Also 6 breuite, brevyte, 6–7 breuitie, 7 breuity, brevitie. [prob. a. AF. brevete (F. brièveté):—brevitāt-em ‘shortness,’ f. brevi-s short: assimilated to the Latin spelling.]
1. Shortness, esp. as applied to time.
1542–3. Act 34 & 35 Hen. VIII., xxvii. § 99. Many sutes … cannot be tried … for breuitie of time.
1628. Feltham, Resolves, I. xxxii. Wks. (1677), 55. Miserable brevity! more miserable uncertainty of life!
1853. Robertson, Serm., xiv. 177. The deep thought of the brevity of time.
2. The being short in speech or writing; contraction into few words, conciseness, terseness.
1509. Barclay, Ship of Fooles (1570), 18. If that it were not for cause of breuitie, I could shewe [etc.].
1574. Whitgift, Def. Aunsw., II. Wks. 1851, I. 237. I omit them for brevity’ sake.
1602. Shaks., Ham., II. ii. 90. Since Breuitie is the Soule of Wit … I will be breefe.
1606. Holland, Sueton., To Rdr. Brevitie is many times the mother of Obscuritie.
1663. Butler, Hud., I. I. 669. Brevity is very good, When w’ are, or are not understood.
1732. De Foe, etc., Tour Gt. Brit. (1769), II. 287. On the Churn … stands Cirencester (or Cicester, for Brevity).
1811. Syd. Smith, Wks. (1867), I. 208. Brevity is in writing what charity is to all other virtues.
3. Shortness in other relations. rare and forced.
1597. Shaks., 2 Hen. IV., II. ii. 135. I will imitate the honourable Romaines in breuitie. Poin. Sure he meanes breuity in breath: short-winded.
1863. Riddles (Routledge). Why is wit like a Chinese lady’s foot? Because brevity is the sole of it.
