[f. SPIRITUAL a. + -NESS.] The fact, quality or state of being spiritual in origin, character or nature; spirituality.
Very common in the 17th c.; now rare.
1561. Daus, trans. Bullinger on Apoc. (1573), 149 b. Otherwyse there is no spiritualness at all: for they be altogether fleshe.
1579. W. Wilkinson, Confut. Fam. Love, B ij. Out of your spiritualnes judge all thinges according to the ballance of equitye.
a. 1603. T. Cartwright, Confut. Rhem. N. T. (1618), 438. The spiritualnesse of our bodies doth not take away their naturall and essentiall properties.
1642. D. Rogers, Naaman, 108. The spiritualnesse and precisenesse of Christ is a burthen to them.
1693. G. Firmin, Rev. Mr. Davis’s Vind., i. 6. It was the Law opened in the Spiritualness of it, that took of Paul from his own Righteousness.
1721. Bailey, Spirituality, Spiritualness, Devotion.
1889. Pall Mall Gaz., 15 June, 6/1. A pseudo spiritualness which makes small account of the daily behaviour and moral stamina of our teachers and preachers?
b. A spiritual condition or state. rare–1.
1658. Durham, Comm. Revelation 1, 29. To be in the spirit, is,… to be in a spiritualnesse abstracted from carnalnesse.
