courage
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈkʌ.ɹɪdʒ/
note: US, hurry–furry merger
ipa: /ˈkɝ.ɪd͡ʒ/
note: Indic
ipa: /kəˈreː.d͡ʒ/
Forms: form: courages
Etymology: From Middle English corage, from Old French corage (French courage), from Vulgar Latin *corāticum, from Latin cor (“heart”). Distantly related to cardiac (“of the heart”), which is from Greek, but from the same Proto-Indo-European root. Displaced Middle English elne, ellen, from Old English ellen (“courage, valor”).
Senses: examples: text: A great part of courage is the courage of having done the thing before.
ref: 1860, R[alph] W[aldo] Emerson, “Essay IV. Culture.”, in The Conduct of Life, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor and Fields, →OCLC, page 120:
text: There is a stubbornness about me that never can bear to be frightened at the will of others. My courage always rises at every attempt to intimidate me.
ref: 1813 January 27, [Jane Austen], Pride and Prejudice: […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: […] [George Sidney] for T[homas] Egerton, […], →OCLC:
text: It takes a lot of courage to be successful in business.
glosses: The quality of being confident, not afraid or easily intimidated, but without being incautious or inconsiderate.
examples: text: He plucked up the courage to tell her how he felt.
text: Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear—not absence of fear.
ref: 1897, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], “[Pudd’nhead Wilson] Chapter XII”, in The Tragedy of Pudd’nhead Wilson: And the Comedy Those Extraordinary Twins, Hartford, Conn.: American Publishing Company, →OCLC, page 155:
glosses: The ability to overcome one's fear, do or live things which one finds frightening.
examples: text: “Courage is not simply one of the virtues but the form of every virtue at the testing point, which means at the point of highest reality.”
ref: 1942, C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters:
text: I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It's when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what.
ref: 1960 July 11, Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird, Philadelphia, Pa.; New York, N.Y.: J[oshua] B[allinger] Lippincott Company, →OCLC:
text: Courage isn't having the strength to go on - it is going on when you don't have strength.
ref: 1993, Stanley P. Cornils, The Mourning After: How to Manage Grief Wisely:
text: 2008, Maya Angelou, address for the 2008 Cornell University commencement
Courage is the most important of all the virtues because without courage, you can't practice any other virtue consistently.
text: I hope you live a life you’re proud of. If you find that you’re not, I hope you have the courage to start all over again.
ref: 2008, Eric Roth, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button Screenplay:
glosses: The ability to maintain one's will or intent despite either the experience of fear, frailty, or frustration; or the occurrence of adversity, difficulty, defeat or reversal. Moral fortitude.
Synonyms: word: audacity
word: balls
word: bield
word: boldhead
word: boldness
word: bravehood
word: braveness
word: bravery
word: courage
word: courageousness
word: daring
word: fearlessness
word: grit
word: guts
word: heart
word: intrepidity
word: intrepidness
word: mood
word: nerve
word: ovaries
word: pecker
word: pluck
word: spunk
word: steel
word: undauntedness
word: valour
Derived terms: courageless
courage of one's convictions
courageous
digital courage
discourage
Dutch courage
encourage
gather up one's courage
liquid courage
pluck up one's courage
screw up one's courage
take courage
take one's courage in both hands
Related terms: word: cardiac
word: bravado
word: chutzpah
word: cojones
word: heroism
word: impudence
word: piss and vinegar
word: brave
word: hero