imprudence

plural imprudences

1. uncountableusuallyThe quality or state of being imprudent; lack of prudence, caution, discretion or circumspection.

   [Hamilton were to have said:] nothing but a permanent body can check the imprudence of democracy.

   1861, Jonathan Elliot, Debates of State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution, vol. I, page 422

2. countableusuallyAn imprudent act.

   This man finally fell a victim to his diplomacies, perhaps also to his imprudences.

   1903, S.C. Hill, Three Frenchmen in Bengal

   4 more examples

   Ah: my dear—Madam there is the great mistake—'tis this very conscious Innocence that is of the greatest Prejudice to you—what is it makes you negligent of Forms and careless of the world's opinion—why the consciousness of your Innocence—what makes you thoughtless in your Conduct and apt to run into a thousand little imprudences—

   1777, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, The School for Scandal, IV.iii

   At about the age of twenty-three, to crown his other imprudences, he married, without improving his reduced circumstances thereby.

   1753, Theophilus Cibber, The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753)

   Yes, for six months he threw all his medicines in the fire, and designedly committed all sorts of imprudences.

   1891, Francois Coppee, Ten Tales

   He [Timothy Forsyte] had never committed the imprudence of marrying or encumbering himself in any way with children.

   1906 – 1921, John Galsworthy, “Encounter”, in The Forsyte Saga, volume 1