Dictionary entry

Evil (2)

Webster's Dictionary 1913

E″vil (ē″v'l) n. 1. Anything which impairs the happiness of a being or deprives a being of any good; anything which causes suffering of any kind to sentient beings; injury; mischief; harm; — opposed to good.

Evils which our own misdeeds have wrought. Milton.

The evil that men do lives after them. Shak.

2. Moral badness, or the deviation of a moral being from the principles of virtue imposed by conscience, or by the will of the Supreme Being, or by the principles of a lawful human authority; disposition to do wrong; moral offence; wickedness; depravity.

The heart of the sons of men is full of evil. Eccl. ix. 3.

3. malady or disease; especially in the phrase king's evil, the scrofula. Shak.

He was the first that touched for the evil. Addison.