Emily Dickinson Lexicon

STRICT'NESS, n.

1. Closeness; tightness; opposed to laxity.
2. Exactness in the observance of rules, laws, rites and the like; rigorous accuracy; nice regularity or precision. I could not grant too much or distrust too little, to men that pretended singular piety sad religious strictness. – K. Charles.
3. Rigor; severity. These commissioners proceeded with such strictness and severity no did much obscure the king's mercy. – Bacon.