Noun

(dignities)

A quality or state worthy of esteem and respect.

* 1752 , (Henry Fielding), , I. viii

He uttered this ... with great majesty, or, as he called it, dignity .

* 1981 , African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights , art. 5

Every individual shall have the right to the respect of the dignity inherent in a human being.

* 2008 , Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology (ECNH) [Switzerland]

'The dignity' of living beings with regard to plants: Moral consideration of plants for their own sake', 3: ... the ECNH has been expected to make proposals from an ethical perspective to concretise the constitutional term ' dignity of living beings with regard to plants. Dignity of Plants

Decorum, formality, stateliness.

* 1934 , Aldous Huxley, "Puerto Barrios", in Beyond the Mexique Bay :

Official DIGNITY tends to increase in inverse ratio to the importance of the country in which the office is held.Columbia World of Quotations 1996.

High office, rank, or station.

* 1781 , Edward Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire , F. III. 231:

He ... distributed the civil and military dignities among his favourites and followers.

* Macaulay

And the king said, What honour and dignity hath been done to Mordecai for this?

One holding high rank; a dignitary.

* Bible, Jude 8.

These filthy dreamers speak evil of dignities .

(obsolete) Fundamental principle; axiom; maxim.

* Sir Thomas Browne

Sciences concluding from dignities , and principles known by themselves.

Noun

Calmness of mind or matter, self-possession.

* Milton

We seek peace and composure .

* I. Watts

When the passions are all silent, the mind enjoys its most perfect composure .

*

“Did you want anything, ma’am?” I enquired, still preserving my external composure , in spite of her ghastly countenance and strange exaggerated manner.

* {{quote-news

, year=2011 , date=September 2 , author= , title=Wales 2-1 Montenegro , work=BBC citation , page= , passage=Montenegro's early composure was shaken by that set-back and a visibly buoyed Wales nearly added a second goal when Bale broke past two defenders and fired a long-range shot that Bozovic tipped over}}

* {{quote-book

, year=1798 , author=Giacomo Casanova , title=The memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt , chapter=92 citation , passage=He began to lose his composure , and made mistakes, his cards got mixed up, and his scoring was wild.}}

(obsolete) The act of composing, or that which is composed; a composition.

* Evelyn

Signor Pietro, who had an admirable way both of composure [in music] and teaching.

(obsolete) Orderly adjustment; disposition.

* Woodward

Various composures and combinations of these corpuscles.

(obsolete) frame; make; temperament

* Shakespeare

His composure must be rare indeed / Whom these things can not blemish.

(obsolete) A combination; a union; a bond.

(Shakespeare)

(Webster 1913)