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Individuality   /ɪndˌɪvɪdʒuˈælɪti/   Listen
Individuality

noun
(pl. individualities)
1.
The quality of being individual.  Synonyms: individualism, individuation.
2.
The distinct personality of an individual regarded as a persisting entity.  Synonyms: identity, personal identity.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Individuality" Quotes from Famous Books



... (outside the tiny band of gentlemen-rankers). What cruel awful publicity of existence—that was the worst of all. Oh, for a private room and a private coat, and a meal in solitude! Some place of one's own, where one could express one's own individuality in the choice and arrangement of property, and impress it ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren

... pressure, moreover, in the long tube, the absorption was 25.7 per cent.; while for 7 inches in the short tube it was 25.6 per cent. of the total beam. Thus closely do the absorptions in the two cases run together—thus emphatically do the molecules assert their individuality. As long as their number is unaltered, their action on radiant heat is unchanged. Passing from the lime light to the incandescent spiral, the absorptions of the smaller equivalent quantities, in the two tubes, were 23.5 and 23.4 per cent.; while the absorptions of the larger ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 365, December 30, 1882 • Various

... little with any possible measure of reward or punishment in some supposed court of the hereafter. Nevertheless, psychic investigation always interested him, and he was good-naturedly willing to explore, even hoping, perhaps, to be convinced that individuality continues beyond death. The letter which follows indicates his customary attitude in relation to spiritualistic research. The experiments here mentioned, ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... such actual thing as individuality, if the feeling we call by that name be naught but the transient illusion the Buddhists would have us believe it, any faith founded upon it as basis vanishes as does the picture in a revolving kaleidoscope,—less ...
— The Soul of the Far East • Percival Lowell

... conclusion from the work of Paul Laurence Dunbar and the younger writers of the day, we should say that the genius of the race is subjective and romantic rather than objective and classic. In poetry, least of all arts, does the Negro conceal his individuality. This is his great gift, but also in another way the spur to further achievement. The race should in course of time produce many brilliant lyric poets. Dunbar was a lyric poet; so was Pushkin. The drama and the epic obviously ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 • Various

... 27th of August I took leave of Newport and its pleasant atmosphere and sociable visitors; and certainly think that it would be difficult to select a place better adapted for a summer's residence, were there any means of conserving one's individuality a little: the ...
— Impressions of America - During The Years 1833, 1834, and 1835. In Two Volumes, Volume II. • Tyrone Power

... had been wrong in grafting his own strong individuality on an entirely foreign trunk—he had not been careful enough to harmonise the two styles—it was merely an odd coincidence that the reviewer, struck naturally enough by the disparity, should have pitched ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey

... considered that the most trifling variation in the facts of the two cases might give rise to the most important miscalculations, by diverting thoroughly the two courses of events; very much as, in arithmetic, an error which, in its own individuality, may be inappreciable, produces, at length, by dint of multiplication at all points of the process, a result enormously at variance with truth. And, in regard to the former branch, we must not fail to hold in ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 1 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe

... for visitors are quite the best things of their kind in all England, in spite of the fact that the attractions, the teas, the concerts, and the lectures—to say nothing of drinking and bathing in the waters—lack individuality. ...
— The Automobilist Abroad • M. F. (Milburg Francisco) Mansfield

... Leete replied; "but the inner imperium is one from which you will admit there is not likely to be much danger to the nation. The lack of some such recognition of the distinct individuality of the sexes was one of the innumerable defects of your society. The passional attraction between men and women has too often prevented a perception of the profound differences which make the members of each sex in many things ...
— Looking Backward - 2000-1887 • Edward Bellamy

... as they grew older, fortunately showed signs of some individuality of disposition. Edith, the second girl, clung to her aunt Julia; Eric, the son, clung frantically to polo; while Rose, the elder daughter, appeared to cling mainly to herself. Collectively, of course, they clung to their father, whose attitude in the family ...
— The Chaperon • Henry James

... hand! Curiously enough this transcription, difficult as it is, does not tax the fingers as much as a bedevilment of the A minor, op. 25, No. 4, which is extremely difficult, demanding color discrimination and individuality ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker

... of the United States of America." And finally, in the articles of confederation, the style of the confederacy is declared to be "the United States of America." It was with reference to the old articles of confederation, and to preserve the identity and established individuality of their character, that the preamble to this Constitution, not content, simply, with declaring that it is "we the people of the United States," who enter into this compact, adds that it is for "the United States of America." Concerning the territory contemplated ...
— American Eloquence, Volume I. (of 4) - Studies In American Political History (1896) • Various

... jealousy seem to be in the very nature of the former and are absolutely incompatible with the latter. The former is the intensest realisation of which our individualities are capable; the latter is the way of escape from the limitations of individuality. It may be true that a few men and more women do achieve the completest unselfishness and self-abandonment in earthly love. So the poets and romancers tell us. If so, it is that by an imaginative perversion they ...
— God The Invisible King • Herbert George Wells

... grave visible. The little mound, under which lay what was once such a touching image of innocence, beauty, and feeling, had sunk down to the level of the earth about it. He regretted this, inasmuch as it took away, he thought, part of her individuality. Still he knew it was the spot wherein she had been buried, and with much of that vivid feeling, and strong figurative language, inseparable from the habits of thought and language of the old Irish families, he delivered the mother's message ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton

... combine the solidarity of the group with the full expression of its members' individualities. To be effective the Church must work as a compactly ordered whole. Individuals must surrender personal preferences in order that the Church may have collective force. Teamwork often demands the suppression of individuality. There will have to be sufficient authority lodged in those who exercise oversight to enable them to lead the Christian forces and administer their resources. But we dare not curtail the freedom of conscience, ...
— Some Christian Convictions - A Practical Restatement in Terms of Present-Day Thinking • Henry Sloane Coffin

... superstitions of the vulgar." The Bible, perhaps, excels all other books in this sort of description. "Shakspeare was an exact surveyor of the inanimate world." The Bible is full of similar sketches. An excellence of Shakspeare is the individuality of his characters. "They are real beings of flesh and blood," the critics tell us; "they speak like men, not like authors." How truly this applies to the persons mentioned in sacred writ! Goethe has compared the characters of Shakspeare to "watches with crystalline cases and plates, which, while ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IV, No. 22, Aug., 1859 • Various

... which the car was grinding its way, had a freakish individuality in sidewalks. Each builder had had his own idea of what the proper street level should be, and had laid his sidewalk accordingly. There were at least six different levels in this one block. The ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... typical and the ideal in the human face and figure. Not so in Egypt. Here the task of the artist was to make a counterfeit presentment of his subject and he has achieved his task at times with marvelous skill. Especially the heads of the best statues have an individuality and lifelikeness which have hardly been surpassed in any age. But let not our admiration blind us to the limitations of Egyptian art. The sculptor never attains to freedom in the posing of his figures. Whether the subject sits, stands, kneels, or squats, the body and ...
— A History Of Greek Art • F. B. Tarbell

... Greek Dress.—Greek Costume, then, is something fully sharing in the national characteristics of harmony, simplicity, individuality. It is easy to see how admirably this style of dress is adapted to furnish over ready models and inspiration for the sculptor.[*] Unconventional in its arrangement, it is also unconventional in its color. ...
— A Day In Old Athens • William Stearns Davis

... Mannering assented. "You may find it hard to understand, but here is the truth. I have lost all taste for public life. The whole thing is rotten, Borrowdean, rotten from beginning to end. I have had enough of it to last me all my days. Party policy must come before principle. A man's individuality, his whole character, is assailed and suborned on every side. There is but one life, one measure of days, that you or I know anything of. It doesn't last very long. The months and years have a knack of slipping away emptily enough ...
— A Lost Leader • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... of praise or exaltation was thus revealed at a comparatively early stage of his career, and in connection with the first deeds that made him famous. The incident just described shows that his way of asserting his individuality was not always unattended with unkindness to those who were nearest and dearest to him. His distrust of his own temper, and of his capacity to speak and act conventionally, urged him towards a solitary life; ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume I • Demetrius Charles Boulger

... involves the enslavement of individuals. Freedom is that phase of the social ideal which emphasizes individuality.—All mankind acknowledges kindness as the law of right intercourse within a social group.—The ideal of service goes with the sense of unity.—A likeness of spirit and principle is essential to moral unity. The creation ...
— The Family and it's Members • Anna Garlin Spencer

... difference may be observed in this respect as among that number of cows in regard to the milk they yield. I have in my mind now a "sugar-bush" nestled in the lap of a spur of the Catskills, every tree of which is known to me, and assumes a distinct individuality in my thought. I know the look and quality of the whole two hundred; and when on my annual visit to the old homestead I find one has perished, or fallen before the axe, I feel a personal loss. They are all veterans, and have yielded up their life's blood for the profit of two or three ...
— Winter Sunshine • John Burroughs

... manner. The sadness in her dark eyes gave her a new dignity, and though a few girls might pass ill-natured remarks about her clothes, her general prestige in the school remained the same. There was an individuality about Gipsy which marked her out, and raised her above the ordinary level. She was full of original ideas, and had a persuasive way of stating her views that invariably won her a following. The girls were becoming accustomed to consult ...
— The Leader of the Lower School - A Tale of School Life • Angela Brazil

... in the glaring splendor; and everything that was ugly seemed ten times uglier, and everything was either handsome or ugly. There was no soft blending, or kind obscurity, or elusive mistiness in that searching glitter. The only things that held their own individuality were the firs—for the fir is the tree of mystery and shadow, and yields never to the encroachments ...
— Anne's House of Dreams • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... been suggested by Mrs. Catt that this conference should consider issuing a Declaration of Principles, expressing briefly the demand for independence and individuality which women are making today. Mrs. Fenwick Miller warmly supported the suggestion and a committee of three was appointed to draw it up—Mrs. Avery, Mrs. Evald and Miss Fensham. As finally submitted, discussed and accepted it formed the platform of the international organization and was adopted ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI • Various

... inexhaustible in details of manners and customs, a word-painter like Tacitus; the author of a language of his own, lacking in accuracy, system, and art, yet an admirable writer." Leon Vallee reinforces this by saying: "Saint-Simon can not be compared to any of his contemporaries. He has an individuality, a style, and a language solely his own.... Language he treated like an abject slave. When he had gone to its farthest limit, when it failed to express his ideas or feelings, he forced it—the result was a new term, or a change in the ordinary meaning ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon

... was evidently some years before; for there was far more careful minuteness of detail, and less of that freshness of colouring and freedom of handling that delighted and surprised me in them. Nevertheless, I surveyed it with considerable interest. There was a certain individuality in the features and expression that stamped it, at once, a successful likeness. The bright blue eyes regarded the spectator with a kind of lurking drollery—you almost expected to see them wink; the ...
— The Tenant of Wildfell Hall • Anne Bronte

... compositions entitle him to high rank among his contemporaries. As a madrigalist he was inferior to Morley, Wilbye and Gibbons, though even in this branch of his art he often displays great charm and individuality. ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various

... popularity was an indiction, this had become suddenly true. For the poetess's third contribution, without changing its strong local color and individuality, had been an unexpected outburst of human passion—a love-song, that touched those to whom the subtler meditative graces of the poetess had been unknown. Many people had listened to this impassioned but despairing cry from some remote and charmed ...
— A Sappho of Green Springs • Bret Harte

... of some abilities who had been doomed to much disappointment and suffered from many sorrows. Doubtless his talents had not proved to be of a nature to advance him in the world. Probably, indeed—and here Morris's hazard was correct—he was a scholar and a bookworm without individuality, to whom fate had assigned minor positions in a profession, which, however sincere his faith, he ...
— Stella Fregelius • H. Rider Haggard

... as the culmination of a series of virtues. What the world needs and what individuals need is a higher standard of living, a great realizing sense of the privilege and dignity of life, a higher and nobler conception of individuality. ...
— The Majesty of Calmness • William George Jordan

... suddenly where he was when the speaker had laughed. Of the many personal attributes of man, some may become slurred out of all character, disguised and levelled down among the herd, blurred with time, robbed of individuality. Faces may be so lost and blurred, almost beyond the recognition of those who have loved them. But who ever forgot a friend's laugh, or lost the character of his own? If Ulysses had laughed when he came back to Ithaca, his dog would ...
— The Lee Shore • Rose Macaulay

... only whiter than before. But the life of life was, of course, out-doors. There was a barn containing a hay-mow and a large hen-coop, soon populous with hens and chickens, with an heroic snow-white rooster to keep them in order. Hens are the most audacious and presuming of pets, and they have strong individuality. ...
— Hawthorne and His Circle • Julian Hawthorne

... paradox is, 'Yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.' The Christian life is a life in which an indwelling Christ casts out, and therefore quickens, self. We gain ourselves when we lose ourselves. His abiding in us does not destroy but heightens our individuality. We then most truly live when we can say, 'Not I, but Christ liveth in me'; the soul of my soul ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... life-long habit of never calling in question the behavior of those I came in contact with, and of never expecting any thing different from that I received, I might have wondered over his visit. Every person's individuality was sacred to me, from the fact, perhaps, that my own individuality had never been respected by any person with whom I had any relation—not ...
— Lemorne Versus Huell • Elizabeth Drew Stoddard

... lies the kingdom of Corea, separated by a river from the former, by a strait of the ocean from the latter, claimed as a vassal state by both, yet preserving its individuality as a state against the pair. It has often been invaded by China, but never conquered. It has twice been invaded by Japan, as described in preceding tales, and made tributary, but not conquered. ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 12 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... a palace or two and thought how interesting it must have been to be rich in the days of "Sir Horatio Palavasene, who robbed the Pope to pay the Queen." Wealth had its individuality in those days, and expressed itself with truth and splendour in sculpture, and picture, and tapestry, and precious things, with the picturesqueness of contrast and homage. As the Senator said, a banquet hall did not then suggest a Fifth Avenue hairdresser's ...
— A Voyage of Consolation - (being in the nature of a sequel to the experiences of 'An - American girl in London') • Sara Jeannette Duncan

... nourish his life, less divine than that offered by other souls; nowhere but in other lives can he breathe. Only by the reflex of other lives can he ripen his specialty, develop the idea of himself, the individuality that distinguishes him from every other. Were all men alike, each would still have an individuality, secured by his personal consciousness, but there would be small reason why there should be more than two or three ...
— Lilith • George MacDonald

... easy to read as a page in dear handwriting! The mind of Madame Bernard, a worldly, trumpery, poor mind, but harmless enough, was readily to be discerned in her features which were at once refined and commonplace. How little there was of reflection, of decision, of exercise of will, in short of individuality, behind the poetic grace of the one and the pretty affectations of the other! What a face, on the contrary, was that of my stepfather, with its strong individuality, and its vivid expression! In this man of ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne

... been brought into being owing to blundering misreading. For instance, there are many saints in the Roman calendar whose individuality it would not be easy to prove. All know how St. Veronica came into being, and equally well known is the origin of St. Ursula and her eleven thousand virgins. In this case, through the misreading of her name, the unfortunate virgin martyr ...
— Literary Blunders • Henry B. Wheatley

... pointed out that there is an eighth sense; and yet the sense of property is more valuable and more detestable than all the others in combination. The person who owns something is civilised. It is man's escape from wolf and monkeydom. It is individuality at last, or the promise of it, while those other ownerless people must remain either beasts of prey or beasts of burden, grinning with ineffective teeth, or bowing stupid heads for their masters' loads, and all begging humbly for last straws ...
— Here are Ladies • James Stephens

... the slave kept his individuality, and outwardly there was no distinction in color and clothing; there was very little sound barrier between the slave and the freeman. The slave attended the same games as the freeman, participated in the affairs of the municipality, and attended the same college. The ancients kept the bodies ...
— The Necessity of Atheism • Dr. D.M. Brooks

... which justifies itself in the day of trial. She divides her charming chronicle into three parts—Peace, The Vortex, and Victory. The first deals with the childhood of the happy brood of Anthony and Frances, delicate studies subtly differentiated. Even the little cats have their astonishing individuality, and I don't envy anyone who can read of Jerry's death and Nicky's grief without a gulp. The Vortex is—no, not the War; that comes later—but the trials of a world which tests adolescence, a world of suffrage rebellions, of Futuristic art and morals. Then the real vortex of the War, the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 153, Dec. 5, 1917 • Various

... as under graver faults, lies very commonly an overestimate of our special individuality, as distinguished from our generic humanity. It is just here that the very highest society asserts its superior breeding. Among truly elegant people of the highest ton, you will find more real ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 20, June, 1859 • Various

... address and unabashed effrontery. If I had my way I would put half the little mannikins and pattern dolls of our latter day nurseries into a big corn-popper and see if I couldn't evolve something sweeter and more wholesome out of the hard, round, compact little kernels of their present individuality. I would utterly do away with children's parties and "butterfly balls" and kirmess dissipations. There should be a new deal of bread and milk all around. Every boy in the land should go to bed at sundown, and every girl should wear a sunbonnet. There should be no carrying of canes, ...
— A String of Amber Beads • Martha Everts Holden

... of expression is correct—Ruskin or Millet? Are there any laws which govern, or is it a matter of taste, fancy, or feeling? Is it a matter of individuality? If so, which individual by his methods tells us the most truths? Let us endeavor ...
— Outdoor Sketching - Four Talks Given before the Art Institute of Chicago; The Scammon Lectures, 1914 • Francis Hopkinson Smith

... individuality of that Bull came in the way. Had not they visited him together only the other day? He struck confusion into memory and oblivion alike. The face Gwen saw, when the letter that hid it fell on the coverlid, was almost terrified. "Oh, see the things I say!" cried old Maisie, ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan

... emergence of Jesus from the baptismal grave demonstrate the distinct individuality of the three Personages of the Godhead. On that solemn occasion Jesus the Son was present in the flesh; the presence of the Holy Ghost was manifest through the accompanying sign of the dove, and the voice of the Eternal Father was heard from heaven. Had we no other evidence of the separate ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage

... are peculiarly fitted to the sprightly, joyous character of the dance; which is more than can be said for any of the modern substitutes. When these are used, the Lancers, in our opinion, loses its individuality and spirit, becoming almost like a common quadrille. We should be heartily glad to see the old tunes restored once for all ...
— Routledge's Manual of Etiquette • George Routledge

... marriage, that his enormous power over her would outweigh any sentimental obstacles which she might set up—inward objections that, without his presence and firmness, might prove too much for her acquiescence. Doubtless he foresaw, too, the advantage of getting her into the house before making the individuality of her husband ...
— The Romantic Adventures of a Milkmaid • Thomas Hardy

... bright-eyed little Brahman wife chatted away, as gay as a bird. The fount of knowledge was opened to her—the beaming eye, the elastic figure, and the individuality of her Western sisters were becoming hers. But none of ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various

... improved, and that Swedenborg has not deceived me. He relates, namely, with great confidence, that we shall peacefully carry on our old occupations in the other world, just as we have done in this; that we shall there preserve our individuality unaltered, and that death will produce no particular change in our organic development. Swedenborg is a thoroughly honorable fellow, and quite worthy of credit in what he tells us about the other world, where he saw with his own eyes the persons who had played ...
— The Essays of "George Eliot" - Complete • George Eliot

... demonstrates convincingly that true nationalism is not incompatible with the final realization of the ideal of the universal brotherhood of men. National devotion is but a higher aspect of devotion to family. In nature we see that, in the measure in which the individuality of a being is distinct, its superiority and its independence are increased. Differentiation is the law of progress. Why not apply the law to human ...
— The Renascence of Hebrew Literature (1743-1885) • Nahum Slouschz

... The individuality of each of the several groups was evident by titles or medallions of a decorative character, which also included a subtitle and index, arranged with as many particulars and in as methodical manner as possible, of all exhibitors, in ...
— Final Report of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission • Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission

... the fear of the god of the tribe, the overpowering influence of custom and the unswerving directness of the punishment of the man who violates it tend to prevent the development of individuality and of independent thinking; and the normal attitude of practically every person is to obey the customs and the laws, although often those laws leave to the individual a range of action not found in later civilized states. But as the sense of right and justice and the desire to promote the public ...
— The Making of a Nation - The Beginnings of Israel's History • Charles Foster Kent and Jeremiah Whipple Jenks

... that she had grown all at once in strength and individuality till there was nothing for him to do but to submit. This was an illusion, no doubt; she was just what she had always been, and what he had always judged her, a gifted young woman, rather inclined to flirt and easily guided in any direction, ...
— Fair Margaret - A Portrait • Francis Marion Crawford

... note, in passing, the strangely singular fact of a departed soul declaring that death is always the cessation of individuality! ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 19, June, 1891 • Various

... the man or woman as he or she really is; secondly, there is the much superior individual as assessed personally; thirdly, and perhaps the most important in the general scheme of things, there is the same individuality as viewed by others. For an instant, the somewhat idealized figure which John Menzies Grant offered to a pretty and intelligent but inexperienced girl was in danger of losing its impressiveness. But, since Grant was not only a good fellow but a gentleman, ...
— The Postmaster's Daughter • Louis Tracy

... attitude of free inquiry, its tendency to emphasize individual life and thought, and its break with the traditions of the past, whether in literature or in religion. The Reformation did not, however, bring the principle of individuality to full maturity; and it retained many of the old institutional methods, as well as a large degree of their social motive. The Reformed churches were often as autocratic as the Catholic Church had been, and as little inclined to approve of individual departures ...
— Unitarianism in America • George Willis Cooke

... content to remain without preferment and only a proportion of his pay for over five years on the frontier. He had hoped to find the fellow adaptable, but this long-limbed, slow-spoken gentleman was not altogether so transparent an individuality as Selpdorf had led ...
— A Modern Mercenary • Kate Prichard and Hesketh Vernon Hesketh-Prichard

... leaves the author's hands for those of the public, is a thing which, I suppose, must come to one who produces a work of the imagination. It is no doubt due to the fact that every piece of art which has individuality and real likeness to the scenes and character it is intended to depict is done in a kind of trance. The author, in effect, self-hypnotises himself, has created an atmosphere which is separate and apart from that of ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... this time he would sooner have parted with any other possession. It was a round affair, about three feet in diameter, had a high back, was painted green on the outside and white within. Here its resemblance to ordinary bath-tubs ended, and its individuality became apparent. To begin with, it was built with double sides about three inches apart, and the space thus formed was divided by metallic partitions into many compartments, of different sizes, all ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore

... largely upon individual capacity; but this general distinction may be made between promotion in clerical work and in administrative work; in the clerical field it tends to be automatic but limited; in administrative work it comes more often through a worker's initiative or individuality than through automatic progression and it has ...
— Wage Earning and Education • R. R. Lutz

... reaction from tenderness. All at once, without transition, he detested her. But only for a moment. He remembered that she was pretty, and, more, that she had a special grace in the intimacy of life. She had the secret of individuality which ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad

... sprinkling of nutmeg strewn over all. As we touched our glasses together, my legendary friend made himself known to me as Mr. Bela Tiffany, and I rejoiced at the oddity of the name, because it gave his image and character a sort of individuality in my conception. The old gentleman's draught acted as a solvent upon his memory, so that it overflowed with tales, traditions, anecdotes of famous dead people and traits of ancient manners, some of which were childish as a nurse's lullaby, while others ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... his commanding officer. In the furnace in which his flesh may be consumed he looks about him, and next morning he writes, 'Well, it was interesting.' And he adds, 'what I had kept about me of my own individuality was a certain visual perceptiveness that caused me to register the setting of things—a setting that dramatised itself as artistically as in any stage-management. During all these minutes I never relaxed in my resolve to see how it was.' He then, too, became ...
— Letters of a Soldier - 1914-1915 • Anonymous

... bolder and yet a more capable man never stood over the table. He was not an imaginative man. He did not possess, and hence had no tolerance for, emotion. His nature was accurate, precise, scientific. Men were to him no more than pawns, without individuality or personal value. But as cases it was different. The more broken a man was, the more precarious his grip on life, the greater his significance in the eyes of Doctor Bicknell. He would as readily forsake a poet laureate suffering from a common accident for a nameless, mangled vagrant who defied ...
— When God Laughs and Other Stories • Jack London

... Village Stories' and 'On the Heights' stands out in honorable individuality among modern German novelists, even if the latest fashions in fiction make his work already a little antiquated. Auerbach's biography is one of industry rather than of incident. His birth was humble. His life was long. ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner

... trance simply because there's not enough left in him to constitute an individuality. The germ has taken the inside clean out of him. He's just an ...
— The Blue Germ • Martin Swayne

... twice that of the tower, and this hugeness is perhaps out of proportion with the rest of the building; yet I do not think for a moment that this great spire could have been different without robbing the church of its striking and pleasing individuality. There are Transitional Norman arches at the east end of the nave, but most of the work is Decorated or Perpendicular. The windows of the latter period in the south transept are singularly happy in the wonderful amount of light they allow to flood through their pale ...
— Yorkshire Painted And Described • Gordon Home

... the fence until the retreating sheep lost their individuality as blatting animals, ambling erratically here and there, while they moved toward the brow of the hill, and merged into a great, gray blotch against the faint green of the new grass—a blotch from which rose again that vibrant, sing-song humming of many voices mingled. Then ...
— Flying U Ranch • B. M. Bower

... blood, from the rest of the community, they were never confounded with the other tribes and nations who were incorporated into the great Peruvian monarchy. After the lapse of centuries, they still retained their individuality as a peculiar people. They were to the conquered races of the country what the Romans were to the barbarous hordes of the Empire, or the Normans to the ancient inhabitants of the British Isles. Clustering around the throne, they formed an invincible phalanx, ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott

... were glorious. The trees alone were enough to satisfy any one with a love of beauty. Great candelabra-shaped euphorbias, with wondrous thorns and lovely scarlet blossoms; huge forest-trees that seemed to have lost their own individuality in the wreathing clusters of creeping flowering plants they bore. Everything was beautiful; and as they walked on in the glowing sunshine, they seemed to have come to one of the most ...
— Off to the Wilds - Being the Adventures of Two Brothers • George Manville Fenn

... freedom to assert your individuality, Stella," he continued. "I can but show you the way and give you a new point of view, but I will never try to rule you and drag you to mine. I will never put any chains upon you but those of love. Do they sound as if they would be ...
— The Point of View • Elinor Glyn

... their imagination the ever-varying form; the latter must impress their preconceptions on the world without, in order to present them back to their own view with the satisfying degree of clearness, distinctness, and individuality. These in tranquil times are formed to exhibit a perfect poem in palace, or temple, or landscape-garden; or a tale of romance in canals that join sea with sea, or in walls of rock, which, shouldering back the billows, imitate the power, and supply the benevolence of nature to sheltered ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... disengage himself from old habits and prejudices, and construct anew his scheme of life. He is one of a tribe, and must stand or fall by his profession and his order. He has lost all perception of his own individuality, and is afraid to take a single step that is not prescribed by custom and example. But, independently of the Robinson Crusoes of the class, many such slaves of conventionalism achieve their freedom while intending only to better ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 457 - Volume 18, New Series, October 2, 1852 • Various

... Jean," he said quickly. "It is the very unjust extinguisher which the elders use for the suppression of individuality in the young." ...
— We Two • Edna Lyall

... gradually assuming a greater complexity, a larger measure of those minor features which make the ordinary man interesting. Significantly enough, the last thing to be acquired was a name such as ordinary men bear. A few characters attained to that certificate of individuality, but even Heywood, the master of the Interlude, preferred class names, such as Palmer, Pardoner, or Pedlar. This should warn us not to expect too much from the change. To the very end some features of the earliest Moralities are discernible: we shall meet Good Angel ...
— The Growth of English Drama • Arnold Wynne

... curious ruling of fate which makes the spinning of cotton fiber possible. There are many other short vegetable fibers, but cotton is the only one which can profitably be spun into thread. Hemp and flax, its chief vegetable competitors, are both long fibered. The individuality of the cotton fiber lies in its shape. Viewed through the microscope, the fiber is seen to be, not a hollow cylinder, but rather a flattened cylinder, shaped in cross-section something like the figure ...
— The Fabric of Civilization - A Short Survey of the Cotton Industry in the United States • Anonymous

... commonly understood is a misleading term for Browning's art. If his keen objective senses penned his imagination, save for a few daring escapades, within the limits of a somewhat normal actuality, it exercised, within those limits, a superb individuality of choice. The acute observer was doubled with a poet whose vehement and fiery energy and intense self-consciousness influenced what he observed, and yet far more what he imagined and what he expressed. It is possible to distinguish four main lines along which this determining bias told. He ...
— Robert Browning • C. H. Herford

... power, of course, but power; and she loved power, force. Had she not said so, shown it, but a moment before? Was it possible that she was really interested in him, perhaps because he was different from the average Englishman and not of a general pattern? She was a woman of brains, of great individuality, and his own individuality might influence her. It was too good to be true; but there had ever been something of the gambler in him, and he had always plunged. If he ever had a conviction he acted on it instantly, ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... tone and gesture, something, too, of the student accustomed to seclusion. Daniel's accent had nothing at all in keeping with a shabby coat; that of the younger man was less markedly refined, with much more of individuality. ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing

... the wild old life, the life in which man and the animals seem to be nearer to each other than in the countries where we have changed beasts into meat-producing engines deprived of individuality, still takes its course, as it has done from immemorial time. Children respect their parents, wives look at their husbands almost as gods, and at the tent door elders administer what they imagine justice, stroking their long white beards, and as impressed ...
— Bulgaria • Frank Fox

... glamour about him; she saw new charm in him, or perhaps, as she told herself, she saw for the first time how charming he really was. His speech seemed actually the pleasanter for the stammer at which they had all laughed years ago; the slight limp lent its own touch of individuality, and the man's blunt criticisms of books and music, politics and people, were softened by his humour, his genuine humility, and ...
— Sisters • Kathleen Norris

... he had great respect, though he did not happen to know any single member. He liked to look at her. She was shy and discreet in bearing; she usually entertained herself with a book, which permitted him larger liberty of eye; and she dressed with a neatness which had an individuality: she evidently expressed herself in her clothes. That is not ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, September, 1885 • Various

... mother; that it's impossible for anybody to preserve any individuality in contact with you... that as a matter of fact, neither father nor Letitia nor Freddy nor myself have preserved a shred of it. Grandfather said that to you himself, the last time you ever saw him... I know it, for I've heard father say it ...
— The Naturewoman • Upton Sinclair

... intercourse of minds. The boundaries are invisible, but they are never crossed. There is such good will to impart, and such good will to receive, that each threatens to become the other; but the law of individuality collects its secret strength: you are you, and I am I, and so ...
— Representative Men • Ralph Waldo Emerson

... defender of her own national existence, need hardly be demonstrated. She poses as the guardian of the Balkan States. But is there any case on record where Russia has really protected the independence of smaller neighboring countries? Has she not crushed out provincial and racial individuality wherever she has extended her power? Is it not the sole aim of her national policy to Russianize forcibly every ...
— The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915 - What Americans Say to Europe • Various

... it recognizes man as an individual soul, and, as such, addresses him with its truths and its sanctions. Indeed, it bases its grand doctrine of human brotherhood and equality upon the essential individuality of each man, because each represents all,—each has in himself the nature of every other. It demands individual repentance, individual holiness, individual faith. One cannot believe for another. One cannot decide questions of conscience for another. One cannot bear the sins or appropriate ...
— The Crown of Thorns - A Token for the Sorrowing • E. H. Chapin

... talking Mike was able to enjoy the girl's beauty and study her individuality. Pretty as she was—and more than pretty—it was her personality which pleased him—the bigness of her nature, the evidence of her wide-mindedness and her quick grasp of fresh subjects, and above all, in her, as in Freddy, there was the ring of ...
— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer

... had only special schools[6363]; here only could a place be found for them and professors obtained. Henceforth, the peculiar character of these schools has changed: they have ceased to be strictly special and veritably professional.—Each school, being an individuality, has developed apart and on its own account; its aim has been to install and furnish under its own roof all the general, collateral, accessory and ornamental studies which, far or near, could be of service to its own pupils. No longer ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 6 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 2 (of 2) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... already mysterious relationships between matter and spirit. Secondly, soul should be conceived as a psychical individual, subject to spacial determinations—but since it has to be deprived by death of its body which individualizes it, it will cease to be individuality after death, to the disappointment of the believer. How could you think anything purely spiritual and formless existing without blending together with other things? Thirdly, it fails to gratify the desire, ...
— The Religion of the Samurai • Kaiten Nukariya

... as he wants, and what he takes he heightens and humanizes with the same skill which he had shown in transforming the Filostrato. Of the individual characters Theseus himself, the arbiter of the plot, is most notably developed; Emilie and her two lovers receive just as much individuality as they will bear without disturbing the atmosphere of romance. The whole story is pulled together and made more rapid and effective. A comparison of almost any scene as told by the two poets suffices to show ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 1 - "Chtelet" to "Chicago" • Various

... enfranchisement of woman, arousing the positive attributes of her nature in demanding equal rights with her brother, man, in the political arena, as she has already done in the educational field. The masculine portion of the race is becoming more aggressive, mentally, asserting greater individuality, independent thought and action. The intellect of the race is being directed, however slowly, into scientific channels, while the human soul is slowly awakening to a sense of a deathless immortality and a desire for spiritual truth. It is slowly but ...
— The Light of Egypt, Volume II • Henry O. Wagner/Belle M. Wagner/Thomas H. Burgoyne

... seasoning, become so tinder dry that no frosts or heats could penetrate them. Many architects had worked on it as it grew, room by room, through the years, and every man had left behind the mark of his individuality, from Pretty Charlie the pilot, who swung an axe better than any Indian on the river, to Larsen the ship's carpenter, who worked with an adze and who starved the summer following on the Koyukuk. It had stretched ...
— The Barrier • Rex Beach

... runs the proverb. "Many nations, many ships," is almost equally true. A nation may show its individuality in the fashion of its marine architecture as much as in any other direction— as, for instance, in its national dress, dwelling-houses, food, amusements; and an ethnologist in studying a people's characteristics may do wisely not to ...
— Man on the Ocean - A Book about Boats and Ships • R.M. Ballantyne

... genius, at least when these are in needy circumstances, as is the case of those who are here placed before our eyes. In so far as in his 'Improvisatore,' in 'O. T.,' and in 'Only a Fiddler,' he represents not only himself, in his own separate individuality, but at the same time the momentous combat which so many have to pass through, and which he understands so well, because in it his own life has developed itself; therefore in no instance can he be said to present to the reader what belongs to the ...
— The True Story of My Life • Hans Christian Andersen

... "Buddhism teaches the reign of perfect goodness and wisdom without a personal God, continuance of individuality without an immortal soul, eternal happiness without a local heaven, the way of salvation without a vicarious saviour, redemption worked out by each one himself without any prayers, sacrifices, and penances, without the ministry ...
— Oriental Religions and Christianity • Frank F. Ellinwood

... feature that betokened the high-born and high-bred, but dressed in a dainty khaki riding costume, if that uncompromising fabric could ever be called dainty. Margaret, remembering it afterward, wondered what it had been that gave it that unique individuality, and decided it was perhaps a combination of cut and finish and little dainty accessories. A bit of creamy lace at the throat of the rolling collar, a touch of golden-brown velvet in a golden clasp, the flash of a wonderful jewel on her finger, ...
— A Voice in the Wilderness • Grace Livingston Hill

... It was to him as if there were no such person. Her feeble light was extinguished by the radiance of her sister's beauty; her very individuality was annihilated. ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon

... all; they were simply played through under the leadership of Conzertmeister [Footnote: i.e., the leader of the first violins.] Mathai, like overtures and entr'actes at a theatre. At least there was no "disturbing individuality," in the shape of a conductor! The principal classical pieces which presented no particular technical difficulties were regularly given every winter; the execution was smooth and precise; and the members of the orchestra evidently enjoyed the annual ...
— On Conducting (Ueber das Dirigiren): - A Treatise on Style in the Execution of Classical Music • Richard Wagner (translated by Edward Dannreuther)

... threshold of Parinirvana, many such parts, which often are disagreeable to it, but like a bee, collecting its honey from every flower, and leaving the rest to feed the worms of the earth, our spiritual individuality, the Sutratma, collecting only the nectar of moral qualities and consciousness from every terrestrial personality in which it has to clothe itself, forced by Karma, unites at last all these qualities in one, having then become a perfect being, ...
— Death—and After? • Annie Besant

... deserted streets, lighted but by the lamps of heaven, all the gayety of day was hushed and breathless. Here and there, stretched under a portico or a dingy booth, were sleeping groups of houseless Lazzaroni,—a tribe now merging its indolent individuality amidst ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... himself almost exclusively to his observation of men and pleasures. He had been here and there, he had seen this and that. Somehow he made Carrie wish to see similar things, and all the while kept her aware of himself. She could not shut out the consciousness of his individuality and presence for a moment. He would raise his eyes slowly in smiling emphasis of something, and she was fixed by their magnetism. He would draw out, with the easiest grace, her approval. Once he touched her hand for ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser

... probably do much for the country as regards commercial and intellectual improvement, will prove fatal in a degree to the picturesqueness which now renders Mexico so attractive. Radical progress in one direction must needs be destructive in another, and while some of the allurements of her strong individuality will disappear, her moral and physical status will be greatly improved. Her ragged, half-naked people will don proper attire, sacrificing the gaudy colors which now make every out-door scene kaleidoscopic; a modern grain thresher will take the place of weary animals ...
— Aztec Land • Maturin M. Ballou



Words linked to "Individuality" :   commonality, individualism, peculiarity, single, individual, singularity, personhood, identification, speciality, personality, individuation, specialty, specialness, personal identity, trait, distinctiveness, uniqueness, identity, gender identity



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