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From: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

 Vir·tue n.
 1. Manly strength or courage; bravery; daring; spirit; valor.  [Obs.]
 Built too strong
 For force or virtue ever to expugn.   --Chapman.
 2. Active quality or power; capacity or power adequate to the production of a given effect; energy; strength; potency; efficacy; as, the virtue of a medicine.
    Jesus, immediately knowing in himself that virtue had gone out of him, turned him about.   --Mark v. 30.
    A man was driven to depend for his security against misunderstanding, upon the pure virtue of his syntax.   --De Quincey.
    The virtue of his midnight agony.   --Keble.
 3. Energy or influence operating without contact of the material or sensible substance.
 She moves the body which she doth possess,
 Yet no part toucheth, but by virtue's touch.   --Sir. J. Davies.
 4. Excellence; value; merit; meritoriousness; worth.
    I made virtue of necessity.   --Chaucer.
    In the Greek poets, . . . the economy of poems is better observed than in Terence, who thought the sole grace and virtue of their fable the sticking in of sentences.   --B. Jonson.
 5. Specifically, moral excellence; integrity of character; purity of soul; performance of duty.
    Virtue only makes our bliss below.   --Pope.
 If there's Power above us,
 And that there is all nature cries aloud
 Through all her works, he must delight in virtue.   --Addison.
 6. A particular moral excellence; as, the virtue of temperance, of charity, etc.  “The very virtue of compassion.” --Shak. “Remember all his virtues.” --Addison.
 7. Specifically: Chastity; purity; especially, the chastity of women; virginity.
 H. I believe the girl has virtue.
 M.  And if she has, I should be the last man in the world to attempt to corrupt it.   --Goldsmith.
 8. pl. One of the orders of the celestial hierarchy.
    Thrones, dominations, princedoms, virtues, powers.   --Milton.
 Cardinal virtues. See under Cardinal, a.
 In virtue of, or By virtue of, through the force of; by authority of.  “He used to travel through Greece by virtue of this fable, which procured him reception in all the towns.” --Addison. “This they shall attain, partly in virtue of the promise made by God, and partly in virtue of piety.” --Atterbury.
 Theological virtues, the three virtues, faith, hope, and charity.  See --1 Cor. xiii. 13.
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