eunoia

English

Alternative forms

eunœa (obsolete, rare)

Etymology

From Ancient Greek εὔνοια (eúnoia, “goodwill”, literally “well-mindedness”), from εὖ (eû, “well, good”) + νόος (nóos, “mind, spirit”).

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): /juːˈnɔɪ.ə/
Audio (US): (file)
Rhymes: -ɔɪ.ə

Noun

eunoia (uncountable)

(rhetoric) Goodwill towards an audience, either perceived or real; the perception that the speaker has the audience's interest at heart.
- 1643, John Milton, Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce:
  Yea the Apostle himself in the forecited 2 Cor. 6.14. alludes from that place of Deut. to forbid mis-yoking mariage; as by the Greek word is evident, though he instance but in one example of mis-matching with an Infidell: yet next to that what can be a fouler incongruity, a greater violence to the reverend secret of nature, then to force a mixture of minds that cannot unite, and to sowe the furrow of mans nativity with seed of two incoherent and uncombining dispositions; which act being kindly and voluntarie, as it ought, the Apostle in the language he wrote call’d Eunoia, and the Latines Benevolence, intimating the original therof to be in the understanding and the will;[...]
- 1994, Eugene Garver, Aristotle's Rhetoric: An Art of Character, page 112:
  Direct argument is a dangerous strategy for developing eunoia, since "those who have many friends and treat everyone as close to them seem to be friends to no one, except in a fellow-citizens way. These people are regarded as ingratiating."
(medicine, psychology) A state of normal adult mental health.
- 1899, Editorial Comment: "A New Faculty and its Localization", Medicine 5: 584
  The author says if we translate this metopic or coronal curve into the language of psychology we have eunoia or prothymia.
- 1912, William Eastbrook Chancellor, "Temperment and the Education of Foreigners and of Their Children for American Citizenship", Educational Foundations 39 (1)
  We can usually tell which baby at three months old will never reach even imbecility, which child at three will never reach morinoia, habits of life, which boy or girl at six or seven will be arrested in morinoia and not proceed into eunoia.

Related terms

Translations

(rhetoric) goodwill towards an audience

(medicine, psychology) state of normal adult mental health

Russian: разумность (ru) (razumnostʹ)