hardship: to show fortitude in adversity. Stoicism is calm fortitude, with such repression of emotion as to seem almost like indifference to pleasure or pain: The American Indians were noted for stoicism under torture. 3. indefatigability, persistence, assiduity.
Synonyms: These nouns denote the capacity to endure hardship, difficulty, or inconvenience without complaint. Patience emphasizes calmness, self-control, and the willingness or ability to tolerate delay: Our patience will achieve more than our force (Edmund Burke).
Long-suffering is long and patient endurance, as of wrong or provocation: The general, a man not known for docility and long-suffering, flew into a rage. Resignation implies acceptance of or submission to something trying, as out of despair or necessity: I undertook the job with an air of resignation. Forbearance denotes restraint, as in retaliating, demanding what is due, or voicing disapproval: "It is the mutual duty of all to practice Christian forbearance, love, and charity towards each other" (Patrick Henry).
c.1225, "quality of being patient in suffering," from O.Fr. pacience, from L. patientia "patience, endurance," from patientem (nom. patiens), prp. of pati "to suffer, endure," from PIE base *pei- "to damage, injure, hurt" (see passion).
"Patiencen. A minor form of despair, disguised as a virtue." [Ambrose Bierce, "Devil's Dictionary," 1911]
Meaning "constancy in effort" is attested from 1517. Meaning "card game for one person" is from 1816.
Monk\, n. [AS. munuc, munec, munc, L. monachus, Gr. ?, fr. ? alone. Cf. Monachism.]1. A man who retires from the ordinary temporal concerns of the world, and devotes himself to religion; one of a religious community of men inhabiting a monastery, and bound by vows to a life of chastity, obedience, and poverty. "A monk out of his cloister." --Chaucer. Monks in some respects agree with regulars, as in the substantial vows of religion; but in other respects monks and regulars differ; for that regulars, vows excepted, are not tied up to so strict a rule of life as monks are. --Ayliffe. 2. (Print.) A blotch or spot of ink on a printed page, caused by the ink not being properly distributed. It is distinguished from a friar, or white spot caused by a deficiency of ink. 3. A piece of tinder made of agaric, used in firing the powder hose or train of a mine. 4. (Zo["o]l.) (a) A South American monkey (Pithecia monachus); also applied to other species, as Cebus xanthocephalus. (b) The European bullfinch. Monk bat (Zo["o]l.), a South American and West Indian bat (Molossus nasutus); -- so called because the males live in communities by themselves. Monk bird(Zo["o]l.), the friar bird. Monk seal (Zo["o]l.), a species of seal (Monachus albiventer) inhabiting the Black Sea, the Mediterranean Sea, and the adjacent parts of the Atlantic. Monk's rhubarb (Bot.), a kind of dock; -- also called patience (Rumex Patientia).