velleitary

comparative more velleitary · superlative most velleitary

1. Slow in taking action; lacking resolve.

   The Preface of the S.T. being vindicated from the exceptions of Mr. T. wherein his skirmiſhings have been manifeſted to be velitary, and weak indeed.

   1668, Robert Brown, Jerubbaal, Or, A Vindication of The Sober Testimony Against Sinful Complyance

   2 more examples

   And these kisses, […] it was Mrs. Gorman's invariable habit to catch up, as it were, upon her own lips, and return, with tranquil civility, as one picks up a glove, or newspaper, let fall in some public place, and restores it with a smile, if not a bow, to its rightful proprietor. So that each kiss was in reality two kisses, first Watt's kiss, velleitary, anxious, and then Mrs. Gorman's, unctious and urbane.

   1953, Samuel Beckett, Watt, [Paris]: Olympia Press, →OCLC

   The women, who are frequently, if not universally, complicitous with Mona, are also shown to be velleitary and unwilling to break with convention as she has done: "I'd have liked to be free," says one, dreamily; and another: "When you're married, you're caught for life".

   1999, Ross Chambers, Loiterature