Definition of "neutrality"

And what happineſs is there in a ſtorm of paſſions? On this account the Scepticks affected an indifferent æquipondious neutrality as the only means to their Ataraxia, and freedom from paßionate diſturbances.

1665, Joseph Glanvill, chapter XXVII, in Scepsis Scientifica: Or, Confest Ignorance, the Way to Science; in an Essay of the Vanity of Dogmatizing, and Confident Opinion with a Reply to the Exceptions of the Learned Thomas Albius‎, London: E. Cotes, page 168

Men who possess a state of neutrality in times of public danger, desert the interest of their fellow subjects.

1709, Joseph Addison, The Tatler

The official pretence of a scrupulous solicitude to maintain neutrality is flagrantly insincere.

1856 June 14, “England and America”, in The Saturday Review of Politics, Literature, Science, and Art, volume 2, number 33, London: John W. Parker and Son, page 141

There is no health; physicians say that we At best enjoy but a neutrality.

1611, John Donne, An Anatomy of the World