good – English adjective declension

Adjective: good

Comparison Forms

Synthetic

Comparative	better
Superlative	best

Perifrastic

Sample Sentences

good intentions
c. 1525, The Example of Euyll Tongues, page a3 rectoː
Yf ony man wolde begynne his synnes to reny / Or ony good people that fro vyce dyde refrayne / What so euer he were that to vertue wolde applye / But an yll tonge wyll all ouer throwe agayne
If any man would begin to renounce his sins, / Or any good people who refrained from vice, / Whatsoever he who wished to apply himself to virtue might be, / Still an ill tongue would overthrow it all again.
When we are happy, we are always good, but when we are good, we are not always happy. [1891, Oscar Wilde, chapter 6, in The Picture of Dorian Gray, London; New York, N.Y.: Ward Lock & Co., →OCLC:]
a good swimmer
Flatter him it may, I confess, (as those are generally good at flattering who are good for nothing else,) but in the meantime the poor man is left under the fatal necessity of a needless delusion [1704, Robert South, Twelve Sermons Preached on Several Occasions, On the nature and measure of conscience:]
Ivor had acquired more than a mile of fishing rights with the house ; he was not at all a good fisherman, but one must do something ; one generally, however, banged a ball with a squash-racket against a wall. [1922, Michael Arlen, “3/19/2”, in “Piracy”: A Romantic Chronicle of These Days:]
And Marsha says I am a good cook! [2016, VOA Learning English (public domain)]
Can you lend me fifty dollars? You know I'm good for it.
Be good while your mother and I are out.
Were you a good boy for the babysitter?
Would you like a glass of water? — I'm good.
[Are] you good? — Yeah, I'm fine.
Gimme another beer! — I think you're good.
My mother said she's good with me being alone with my date as long as she's met them first.
The soup is rather spicy. Are you good with that, or would you like something else?
Thou art a Traitor, and a Miſcreant;
Too good to be ſo, and too bad to liue,
Since the more faire and chriſtall is the skie,
The vglier ſeeme the cloudes that in it flye: [1595 December 9 (first known performance), William Shakespeare, “The Life and Death of King Richard the Second”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i], page 23, columns 1–2:]
it’s a good watch; the flashlight batteries are still good
1526, Herballː
Against cough and scarceness of breath caused of cold take the drink that it hath been sodden in with Liquorice[,] or that the powder hath been sodden in with dry figs[,] for the same the electuary called dyacalamentum is good[,] and it is made thus.
Plant breeding is always a numbers game.[…]The wild species we use are rich in genetic variation,[…]. In addition, we are looking for rare alleles, so the more plants we try, the better. These rarities may be new mutations, or they can be existing ones that are neutral—or are even selected against—in a wild population. A good example is mutations that disrupt seed dispersal, leaving the seeds on the heads long after they are ripe. [2013 May-June, David Van Tassel, Lee DeHaan, “Wild Plants to the Rescue”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 3:]
a good worker
There was a neat hat-and-umbrella stand, and the stranger's weary feet fell soft on a good, serviceable dark-red drugget, which matched in colour the flock-paper on the walls. [1913, Mrs. [Marie] Belloc Lowndes, chapter II, in The Lodger, London: Methuen, →OCLC; republished in Novels of Mystery: The Lodger; The Story of Ivy; What Really Happened, New York, N.Y.: Longmans, Green and Co., […], [1933], →OCLC, page 0091:]
in good sooth
Love no man in good earnest. [c. 1598–1600 (date written), William Shakespeare, “As You Like It”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii]:]
The food was very good.
Eat a good dinner so you will be ready for the big game tomorrow.
The bread is still good.
This coupon is good for a free doughnut.
This theory still holds good even if much higher temperatures are assumed.
Twinnia biclavata differs from T. nova by inversion IS-1 and a nucleolar shift. Both are good species. [1966, K. Rothfels, Margaret Freeman, “The salivary gland chromosomes of three North American species of Twinnia (Diptera: Simuliidae)”, in Canadian Journal of Zoology, volume 44, number 5, →DOI:]
It is not good to be alone, / to walk here in this worthely wone, / In all this welthly wyn; (It is not good to be alone / to walk here in this noble dwelling-place / in all this rich delight.) [15th c., “[The Creation]”, in Wakefield Mystery Plays; Re-edited in George England, Alfred W. Pollard, editors, The Towneley Plays (Early English Text Society Extra Series; LXXI), London: […] Oxford University Press, 1897, →OCLC, page 6, lines 184–185:]
If all was good and fair we met,
⁠This earth had been the Paradise
⁠It never look’d to human eyes
Since Adam left his garden yet. [1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], “Canto XXIV”, in In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 41:]
Exercise and a varied diet are good for you.
We had a good time.
a good omen; good weather
Not unnaturally, “Auntie” took this communication in bad part.[…]Next day she[…]tried to recover her ward by the hair of the head. Then, thwarted, the wretched creature went to the police for help; she was versed in the law, and perhaps had spared no pains to keep on good terms with the local constabulary. [1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XLIV, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC, page 361:]
a person's good name
a good job
[I]f thou ask me why, / Sufficeth my reaſons are both good and waighty. [c. 1590–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Taming of the Shrew”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i], page 212, column 2:]
The soup is good and hot.
I'm good when you are.
The reports are good to go.
Good Friday, Good Wednesday, the Good Book
all in good time
a good while longer
a good number of seeds
A good part of his day was spent shopping.
It will be a good while longer until he's done.
He's had a good amount of troubles, he has.
The big houses, and there are a good many of them, lie for the most part in what may be called by courtesy the valleys. You catch a glimpse of them sometimes at a little distance from the [railway] line, which seems to have shown some ingenuity in avoiding them,[…]. [1909 September 9, Archibald Marshall [pseudonym; Arthur Hammond Marshall], chapter III, in The Squire’s Daughter, London: Methuen & Co. […], →OCLC:]
This hill will take a good hour and a half to climb.
The car was a good ten miles away.
Athelstan Arundel walked home all the way, foaming and raging. No omnibus, cab, or conveyance ever built could contain a young man in such a rage. His mother lived at Pembridge Square, which is four good measured miles from Lincoln's Inn. [1892, Walter Besant, “Prologue: Who is Edmund Gray?”, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC, page 16:]
No, not that one. That's my good shirt I only wear for special occasions.
Shoot! A tear. And these are my good jeans.

Adjectives inflected like good

good,

Etymology

1. Inherited from Middle English good, from Old English gōd, from Proto-West Germanic *gōd, from Proto-Germanic *gōdaz (“good”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰedʰ- (“to unite, be associated, suit, fit”).
2. Related to gather and together, but not to god/God.
3. Eclipsed non-native Middle English bon, bone, boon, boun (“good”) borrowed from Old French bon (“good”), from Latin bonus (“good”).
4. Cognates
5. Cognate with Scots gude, guid (“good”), Yola gayde, gooude, gude (“good”), North Frisian goud, gud, guid, gur, gödj, gööd (“good”), Saterland Frisian goud (“good”), West Frisian goed (“good”), Alemannic German guet (“good”), Bavarian guad (“good”), Central Franconian gut, jot, jott (“good”), Cimbrian guat, guut (“good”), Dutch goed (“good”), Dutch Low Saxon good (“good”), German gut (“good”), Limburgish good, gott (“good”), Low German god, goot, got, gued (“good”), Luxembourgish gutt (“good”), Mòcheno guat (“good”), Vilamovian güt (“good”), Yiddish גוט (gut, “good”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish god (“good”), Elfdalian guoð (“good”), Faroese and Icelandic góður (“good”), Gothic 𐌲𐍉𐌸𐍃 (gōþs, “good”), Vandalic *guths (“good”); also Albanian nge (“chance, leisure, opportunity, time”), Latvian gods (“honor”), Lithuanian guõdas (“nobleness, virtue; glory, honour”), Belarusian го́дны (hódny, “worthy”), Bulgarian го́ден (góden, “fit, suitable”), Czech hodný (“good, kind”), Polish godny, godzien (“dignified, worthy”), Russian го́дный (gódnyj, “fit, well-suited, good for; (coll.) good”), Ukrainian гі́дний (hídnyj, “deserving, worthy”), го́дний (hódnyj, “fit, well-suited, good for; (coll.) good”). See: Dutch Adjectives 'goed', German Adjectives 'gut', Gothic Adjectives '𐌲𐍉𐌸𐍃', Czech Adjectives 'hodný', Polish Adjectives 'godny'.

Verbs referencing "good"

German Adjectives gut, Finnish Adjectives kut.