selfly

selfly

English

Etymology

From Middle English selfly, from Old English selflīċ (“automatic, spontaneous, voluntary”); equivalent to self +‎ -ly.

Adjective

selfly (comparative more selfly, superlative most selfly)

1. Of or pertaining to self or one's own self, personal.
   • 2001, Jed Rasula, Steve McCaffery, Imagining Language: An Anthology:

     This denotes and declares the divided tongues, where every property had brought itself forth out of the universal sensual tongue into a selishness and a peculiar selfly understanding, so that they did not any longer understand one another […]

Adverb

selfly (not comparable)

1. In, of, or by one's self; of one's own accord, voluntary, automatic.
   • 1880, Josuah Sylvester, The complete works of Joshuah Sylvester:

     Thy gloomy Front, that selfly hath no light