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unaˈttainable, a. and n.
[un-1 7 b and 12.]
A. adj. That cannot be attained or reached.
1662Bp. Hopkins Serm., Funeral (1685) 52 Those thirty or forty years, which were judged by thee in thy childhood an unattainable age. 1690Locke Hum. Und. ii. xxi. §40 The will..cannot, at any time, be moved towards what is judged, at that time, unattainable. 1736Pope Let. to Swift 25 Mar., A View of the useful and therefore attainable, and of the un-useful and therefore un-attainable, Arts. 1771Junius' Lett. lxiii. (1788) 334 This, though a wicked purpose, is neither absurd nor unattainable. 1809Edin. Rev. XIV. 283 The great body of the people never yet engaged eagerly in the pursuit of an unattainable object. 1860Ruskin Unto this Last (1862) 80 Though absolute justice be unattainable, as much justice as we need for all practical use is attainable.
B. n.
1. An unattainable thing. rare.
1661Glanvill Van. Dogm. 112 Temperamentum ad pondus, may well be reckon'd among the three Philosophical unattainables. 1786Cowper Let. to Lady Hesketh 10 Apr., Range and jack [in a kitchen] are not unattainables; they may be easily supplied.
2. With the: That which is not attainable.
1857Maurice Ep. St. John xx. 340 In one sense I can admit that man is always striving after the unattainable. 1882M. E. Braddon Mt. Royal I. iii. 101 All women sigh for the unattainable.
Hence unaˈttainableness; -ably adv.
1690Locke Hum. Und. ii. xx. §11 Despair is the thought of the unattainableness of any Good. 1863Hawthorne Our Old Home (1879) 371 A strange repulsion and unattainableness in the very spell that made her beautiful. 1894Hall Caine Manxman iii. xxv, She would be with him always;..the more reproachfully and unattainably, because she would be the wife of another man. |