Also 7 expedency. [f. EXPEDIENT: see -ENCY.]
1. The quality or state of being expedient; suitability to the circumstances or conditions of the case; fitness, advantage; † an advantage.
1612. Brinsley, Lud. Lit., xxviii. (1627), 281. Though some good Schoolemasters doe doubt of the expediency.
1661. Grand Debate, 10. Those who are unsatisfied concerning their lawfulness, or expedency.
a. 1677. Barrow, Serm., xxxii. (1741), II. 333. From a wise consideration of humane affairs … we may collect the … expediency, the … necessity of future judgment.
1680. H. Dodwell, 2 Lett. (1691), C j b. Many other expediencies hereof [of this Compendium] might have been mentioned.
1741. C. Middleton, Cicero, II. IX. 309. In some perplexity to the last, about the expediency of the voyage.
1879. Cassell’s Techn. Educ., III. 194/2. It is not a question of expediency, it is a question of sheer necessity.
† b. concr. = EXPEDIENT B. 2. Obs.
1683. J. Barnard, Life Heylyn, 179. He proposed a most excellent expediency,… for the satisfaction of some scrupolous Members.
2. The consideration of what is expedient, as a motive or rule of action; ‘policy,’ prudential considerations as distinguished from those of morality or justice. In mod. use often in a bad sense, the consideration of what is merely politic (esp. with regard to self-interest) to the neglect of what is just or right.
1612–5. Bp. Hall, Contempl. N. T., I. i. (1634), 2. Matters of good order in holy affaires may be ruled by the wise institution of men according to reason and expediencie.
1754. Chatham, Lett. Nephew, vi. 43. Matters of mere expediency, that affect neither honor, morality, or religion.
1786. Burke, W. Hastings, Wks. 1842, II. 168. Warren Hastings did act … contrary to his own declared sense of expediency, consistency, and justice.
1815. Jane Austen, Emma, I. xviii. 126. Following his duty instead of consulting expediency.
1828. D’Israeli, Charles I., II. ix. 230. Where political expediency seems to violate all moral right.
1862. Ruskin, Unto this Last, 8. For no human actions ever were intended … to be guided by balances of expediency.
1875. Jowett, Plato (ed. 2), III. 156. The right of private property is based on expediency.
b. occas. in pl. Motives of expediency; the requirements of expediency.
1843. Carlyle, Past & Pr. (1858), 139. Looming with shapes of expediencies.
1859. Mill, Liberty, i. 25. These reasons must arise from the special expediencies of the case.
3. Comb.
1853. G. S. Faber, Revival Fr. Emp., 54. Even those wise men of this world, our liberalising Expediency-Mongers, have been constrained to admit [etc.].
