1. harden - Noun
2. harden - Verb
3. Harden - Proper noun
To make hard or harder; to make firm or compact; to indurate; as, to harden clay or iron.
To accustom by labor or suffering to endure with constancy; to strengthen; to stiffen; to inure; also, to confirm in wickedness or shame; to make unimpressionable.
To become hard or harder; to acquire solidity, or more compactness; as, mortar hardens by drying.
To become confirmed or strengthened, in either a good or a bad sense.
Source: Webster's dictionaryWar makes men barbarous because, to take part in it, one must harden oneself against all regret, all appreciation of delicacy and sensitive values. One must live as if those values did not exist, and when the war is over one has lost the resilience to return to those values. Cesare Pavese
Things can harden meaningfully in the moment of indecision. John Ashbery
I never wanted to be away from the family. Intuitively, I knew how easily distances could harden and become permanent. Junot Diaz
From the time the Englishman's bones harden into bones at all, he makes his skeleton a flagstaff, and he early plants his feet like one who is to walk the world and the decks of all the seas. Willa Cather
Soft words butter no parsnips, but they won't harden the heart of the cabbage either. Irish Proverb
A difficult journey will make you daring and harden your will. African Proverb