Hu*man"i*ty (?), n.;
pl. Humanities (#). [L.
humanitas: cf. F. humanité. See Human.]
1. The quality of being human; the peculiar nature of man, by which
he is distinguished from other beings.
2. Mankind collectively;
the human race.
But
hearing oftentimes
The still, and music humanity.
Wordsworth.
It is a debt we owe to humanity.
S.
S. Smith.
3. The quality of being humane; the kind feelings, dispositions, and sympathies of man; especially, a disposition to relieve persons or animals in distress, and to treat all
creatures with kindness and tenderness. "The common offices of humanity and friendship."
Locke.
4. Mental
cultivation; liberal
education; instruction in classical and polite literature.
Polished with humanity and the study of
witty science.
Holland. 5.
pl. (With definite
article) The branches of polite or
elegant learning; as language, rhetoric, poetry, and the ancient classics; belles-letters.
&fist; The cultivation of the languages, literature, history, and archæology of Greece and Rome, were very commonly called literæ humaniores, or, in English, the humanities, . . . by way of opposition to the literæ divinæ, or divinity. G. P. Marsh.
Hear it pronounced