wishfulnesses

Noun

wishfulness (usually uncountable, plural wishfulnesses)

1. (usually) The state or quality of being wishful.
   • She asked her little question with something of the softness of her old manner, with something of the longing loving wishfulness which used to make so many of her questions sweet to her mother’s ears.1863, Anthony Trollope, chapter 8, in Rachel Ray, volume 2, London: Chapman & Hall, page 170
2. (usually) Wishful thinking.
   • For the long lost glories, that never in fact existed save in the wishfulness of their brains, were being remembered with a reality as vivid, if not more so, as truth itself.1950, Mervyn Peake, chapter 36, in Gormenghast, Penguin, published 1969, page 228