Usage examples "effete":
- They could not tolerate this union of the church with a pagan state and an effete civilization. - "A Short History of Monks and Monasteries", Alfred Wesley Wishart.
- To- day you see them bouncing, buxom, red as cherries, and round as apples; to- morrow they exhibit themselves effete as dead weeds, blanched and broken down. - "Shirley", Charlotte Brontë.
- Hence the cause of the triumph of Democracy over effete Autocracy. - "Temporal Power", Marie Corelli.