Self-restraint; self-command. [1913 Webster]
"He knew what to say; he knew also, when to leave off, -- a continence which is practiced by few writers." [1913 Webster]
The restraint which a person imposes upon his desires and passions; the act or power of refraining from indulgence of the sexual appetite, esp. from unlawful indulgence; sometimes, moderation in sexual indulgence. [1913 Webster]
"If they [the unmarried and widows] have not continency, let them marry." [1913 Webster]

"Chastity is either abstinence or continence: abstinence is that of virgins or widows; continence, that of married persons." [1913 Webster]
Uninterrupted course; continuity. Ayliffe. [1913 Webster]

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THESAURUS

continence

Encratism, Friday, Lenten fare, Platonic love, Pythagoreanism, Pythagorism, Rechabitism, Shakerism, Spartan fare, Stoicism, abnegation, abstainment, abstemiousness, abstention, abstinence, asceticism, avoidance, bachelordom, bachelorhood, bachelorism, bachelorship, banyan day, boundary, bounds, calm, calmness, celibacy, chasteness, chastity, confinement, conservatism, constraint, continency, control, cool, discipline, dispassion, eschewal, evenness, fast, fish day, fruitarianism, gentleness, golden mean, gymnosophy, happy medium, impartiality, intactness, judiciousness, juste-milieu, lenity, limit, limitation, maidenhead, maidenhood, meden agan, middle way, mildness, misogamy, misogyny, moderateness, moderation, moderationism, monachism, monasticism, nephalism, neutrality, nonviolence, nothing in excess, pacifism, plain living, prescription, proscription, prudence, purity, qualification, refraining, refrainment, repose, restrain, restraint, restriction, self-abnegation, self-control, self-denial, self-restraint, serenity, sexual abstinence, simple diet, single blessedness, single state, singleness, sobriety, spare diet, spinsterhood, stability, steadiness, teetotalism, temperance, temperateness, the pledge, total abstinence, tranquillity, unexcessiveness, unextravagance, unextremeness, unwed state, vegetarianism, via media, virgin state, virginity

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ROGET THESAURUS

continence

Purity

N purity, decency, decorum, delicacy, continence, chastity, honesty, virtue, modesty, shame, pudicity, pucelage, virginity, vestal, virgin, Joseph, Hippolytus, Lucretia, Diana, prude, pure, undefiled, modest, delicate, decent, decorous, virginibus puerisque, simon-pure, chaste, continent, virtuous, honest, Platonic, virgin, unsullied, cherry, as chaste as unsunn'd snow, a soul as white as heaven, 'tis Chastity, my brother, Chastity, to the pure all things are pure.

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