Unfitly

adv. [UN-¹ 11.] In an unfit or unsuitable manner; unfittingly, inappropriately.

1561.  T. Norton, trans. Calvin’s Inst., I. xiii. 37 b. Least if I bryng foorth any thyng vnfittly, it shuld geue occasion … to the malicious to cauill.

1632.  Massinger & Field, Fatal Dowry, III. i. Wherein hath Charalois Unfitly so demean’d himself?

1676.  Jas. Cooke, Marrow Chirurg., I. III. vii. 590. There are chaps of the Lips and other parts, which is neglected or unfitly dressed, may turn Cancerous.

1788.  Gibbon, Decl. & F., lx. VI. 128. Their military talents were unfitly recompensed by the lucrative offices of judges and treasurers.

1807.  G. Chalmers, Caledonia, I. III. vii. 393. It is, however, unfitly interpolated, by the editor, as a continuation of the Chronicon Pictorum.

  b.  In the phr. not unfitly.

1586.  T. B., La Primaud. Fr. Acad., I. 160. The answer also of an Egyptian was not unfitlie made to one that asked him what he caried there folded.

1615.  Crooke, Body of Man, 541. Thence also they are not vnfitly called by a Poet … The leaues of the Eye.

1695.  J. Edwards, Perfect. Script., 236. They … are not unfitly translated aprons.

1710.  Berkeley, Princ. Hum. Knowl., § 108. The steady consistent methods of nature may not unfitly be styled the Language of its Author.

1853.  Ruskin, Stones Ven., II. vi. 215. The three architectures may … not unfitly receive their names from those nations by whom they were carried to the highest perfection.