Source : Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

Worth \Worth\, a. [OE. worth, wur[thorn], AS. weor[eth], wurE;
   akin to OFries. werth, OS. wer[eth], D. waard, OHG. werd, G.
   wert, werth, Icel. ver[eth]r, Sw. v["a]rd, Dan. v[ae]rd,
   Goth. wa['i]rps, and perhaps to E. wary. Cf. {Stalwart},
   {Ware} an article of merchandise, {Worship}.]
   1. Valuable; of worthy; estimable; also, worth while. [Obs.]

            It was not worth to make it wise.     --Chaucer.

   2. Equal in value to; furnishing an equivalent for; proper to
      be exchanged for.

            A ring he hath of mine worth forty ducats. --Shak.

            All our doings without charity are nothing worth.
                                                  --Bk. of Com.
                                                  Prayer.

            If your arguments produce no conviction, they are
            worth nothing to me.                  --Beattie.

   3. Deserving of; -- in a good or bad sense, but chiefly in a
      good sense.

            To reign is worth ambition, though in hell.
                                                  --Milton.

            This is life indeed, life worth preserving.
                                                  --Addison.

   4. Having possessions equal to; having wealth or estate to
      the value of.

            At Geneva are merchants reckoned worth twenty
            hundred crowns.                       --Addison.

   {Worth while}, or {Worth the while}. See under {While}, n.