hair shirt

Noun

hairshirt (plural hairshirts)

1. A shirt made of haircloth; especially one worn by ascetics or the penitent.
   • He is practically a total abstainer and I can affirm that he sleeps on a straw litter and eats the most Spartan food, cold dried grocer’s peas. He wears a hairshirt winter and summer and scourges himself every Saturday.1922 February 2, James Joyce, “[Episode 15: Circe]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company […], →OCLC, part II [Odyssey], page 466

   Synonyms:

   cilice, horsehair shirt, sackcloth

2. (figuratively) A state of penitence and humility.
   • And when he went on to say, “The curse must be within ourselves,” Muir bequeathed us a hairshirt: the guilty conscience that plagues so many of us when we see what we are doing to the rest of nature.1981 June 21, Joseph Kastner, “Whole Earth Controversy”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, page 71

See all 3 meanings of hairshirt