  We provide a new characterization of enriched accessible categories by
introducing the two new notions of virtual reflectivity and virtual
orthogonality as a generalization of the usual reflectivity and orthogonality
conditions for locally presentable categories. The word virtual refers to the
fact that the reflectivity and orthogonality conditions are given in the free
completion of the $\mathcal V$-category involved under small limits, instead of
the $\mathcal V$-category itself. In this way we hope to provide a clearer
understanding of the theory as well as a useful way of recognizing accessible
$\mathcal V$-categories. In the last section we prove that the 2-category of
accessible $\mathcal V$-categories, accessible $\mathcal V$-functors, and
$\mathcal V$-natural transformations has all flexible limits.
