[a. F. languide or ad. L. languid-us, f. languēre to LANGUISH.]
1. Of persons or animals, the body, etc.: Faint, weak; inert from fatigue or weakness; wanting in vigor or vitality.
1597. A. M., trans. Guillemeau’s Fr. Chirurg., 50 b/2. The natural caliditye being in these partes feeble and languide.
1615. Crooke, Body of Man, 338. The first births in the beginning of the seauenth moneth are … verie languid and weake.
1707. Floyer, Physic. Pulse-Watch, 33. A languid Pulse depends on languid Spirits.
1744. Armstrong, Preserv. Health, III. 381. Happy he whose toil Has o’er his languid powerless limbs diffus’d A pleasing lassitude.
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist. (1776), VII. 168. (Serpents) Their lungs … are long and large, and doubtless are necessary to promote their languid circulation.
1816. J. Wilson, City Plague, II. ii. How pale you look! Wearied, and pale, and languid.
1857. Mrs. Gatty, Parables fr. Nat., Ser. II. (1868), 144. Languid, indeed, was the voice, and languid were the movements of the grub.
1876. J. Saunders, Lion in Path, xi. This recent illness had still left him languid.
transf. 1764. Goldsm., Trav., 218. Unknown to them when sensual pleasures cloy, To fill the languid pause with finer joy.
1832. Tennyson, Lotos-Eaters, 5. All round the coast the languid air did swoon.
1871. Miss Yonge, Cameos, II. xxxii. 333. No doubt he had longed for her in the weary languid hours before Meaux.
b. Of persons and their deportment: Slow in movement; showing an indisposition (natural or affected) to physical exertion.
1728. Young, Love Fame, V. The languid lady next appears in state, Who was not born to carry her own weight.
1863. Fr. A. Kemble, Resid. in Georgia, 67. They are languid in their deportment.
2. Of persons, their character, feelings, actions, etc.: Not easily roused to emotion, exhibiting only faint interest or concern; spiritless, apathetic. Of interest, impressions: Faint, weak.
1713. Addison, Cato, I. v. I’ll hasten to my troops, And fire their languid souls with Cato’s virtue.
1713. Steele, Guardian, No. 18, ¶ 1. [Death] which, by reason of its seeming distance makes but languid impressions upon the mind.
1742. Pope, Dunc., IV. 46. With mincing step, small voice, and languid eye.
1751. Butler, Charge Clergy Durham, Wks. 1874, II. 331. Without somewhat of this nature, piety will grow languid even among the better sort of men.
1774. Burke, Amer. Tax., Wks. 1842, I. 169. I never heard a more languid debate in this house.
1791. Mrs. Radcliffe, Rom. Forest, i. Madame gazed with concern upon her languid countenance.
1849. Lytton, Caxtons, 12. He was too lazy or too languid where only his own interests were at stake.
1849. Macaulay, Hist. Eng., ii. I. 177. In him dislike was a languid feeling. Ibid., v. 570. A war of which the theatre was so distant … excited only a languid interest in London. Ibid., xvii. IV. 90. An appeal which might have moved the most languid and effeminate natures to heroic exertion.
1870. Howson, Metaph. St. Paul, iv. 153. What a contrast this is to our dull and languid Christianity!
b. Of ideas, style, language: Wanting in force, vividness or interest. Said also of a writer.
a. 1677. Barrow, Serm., Wks. 1686, III. xxxvi. 404. Methinks the highest expressions that language … can afford, are very languid and faint in comparison of what they strain to represent, when [etc.].
a. 1704. T. Brown, Sat. Antients, Wks. 1730, I. 24. To hear Homer call’d dull and heavy … and Horace an Author unpolished languid and without force.
1864. Burton, Scot. Abr., II. ii. 179. They sent me two inscriptions but they were long and languid.
1865. Carlyle, Fredk. Gt., XX. vi. (1872), IX. 108. He had written certain thin Books, all of a thin languid nature.
1865. Seeley, Ecce Homo, iii. (ed. 8), 25. The languid dreams of commentators.
3. Of business, trade, or other activity viewed externally to persons: Sluggish, dull, not brisk or lively.
1832. Dibdin (title), Bibliophobia. Remarks on the present languid and depressed state of Literature and the Book Trade.
1833. Ht. Martineau, Vanderput & S., iv. 64. The business has been very languid.
1866. Crump, Banking, viii. 169. On account of the circulation of their currencies being more languid.
1866. Rogers, Agric. & Prices, I. xviii. 406. The market for exports was exceedingly languid.
1887. Daily News, 20 June, 2/5. A languid tone has been observed in many quarters.
4. Of inanimate things, physical motion, etc.: Weak, wanting in force; slow of movement.
1646. Sir T. Browne, Pseud. Ep., III. xxv. 176. A languid and dumbe allision upon the parts.
1692. Bentley, Boyle Lect., 190. No motion so swift or languid, but a greater velocity or slowness may still be conceived.
1715–20. Pope, Iliad, IX. 279. When the languid flames at length subside.
1748. Shenstone, Odes, Verses to W. Lyttleton, iv. When languid suns are taking leave Of every drooping tree.
1830. Lyell, Princ. Geol., I. 199. That the same power should even in it’s more languid state be capable of raising to the surface considerable quantities of water from the interior.
1834. Macaulay, Pitt, Ess. (1854), 302. Two rivers met, the one gentle, languid, and though languid, yet of no depth.
b. Of color: Faint, not vivid.
1747. Gould, Eng. Ants, 3. The first are of a languid Red; the second extremely black and shining.
1764. Reid, Inquiry, vi. § 22. The colours of objects, according as they are more distant, become more faint and languid.
