Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun Inertia; inertness; absence of exertion.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun rare Lack of activity or exertion; inertness; quietude.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Want of
activity orexertion ;inertness ;quietude .
Etymologies
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Examples
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Her weak faculties approved of inertion: her brain, her eyes, her ears, her heart slept content; they could not wake to work, so lethargy was their Paradise.
Villette 2003
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His former quiet life -- amounting almost to physical inertion -- had given place to a nervous and all-consuming desire to master the rather strenuous art of aviation.
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There had been no flourish of trumpets, no herald of the impending storm, but the pent up forces of revolution in inertion, now fierce for action, discarded restraint.
Shadow and Light An Autobiography with Reminiscences of the Last and Present Century Mifflin Wistar Gibbs 1885
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So matters stood when the limpid inertion of Grace's pool-like existence was disturbed as by a geyser.
The Woodlanders Thomas Hardy 1884
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I remarked in my illness the complete inertion, inaction, and destruction of my chief mental faculties.
Life of Lord Byron With His Letters And Journals Byron, George G 1854
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Her weak faculties approved of inertion: her brain, her eyes, her ears, her heart slept content; they could not wake to work, so lethargy was their Paradise.
Villette Charlotte Bront�� 1835
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After three days of complete inertion, Susan raised herself in her bed, and wept over her hapless fate.
The Village Coquette Anonymous 1822
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Niboe, almost “dissolve in tears,” and instantaneously transform herself into all that was gay and lively, as she sprang into the “frolic dance;” while presently she seemed to sink into all the lassitude, the languor, and the inertion of Ottoman voluptuousness.
Substance and Shadow; or, the Fisherman's Daughter of Brighton Anonymous 1812
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I remarked in my illness the complete inertion, inaction, and destruction of my chief mental faculties.
Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 5 (of 6) With His Letters and Journals George Gordon Byron Byron 1806
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How long this state of mental inertion might have lasted is uncertain, had not the sound of approaching footsteps roused her attention to the cause from whence it proceeded.
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