Evil /(ē"v'l)/

E·vil

Evil

a.
  1. Having qualities tending to injury and mischief; having a nature or properties which tend to badness; mischievous; not good; worthless or deleterious; poor; as, an evil beast; and evil plant; an evil crop.
    A good tree can not bring forth evil fruit.
    — Matt. vii. 18.
  2. Having or exhibiting bad moral qualities; morally corrupt; wicked; wrong; vicious; as, evil conduct, thoughts, heart, words, and the like.
    Ah, what a sign it is of evil life, When death's approach is seen so terrible.
  3. Producing or threatening sorrow, distress, injury, or calamity; unpropitious; calamitous; as, evil tidings; evil arrows; evil days.
    Because he hath brought up an evil name upon a virgin of Israel.
    — Deut. xxii. 19.
    The owl shrieked at thy birth -- an evil sign.
    Evil news rides post, while good news baits.
    It almost led him to believe in the evil eye.

Evil

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.
    The evil that men do lives after them.
  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. [R.]
    He [Edward the Confessor] was the first that touched for the evil.

Evil

adv.
  1. In an evil manner; not well; ill; badly; unhappily; injuriously; unkindly.
    It went evil with his house.
    — 1 Chron. vii. 23.
    The Egyptians evil entreated us, and affected us.