Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The quality or condition of being contrary.
  • noun Something that is contrary.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The state or quality of being contrary; extreme opposition; the relation of the greatest unlikeness within the same class.
  • noun Something contrary to or extremely unlike another; a contrary.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The state or quality of being contrary; opposition; repugnance; disagreement; antagonism.
  • noun Something which is contrary to, or inconsistent with, something else; an inconsistency.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Opposition or contrariness; cross-purposes, marked contrast.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the relation between contraries

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle French contrariété, from Late Latin contrarietas, from contrarius, from contra ("against"). Compare contrary.

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Examples

  • Another partial of oral which Cleopatra never struggled with a dignified question, in contrariety to Antony, a some-more substantial figure.

    Archive 2009-11-01 admin 2009

  • Another partial of oral which Cleopatra never struggled with a dignified question, in contrariety to Antony, a some-more substantial figure.

    Philadelphia Reflections: Shakspere Society of Philadelphia admin 2009

  • "has no substantial being, but is an acting in contrariety to the being formed in us" [Theophylact].

    Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible 1871

  • They are dim with bloodlust, blind with hate and mired in contrariety.

    How Do Y0u Solve A Problem Like Sharia Newmania 2008

  • Divine providence does not determine a free will to one part of a contradiction or contrariety, that is, by a determination preceding the actual volition itself; under other circumstances the concurrence of the very volition with the will is the concomitant cause, and thus determines the will with the volition itself, by an act which is not previous but simultaneous, as the schoolmen express themselves.

    The Works of James Arminius, Vol. 2 1560-1609 1956

  • But this is the most genuinely gracious fear of sin, when we dread the defilement of it, and that contrariety which is in it to the holiness of God.

    Pneumatologia 1616-1683 1967

  • Why assume "contrariety" and "disorder" in a kosmos which seems to have had no experience of either?

    Inspiration and Interpretation: Seven Sermons Preached Before the University of Oxford: With Preliminary Remarks: Being an Answer to a Volume Entitled "Essays and Reviews." 1813-1888 1861

  • Concerning the contrariety that arises from carnal corruption, it is expressed in the scripture by the greatest that can be, namely, that contrariety which is between enemies; yea, and such an one as breaks out into an open war: I have a law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and leading me captive into the law of sin, Rom. vii.

    Sermons Preached Upon Several Occasions. Vol. VI. 1634-1716 1823

  • By this means there arises a kind of contrariety in our method of thinking, from the different points of view, in which we survey the object, and from the nearness or remoteness of those instants of time, which we compare together.

    A Treatise of Human Nature David Hume 1743

  • By this means there arises a kind of contrariety in our method of thinking, from the different points of view, in which we survey the object, and from the nearness or remoteness of those instants of time, which we compare together.

    A treatise of human nature 1739

Comments

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  • Bahaha, WeirdNet!

    August 29, 2009

  • "MENENIUS: This is unlikely:

    He and Aufidius can no more atone

    Than violentest contrariety."

    - William Shakespeare, 'The Tragedy of Coriolanus'.

    August 29, 2009