Online dictionaryOnline dictionary
Synonyms, antonyms, pronunciation

  Home
English Dictionary      examples: 'day', 'get rid of', 'New York Bay'




Variation   /vˌɛriˈeɪʃən/   Listen
Variation

noun
1.
An instance of change; the rate or magnitude of change.  Synonym: fluctuation.
2.
An activity that varies from a norm or standard.  Synonym: variance.
3.
A repetition of a musical theme in which it is modified or embellished.
4.
Something a little different from others of the same type.  Synonyms: edition, variant, version.  "A variant of the same word" , "An emery wheel is the modern variation of a grindstone" , "The boy is a younger edition of his father"
5.
An artifact that deviates from a norm or standard.
6.
The angle (at a particular location) between magnetic north and true north.  Synonyms: magnetic declination, magnetic variation.
7.
The process of varying or being varied.
8.
(astronomy) any perturbation of the mean motion or orbit of a planet or satellite (especially a perturbation of the earth's moon).
9.
(biology) an organism that has characteristics resulting from chromosomal alteration.  Synonyms: mutant, mutation, sport.
10.
(ballet) a solo dance or dance figure.  Synonym: pas seul.
11.
The act of changing or altering something slightly but noticeably from the norm or standard.



Related searches:



WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








Advanced search
     Find words:
Starting with
Ending with
Containing
Matching a pattern  

Synonyms
Antonyms
Quotes
Words linked to  

only single words



Share |
Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar





"Variation" Quotes from Famous Books



... the name in Fraserville nomenclature, he assumed that it had long been established in the community. Harwood had not previously faced a second generation in his pursuit of Hoosier celebrities, and he breathed a sigh of relief at the prospect of a variation on the threadbare scenario of early hardship, the little red schoolhouse, patient industry, and the laborious attainment of meagre political honors—which had ...
— A Hoosier Chronicle • Meredith Nicholson

... by southeast trade winds; annual rainfall averages about 3 m; rainy season from November to April, dry season from May to October; little seasonal temperature variation ...
— The 2000 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... observers, to make a series of observations. The temperature was read off from highly sensitive thermometers at each minute during the ascent, so as to ascertain the difference of the heat of successive strata of the atmosphere, and the rate of variation. In the first flight, the party reached the height of 19,500 feet, and came to a temperature of 7 degrees, or 25 degrees below the freezing-point, which, considering the state of the temperature at the surface, was an unexpected result—in ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 456 - Volume 18, New Series, September 25, 1852 • Various

... was following his clue in the public rooms at Willard's, to which, as he prophesied, Mr. Greenhithe had returned after the unusual variation in his life of a morning spent in the sanctuary. Tom bought a copy of the Baltimore "The Sun," and went into one of the larger rooms resorted to by travellers and loafers, and sat down. But Mr. Greenhithe did not appear there. Tom walked up and down through the passages a little ...
— The Brick Moon, et. al. • Edward Everett Hale

... except that the gentleman in a chariot, ten feet high, who is mowing down enemies a quarter his own size, with unsportsmanslike recklessness, is called Rameses in this place, and Sethi in that, and Amen-hotep in the other. With this trifling variation, when you have seen one temple, one obelisk, one hieroglyphic table, you have seen the whole ...
— Miss Cayley's Adventures • Grant Allen

... Comanches crossed over into the Panhandle country annually for the purpose of killing buffalo. For diversion and pastime, they were always willing to add horse-stealing and the murdering of settlers as a variation. They used to come over in big bands to hunt, and when ready to go back to their reservation in the Indian Territory, they would send the squaws on ahead, while the bucks would split into small bands and steal all the good ...
— Cattle Brands - A Collection of Western Camp-fire Stories • Andy Adams

... them, and Miss De Voe and Lispenard Ogden the others. People tell me I spoil them by the flat framing, and the plain, broad gold mats. But it doesn't spoil them to me. I think the mixture of gold mats and white mats breaks the monotony. And the variation just neutralizes the monotone which the rest of the room has. But of course ...
— The Honorable Peter Stirling and What People Thought of Him • Paul Leicester Ford

... listen to such an insinuation until the fated hour arrived, and brought with it no Mr. Cargill. The impatient entertainer allowed five minutes for difference of clocks, and variation of time, and other five for the procrastination of one who went little into society. But no sooner were the last five minutes expended, than he darted off for the Manse, not, indeed, much like a greyhound or a deer, but with the momentum of a ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott

... the professed, ideas and sentiments of men reveals wide variation in moral judgments. This is especially true of the "pro-ethical" consciousnesses of external authorities, coercions, and opinions—religious, political, and social—by which the mass of mankind are governed; ...
— History Of Modern Philosophy - From Nicolas of Cusa to the Present Time • Richard Falckenberg

... domestic politics, he replied: 'I will be a messenger if in that capacity I can usefully serve the State.' Yet, once more, you turn to the romance maker and discover him taking down, by the lake side of Rotorua, that of Hine- Moa. He rescued it, a Hero and Leander legend, with a variation, from the Maori ages, and placed it, a pearl, among his other delvings from Polynesian mythology. The story captured him, with its naive charm, when first he heard it from the lips of a chief, and many ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne

... were disheartening. A few hours after sunrise, a white haze settled over the dull, dead plain, the heat-waves rolled up to the cavalcade like a burning prairie, sweat and dust crusted over the horses under saddle, without variation of pace or course. Only three herds were met, feeling their way through the mirages, or loitering along the waters. Traveling by night was preferable, and timing the route into camps and marches, the cottonwood on the Arkansas ...
— Wells Brothers • Andy Adams

... sufficiently well educated to know under what sub-species his enemy should be classed; his fear was but the greater because his ignorance led him to imagine every terror at once. He endured most cruel tortures as he noted every variation of the breathing which was so near him; he dared not make ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker

... is, the fittest would survive. Then at once I seemed to see the whole effect of this, that when changes of land and sea, or of climate, or of food-supply, or of enemies occurred—and we know that such changes have always been taking place—and considering the amount of individual variation that my experience as a collector had shown me to exist, then it followed that all the changes necessary for the adaptation of the species to the changing conditions would be brought about; and as great changes in the environment are always slow, there would ...
— Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 1 (of 2) • James Marchant

... reason for the greater livability is that the real hatchability of the eggs is 70 per cent. to 75 per cent., and is reduced by mechanical breakage. The hatchability of eggs varies with the season. This variation is commonly ascribed to nature, it being stated that springtime is the natural breeding season, and therefore eggs ...
— The Dollar Hen • Milo M. Hastings

... of class, race, and national territory which kept men from perceiving the full import of their activity. These more numerous and more varied points of contact denote a greater diversity of stimuli to which an individual has to respond; they consequently put a premium on variation in his action. They secure a liberation of powers which remain suppressed as long as the incitations to action are partial, as they must be in a group which in its exclusiveness shuts out ...
— Democracy and Education • John Dewey

... important order have also taken place in the mariner's compass; the variation of the needle has been reduced to rules, and some anomalies arising from the metallic attraction of the ship itself, have been corrected by Professor Barlow's experiments. The use of the marine barometer and thermometer have ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various

... chief commanding part of thy soul be ever subject to any variation through any corporal either pain or pleasure, neither suffer it to be mixed with these, but let it both circumscribe itself, and confine those affections to their own proper parts and members. But if at any time ...
— Meditations • Marcus Aurelius

... and his reflections often just. His species of satire is between those of Horace and Juvenal, and he has the gaiety of Horace without his laxity of numbers, and the morality of Juvenal with greater variation of images. He plays, indeed, only on the surface of life; he never penetrates the recesses of the mind, and therefore the whole power of his poetry is exhausted by a single perusal; his conceits please only when they surprise. To translate ...
— Lives of the Poets: Gay, Thomson, Young, and Others • Samuel Johnson

... of such changes, uncertainty, and doubt, that public and private interests seemed hopelessly tangled. They were not debased by political corruption until Jefferson took them in hand, and sowed the bountiful crop which has fattened so vast and so curious a variation ...
— The Conqueror • Gertrude Franklin Atherton

... each tree are here in jars numbered to correspond with the trees from which they were gathered and may be compared for variation in size, shape, thinness of shell ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association, Report of the Proceedings at the Fourth Annual Meeting - Washington D.C. November 18 and 19, 1913 • Various

... and to keep themselves from freezing the two men were forced to do sentry-go on the somewhat narrow platform where they stood, occasionally varying the line of their short march by turning down the trail towards their camp, a variation which for perhaps a couple of minutes hid the lake from view. Every time they so turned, when the lake came in sight again, Stane looked down its length with expectation in his eyes, and every time he was disappointed. An hour passed and still they watched without any ...
— A Mating in the Wilds • Ottwell Binns

... of Maupassant's cynicism was just that variation of the artistic idea upon the temperament which puts the best finish upon work necessarily so limited, obliged to be so clenching, as the short story. Flaubert's gigantic dissatisfaction with life, his ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 1 (of 8) - Boule de Suif and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant

... walking on a lower limb and grasping an upper one once attained, a succeeding step in evolution quickly appeared, and one of prime importance to our inquiry. The animal had ceased to be in a full sense a quadruped, while not yet a biped, and a variation in the length of its limbs was almost sure to take place. This is an ordinary result when animals cease to walk on all fours. In the leaping kangaroo and jerboa a shortening of the arms and lengthening ...
— Man And His Ancestor - A Study In Evolution • Charles Morris

... quadrille a roar of satisfaction went up. She was discovered. At previous balls, in the figure, 'all hands round,' Freda had displayed an inimitable step and variation peculiarly her own. As the figure was called, the 'Russian Princess' gave the unique rhythm to limb and body. A chorus of I-told-you-so's shook the squared roof-beams, when lo! it was noticed that 'Aurora Borealis' and ...
— The Son of the Wolf • Jack London

... edition was printed by John Kingston, in 1564, with no other variation, I believe, than in the orthography. Haslewood, in a note on the ...
— Notes & Queries 1850.01.19 • Various

... and that intelligent and elaborate care I should think only a mind trained on the methods of German metaphysicians could impart into that most wearisome of proceedings, wherein every one says the same thing over fourteen different times at least, with a similar voice and gesture, the only variation being in the statements regarding the important points, and the facts of the case, these varying with each individual. This palaver was made by a son claiming to inherit part of his father's property; at last, to the astonishment, ...
— Travels in West Africa • Mary H. Kingsley

... deficient in harmonious compass, and in the mysterious effects of counterpoint. Or, to express myself in different terms, he is musical, but in no respect picturesque. His melodies are light and pleasant, but they are constantly repeated with little or no variation: when we have read a few of his pieces, we know them all; and the composition as a whole is always without significance. His heroes, like those of Corneille, are gallant; his heroines tender, like those of Racine; but this has been ...
— Lectures on Dramatic Art - and Literature • August Wilhelm Schlegel trans John Black

... prerogative century proceeded to vote a second time, when Quintus Fabius Maximus for the fourth time, and Marcus Marcellus for the third time, were created consuls. The other centuries voted for the same persons without any variation. One praetor, likewise, Quintus Fulvius Flaccus, was re-elected; the other new ones who were chosen, were Titus Otacilius Crassus a second time, Quintus Fabius, son of the consul, who was at that time curule ...
— The History of Rome; Books Nine to Twenty-Six • Titus Livius

... the profoundest veneration, was inexpressible. Matilda, the virtuous Matilda, could not be separated from the couch of her father. She hung over him with the most anxious affection. She watched every symptom of his disorder, and every variation of ...
— Italian Letters, Vols. I and II • William Godwin

... exercise until he obtains a position in which he feels no constraint, which will not subject him to bruises from recoil, and from which the mark appears plainly through the sights. Having secured such a position, he must not change it when firing, as a variation in the points of support of the rifle, the distance of the eye from the rear sight, or the tension of the hold has a decided effect, especially at the longer ranges, upon the location ...
— Manual of Military Training - Second, Revised Edition • James A. Moss

... that in Lamartine there is something suggestive of Millevoye, of Voltaire (he of the charming epistles), and of Fontanes; and Victor Hugo wrote with very little variation from the technical form of his predecessors. "But with Alfred de Vigny," he says, "we seek in vain for a resemblance to any French poetry preceding his work. For example, where can we find anything resembling 'Moise, Eloa, Doloeida'? Where did he find his inspiration for style ...
— Cinq Mars, Complete • Alfred de Vigny

... Sun; and also of time and eternity. It was worshipped as a Deity, and esteemed the same as Osiris; by others the same as Vulcan. Vulcanus AEgyptiis Opas dictus est, eodem Cicerone [185]teste. A serpent was also, in the Egyptian language, styled Ob, or Aub: though it may possibly be only a variation of the term above. We are told by Orus Apollo, that the basilisk, or royal serpent, was named Oubaios: [186][Greek: Oubaios, ho estin Hellenisti Basiliskos]. It should have been rendered [Greek: Oubos], Oubus; for [Greek: Oubaios] is a possessive, and not a proper name. ...
— A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume I. • Jacob Bryant

... no more, or little more, than the law as it now exists. All I can say is, that I am sure it is not the practice as it now exists; and that this is not the only case where it has been found to be highly useful to re-enact, with small variation, the existing law, in order to call the attention and excite the zeal, both of those who are to execute the law, and of those who are to ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham

... Finisterre is lower than the neighbouring lands, but the Torinona is visible at seventeen leagues' distance, which proves that the elevation of its highest summit is not less than 300 toises (582 metres). Spanish navigators affirm that on these coasts the magnetic variation differs extremely from that observed at sea. M. Bory, it is true, in the voyage of the sloop Amaranth, found in 1751, that the variation of the needle determined at the Cape was four degrees less than could have been conjectured from the observations made at ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt

... but this is apparently defective. Mr. Rowe, and after him Dr. Warburton, read that there is no soul lost, without any notice of the variation. Mr. Theobald substitutes no foil, and Mr. Pope follows him. To come so near the right, and yet to miss it, is unlucky: the author probably wrote no soil, no stain, no spot: ...
— Johnson's Notes to Shakespeare Vol. I Comedies • Samuel Johnson

... all the Churches abroad, of the Manner in which Lent is kept in this Protestant Country? What our Saviour said to the Jews upon another Occasion, You have turned the House of Prayer into a Den of Thieves, may with a little Variation, be applied to Ourselves, We have turned this Season appointed for serious Reflexions, and Humiliation of Body and Spirit, into a Time of Mirth and Jollity, of Musick, ...
— A Letter from the Lord Bishop of London, to the Clergy and People of London and Westminster; On Occasion of the Late Earthquakes • Thomas Sherlock

... proposed and advocated by Sir Francis Galton, a cousin of Charles Darwin. He expected it to be a great prop to evolution; on the other hand, it is another proof of the unity of our race in Noah's day, and hence fatal to their theory. Biometry is defined to be the "statistical study of variation and heredity." It bears heavily against the ...
— The Evolution Of Man Scientifically Disproved • William A. Williams

... OPINIONS OF CROWDS. The extreme mobility of opinions which do not arise from general beliefs—Apparent variations of ideas and beliefs in less than a century—The real limits of these variations—The matters effected by the variation—The disappearance at present in progress of general beliefs, and the extreme diffusion of the newspaper press, have for result that opinions are nowadays more and more changeable—Why the opinions of crowds tend on the majority of subjects ...
— The Crowd • Gustave le Bon

... Promenade Concerts. He removed the cigarette from his lips and chuckled softly to himself for some moments. Then he replaced the cigarette and joined in the tempestuous and prolonged applause. I looked at him inquiringly. "It is a sort of variation of the theme," he said, "that he sometimes calls the Cosmic Angels Working Together or the Soul of Man Striving with the Divine Essence." I glanced at the programme again. ...
— Impressions And Comments • Havelock Ellis

... to be settled? To say nothing of the impossibility that Colony agents should have general powers of taxing the Colonies at their discretion, consider, I implore you, that the communication by special messages and orders between these agents and their constituents, on each variation of the case, when the parties come to contend together and to dispute on their relative proportions, will be a matter of delay, perplexity, and confusion that ...
— Burke's Speech on Conciliation with America • Edmund Burke

... days work was done and it was time for the evening meal there was the fried meat again with the molasses and the corn bread. Mr. Womble says that they ate this kind of food every day in the week. The only variation was on Sunday when they were given the seconds of the flour and a little more molasses so that they might make a cake. No other sweetening was ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves - Georgia Narratives, Part 4 • Works Projects Administration

... little scenes, as a variation in his part; they represented the Byronic element in the somewhat artificial poetry of his existence; but to the boy, though he was dimly aware of their theatricality, they represented more. The Doctor made perhaps too little, the boy possibly too much, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... the earth. The earth's crust, and the depth to which we are able to penetrate — p. 159, 160, note. Threefold movement of the heat of the earth; its thermic condition. Law of the increase of heat with the increase of depth — p. 160, 161 and note. Magnetism electricity in motion. Periodical variation of terrestrial magnetism. Disturbance of the regular course of the magnetic needle. Magnetic storms; extension of their action. Manifestations of magnetic force on the earth's surface presented under three classes of phenomena, namely, lines of equal ...
— COSMOS: A Sketch of the Physical Description of the Universe, Vol. 1 • Alexander von Humboldt

... said, "Above all, accustom your children constantly to tell the truth; without varying in any circumstance." A lady who heard him said, "Nay, this is too much, for a little variation in narrative must happen a thousand times a day, if one is not perpetually watching." "Well, madam," said the Doctor, "you ...
— Life and Literature - Over two thousand extracts from ancient and modern writers, - and classified in alphabetical order • J. Purver Richardson

... perceiving the satirical note. "Now there's De Maupassant's Fort comma la Mort—quite the most interesting variation—shows the turn a genius can give. There the triangle is the man of middle age, the mother he has loved in his youth and the daughter he comes to love. It forms, you might say, the head of a whole ...
— Murder in Any Degree • Owen Johnson

... do, whether they should make another order rescinding the last or execute the former more strictly. Both are liable to objections. The first will appear like a cruel proceeding and evidence of uncertainty of purpose; the last will show a capricious variation in the practice of the Privy Council, with which the matter rests. Their wise heads were to be put together last night ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville

... idea of the nature of the residence. It was almost a paroxysm. He determined not to vex her reminiscences again; and as this resolution directed his mind to his residence, thinking it pre-eminently gentlemanly, his tongue committed the error of repeating it, with 'gentleman-like' for a variation. ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... beaten him, but she was obliged to content herself with such a sweeping charge of her Zulus among Alwyn's Englishmen, that their general shrieked out in indignation against such a variation of the accustomed ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge

... each (l5s.); the men delighted at the work of slaughtering, and jerking the meat for the voyage. Bought four milch goats at 9 ps. each, and laid in a large stock of dhurra straw for the animals. Got all my men on board and sailed at 4.30 p.m., course due west; variation allowed for. I have already reduced my men from wolves to lambs, and I should like to see the outrageous acts of mutiny which are the scapegoats of the traders for laying their atrocities upon the men's shoulders. I cannot agree with some writers in believing that personal strength ...
— The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile • Sir Samuel White Baker

... which I cannot discern at first glance. But a closer inspection reveals the mystery. Millions of cuttlefish drying in the sun! I could never have believed that so many cuttlefish existed in these waters. And there is scarcely any variation in the dimensions of them: out of ten thousand there is not the difference of half an inch ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan - First Series • Lafcadio Hearn

... pick no holthe in 'em wid no hair-pin!" shouted Hezzy, not to be walked over so easily, and jubilant at this slight variation. ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. 31, No. 1, May 1908 • Various

... humpback and finner whales. An ice-blink to the westward indicated the presence of pack in that direction. After rounding the pack we steered S. 40 E., and at noon on the 10th had reached lat. 58 28 S., long. 20 28 W. Observations showed the compass variation to be 1 less than the chart recorded. I kept the 'Endurance' on the course till midnight, when we entered loose open ice about ninety miles south-east of our noon position. This ice proved to fringe the pack, and progress became slow. There was a long easterly swell ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton

... important as the principle of the three stages which governs the onward movement. This movement, however, is not in a right line, but displays a series of oscillations, unequal and variable, round a mean motion which tends to prevail. The three general causes of variation, according to Comte, are race, climate, and deliberate political action (such as the retrograde policies of Julian the Apostate or Napoleon). But while they cause deflections and oscillation, their power is strictly limited; they may accelerate or retard the ...
— The Idea of Progress - An Inquiry Into Its Origin And Growth • J. B. Bury

... air very adagio, gradually increasing the time in a kind of variation, till at last his execution became so rapid that Vivian, surprised at the mere mechanical action, rose from his chair in order better to examine the player's management and motion of his bow. Exquisite as were the tones, enchanting as were the ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield

... rocks and sand have given out their heat and have become cold, the water continues to give out the vast store of heat accumulated during the summer. This explains why lands situated on or near large bodies of water usually have less variation in temperature than inland regions. In the summer the water cools the region; in the winter, on the contrary, the water heats the region, and hence extremes of ...
— General Science • Bertha M. Clark

... me within was merely a variation of the stormy passion outside, which swept the country from one end to the other. The car of the wielder of my destiny was fast approaching, and the sound of its wheels reverberated in my being. I had a constant feeling that something extraordinary might happen any moment, ...
— The Home and the World • Rabindranath Tagore

... situation. You have said that I asked too much, you have pleaded the fear of ridicule, but you could not understand that you were consenting to buy me—me—your wife! You wished to possess me for a little, as a sort of variation to your usual list, although your heart must have told you that it was degrading to me to be placed on such a plane. You did not recoil from such an idea, but pursued it, just as you pursue them, and the more eagerly, ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant

... trifling variation) from Tennyson's "Maud." For myself, I have no fears of the result. Under the leadership of your veteran General, victory must infallibly crown your arms. We peaceful civilians shall rest secure in the absolute confidence such protection inspires, and be the first to welcome ...
— The Talking Horse - And Other Tales • F. Anstey

... horribly upon him—a loud clap of thunder burst over his head—the vivid lightning flashed in his eyes, and the next moment he found himself standing alone at the porch of the cathedral. He repeated this strange tale day after day, without any variation, and all the populace were firm believers in its truth. Repeated search was made to discover the mysterious house, but all in vain. The man pointed out several as resembling it, which were searched by the ...
— Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds • Charles Mackay

... so well, so awfully well now. He has been a guide these many times. But we skip back to our position, six paces behind. Then another bullet drops and the whole dance-step is repeated with little variation. The sergeant booms once more, and in desperation that the Boches will hear ...
— Private Peat • Harold R. Peat

... machines may be worked by hand or by mechanical power. Bricks made of semi-plastic clay (i.e. ground clay or shale sufficiently damp to adhere under pressure) are generally machine-made throughout. The method of making bricks by hand is the same, with slight variation, the world over. The tempered clay is pressed by hand into a wooden or metal mould or four-sided case (without top or bottom) which is of the desired shape and size, allowance being made for the shrinkage of the brick in drying and firing. The moulder stands at the bench or table, ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various

... politics, religion, and economics; and the essence of this provincialism is always the same,—the substitution of a part for the whole. Larger knowledge of the world and of history would make it perfectly clear that there has always been not only a wide latitude, but great variation, in ritual and worship; that the political story of all the progressive nations has been one long agitation for reforms, and that no reform can ever be final; that reform must succeed reform until the end of time,—reforms ...
— Books and Culture • Hamilton Wright Mabie

... differences. I am not talking now of psychogenetic determinants, but alone of the trends of which Dr. Putnam has spoken. Is he not assuming the contrary to Darwin when he says that function precedes structure? Are not the potentials dependent upon the variation which has determined this function? I am speaking now in the broadest possible terms and not confining myself to the cerebrum. Do we not find it in the tadpole who is prepared for breathing not because he wants to breathe, but because he is going to have a new kind of breathing apparatus ...
— The Journal of Abnormal Psychology - Volume 10

... the first fool I should meet with.... you made me a wife, for which I am much obliged to you, and if you have a wish to make me more grateful still, make me a widow." [Footnote: The speeches which I have omitted consist merely of repetitions of the same thoughts, with but very little variation ...
— Memoirs of the Life of the Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan V1 • Thomas Moore

... Tides.—The variation of the tides is so slight that navigation is almost unaffected by it. The ordinary rise and fall is from 18 to 24 inches, with an increase of about a third at spring tides. High water is later on the eastern than on the western coast; occurring, on full and new ...
— Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and • James Emerson Tennent

... use the abbreviation "q;" for "que".] Quis tulerit Gracchos de seditione quaerentes. [error for "querentes"] maechos [correct form is "moechos"; ae/oe variation is common] ...
— Ebrietatis Encomium - or, the Praise of Drunkenness • Boniface Oinophilus

... minutes, all this magnificence and splendour for the gloom of the garden, in order to renew the pleasing surprise I experienced on my first entering the building. Thus I spent here some hours in the night in a continual variation of entertainment; when the crowd now all at once began to lessen, and I also took a coach and ...
— Travels in England in 1782 • Charles P. Moritz

... localities they can be used only to furnish supplementary reading, since portions only will be adapted to the conditions of the restricted locality. The fundamental life processes are the same the world over, but varying environmental conditions necessitates a variation in emphasis, in application, and in the choice of problems which make up the course. If the teacher is well prepared in subject matter, there is little use for a laboratory manual except as it may suggest new methods ...
— Adequate Preparation for the Teacher of Biological Sciences in Secondary Schools • James Daley McDonald

... toward a mortuary discussion of love. Being young, nearly all of them are anxious for, completely puzzled by and rather afraid of it, all at the same time. They wish to draw up one logical code to cover its every variation; they look at it, as it is at present with the surprised displeasure of florists at a hollyhock that will come blue when by every law of variation it should be rose. It is only a good deal later that they will be able to give, not blasphemy because the rules of the game are always mutually inconsistent, ...
— Young People's Pride • Stephen Vincent Benet

... which is very intimately joined with the mind, and occasions in the latter certain feelings, e.g., pain, which as merely cogitative it would not have.) Sense qualities, as color, sound, odor, cannot constitute the essence of matter, for their variation or loss changes nothing in it; I can abstract from them without the material thing disappearing.[1] There is one property, however, extensive magnitude (quantitas), whose removal would imply the destruction of matter itself. Thus ...
— History Of Modern Philosophy - From Nicolas of Cusa to the Present Time • Richard Falckenberg

... intervening years, midday halts, where an hour of daydream lay sandwiched in between two half days of tramp. And I thought of the companions now so far away. Having heard the tune in a minor key, these came in as chords of some ampler variation, making a kind of symphony of sentiment, where I was brought back ever and anon to the simple motif. And the teahouse maidens entered and went out again like mutes in my mind's ...
— Noto, An Unexplored Corner of Japan • Percival Lowell

... continue. An ordinary flat gas-flame of the "bats-wing" type may vary in temperature in its central portion from 300 deg.F. at the bottom to about 3000 deg.F. at the top. The central portion lies between two hotter layers in which the vertical variation is not so great. The brightness of the upper portion is due to incandescent carbon ...
— Artificial Light - Its Influence upon Civilization • M. Luckiesh

... 'Atavism' which I shall speak of, is, as I said before, one of the most marked and striking tendencies of organic beings; but, side by side with this hereditary tendency there is an equally distinct and remarkable tendency to variation. The tendency to reproduce the original stock has, as it were, its limits, and side by side with it there is a tendency to vary in certain directions, as if there were two opposing powers working upon the organic being, one tending to take it in a ...
— The Perpetuation Of Living Beings, Hereditary Transmission And Variation • Thomas H. Huxley

... the Deciduates, the placenta differs considerably both in outer form and internal structure. The extensive investigations of the last ten years have shown that there is more variation in these respects among the higher mammals than was formerly supposed. The physiological work of this important embryonic organ, the nutrition of the foetus during its long sojourn in the womb, is accomplished in the various groups of the Placentals by ...
— The Evolution of Man, V.2 • Ernst Haeckel

... was embowered in trees in contrast to the Russian shore where the only trees were those in the park. I endeavored to ascertain the cause of this difference, but could not. The Russians said there was often a variation of three or four degrees in the temperature of the two banks, the Chinese one being the milder. Timber for both Chinese and Russian use is cut in the forests up ...
— Overland through Asia; Pictures of Siberian, Chinese, and Tartar - Life • Thomas Wallace Knox

... suffered no inconvenience from this; but it was deplorable to see the bed of what must in some seasons be a fine little stream so completely dry and dusty. This day we met with a new species of Psoralea.* At the camp I ascertained the magnetic variation to be 9 degrees 10 minutes 15 seconds East, by an observation of ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 2 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell

... the fist, when he is struck in the face; this is what moves, this is what maddens a man, unless he is inured to outrage; no one could describe all this so as to bring home to his hearers its bitterness."[1] You see how he preserves, by continual variation, the intrinsic force of these repetitions and broken clauses, so that his order seems irregular, and conversely his irregularity acquires a ...
— On the Sublime • Longinus

... heat of Sambur; hunting of; blood of Sammons, Mr., American Consul-General Sampans, first night in San Francisco Scandinavian steamer Schools for native girls Sclater, Mr. Screaming, Chinese habit of Sedan chairs Serows; hunt for; habits of; hunting for; description of; color variation of; Japanese; difference from gorals; horns of; relationship of; appearance of; killed on Snow Mountain; obtained by Mr. Caldwell at Yen-ping; distribution of; habits of; weight of; hunting of at Hui-yao Servants, wages of Shanghai; riot in Shans; description of ...
— Camps and Trails in China - A Narrative of Exploration, Adventure, and Sport in Little-Known China • Roy Chapman Andrews and Yvette Borup Andrews

... properly no dialects; the style of writers has no professed diversity in the use of words, or of their flexions and terminations, nor differs but by different degrees of skill or care. The oral diction is uniform in no spacious country, but has less variation in England than in most other nations of equal extent. The language of the northern counties retains many words now out of use, but which are commonly of the genuine Teutonick race, and is uttered with a ...
— A Grammar of the English Tongue • Samuel Johnson

... September, in the evening, being about two hundred leagues from the island of Ferro, he, for the first time, noticed the variation of the needle, a phenomenon which had never before been remarked. Struck with the circumstance, he observed it attentively for three days, and found that the variation increased as he advanced. It soon attracted the attention of the pilots, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 344, June, 1844 • Various

... historian of the house; and an old gentleman told me that he remembered one of each. Here was a dawn of intelligence.... Another conversation informed me that the same man was both bard and senachi. This variation discouraged me.... Soon after I was told by a gentleman, who is generally acknowledged the greatest master of Hebridian antiquities, that there had, indeed, once been both bards and senachies; and that senachi signified the man of talk, or of ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell

... who hastened to pay court to the young and beautiful heiress, was, as might be expected, Colonel Baltasar de Villabuena. But his reception was in the highest degree discouraging, and he was able to assure himself, that if any variation had taken place in Rita's sentiments, it was by no means in his favour. His only remaining hope, therefore, was in an appeal to the Count, whom he still believed to be, for the family reasons already adverted to, desirous of ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 • Various

... baby voices answered her from the rear porch. The little ones were there with Mrs. Hays, and they excitedly welcomed this variation ...
— The Precipice • Elia Wilkinson Peattie

... fast as an ordinarily active man is apt to walk. Her motion was nearly unobservable to all on board, and might rather be termed gliding than sailing, the ripple under her cut-water not much exceeding that which is made by the finger as it is moved swiftly through the element; still the slightest variation of the helm changed her course, and this so easily and gracefully as to render her deviations and inclinations like those of the duck. In her present situation, too, the jigger, which was brailed, and hung festooned from its light yard, ready for use, should occasion ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper

... mysterious forests. It is at once an outlet and a nursery for romantic emotion. The out-of-doors movement which began with Thoreau's hut on Walden Pond, and which has gone on broadening and deepening to this hour, implies far more than mere variation from routine. It furnishes, indeed, a healthful escape from the terrific pressure of modern social and commercial exigencies. Yet its more important function is to provide for grown-ups a chance to ...
— The American Mind - The E. T. Earl Lectures • Bliss Perry

... some time it appeared like a speck, as seen against the low, green fringe of the opposite and far-distant shore, yet it at length so enlarged on the vision that the form of a canoe and the gleam of flashing oars became distinctly discernible. Soon a little variation in the line of approach brought not only the canoe and the rowers, but another canoe in tow, plainly in view; and then all knew that their painful suspense was about to be ended. Another half-hour ...
— Gaut Gurley • D. P. Thompson

... sensitive on this particular point-anything but speak disparagingly of that sermon. It has been his stock in trade for numerous years. He begs they will listen to him for a minute, excuse this little trifling variation, charge it to the susceptibility of his constitution. He is willing to admit there is capital in his example which may be used for bad purposes, and says, "Somehow, when I take a little, it don't seem to go right." ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams

... in this aspect of the question will find the facts admirably set forth in Mr. Pell's book on The Law of Births and Deaths, being a study of the variation in the degree of animal fertility under the ...
— Conception Control and Its Effects on the Individual and the Nation • Florence E. Barrett

... just raised Albrecht Duerer to the rank of noble of the empire), 'but neither I nor any one else can make an artist like him.' We may compare this story with a similar and later story of Holbein and Henry VIII., and with another earlier story, having a slight variation, of Titian and Charles V. The universality of the story shakes one's belief in its individual application, but at least the legend, with different names, remains as an indication of ...
— The Old Masters and Their Pictures - For the Use of Schools and Learners in Art • Sarah Tytler

... hesitating and tentative action which results from knowledge that is still so imperfect as to be actively self-conscious; nor yet that it should grow or vary perceptibly unless under such changed conditions as shall baffle memory, and present the alternative of either invention—that is to say, variation—or death. ...
— Selections from Previous Works - and Remarks on Romanes' Mental Evolution in Animals • Samuel Butler

... northward of it we luffed up a little, when, after standing on some way further, I was again sent to the mast-head, to see if I could discover any intervening coral reefs or any others running out from it. I could discover no variation of colour in the sea to indicate the existence of hidden reefs in our course, but my eye fell on a dark object, a mile, or it may have been less, from the shore. At the first glance I thought it was a rock rising out of the water, but on descending to the cross-trees and looking ...
— The Mate of the Lily - Notes from Harry Musgrave's Log Book • W. H. G. Kingston

... have been the first man who introduced acoustic humour by the abrupt variation in his metre. Exclamations and strange sounds were found very effective on the stage, and were now frequently introduced, especially emanating from slaves to amuse the audience. Aristophanes commences the knights with a howling duet between two slaves who ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange

... were taken to obtain this variety on different occasions, and from the most reliable sources, so that there might be no mistake as to the correctness of the name; but after many years of trial we are unable to perceive any decided variation, either in the quality of the fruit, the length of the bunch, or the habit of the plant, from the ...
— Success With Small Fruits • E. P. Roe

... repair though seldom occupied, implements and materials for wood-carving, and in a corner of the room a toy fort and a surprising variety of lead soldiers on foot or on horseback. Such things as these might undergo variation from time to time. The doll's house might disappear any day, as the rocking-horse had disappeared, for instance, a year before. But the furniture and other contents of the room were more stable. It was impossible to think of their being changed; they were so much ...
— The Squire's Daughter - Being the First Book in the Chronicles of the Clintons • Archibald Marshall

... pleasant variation," I observed, forgetting that it is bad form to converse with a servant, and remembering only that I was addressing an old flame of Madame Venus. "Hades isn't a bad place for a little while, ...
— Olympian Nights • John Kendrick Bangs

... ready to live, to take her place in the world. The most precious moment in human development is the young creature's assertion that he is unlike any other human being, and has an individual contribution to make to the world. The variation from the established type is at the root of all change, the only possible basis for progress, all that keeps life from growing unprofitably stale ...
— The Spirit of Youth and the City Streets • Jane Addams

... tendency is plainly shown in the two forms of the letter h, as given in Landa's alphabet; the original form is more elaborate than the variation of it. The original form is The variation is given as . Now let us suppose this simplification to be carried a step farther: we have seen the upper and lower parts of the first form shrink into a smaller and less elaborate shape; let us imagine that the same ...
— The Antediluvian World • Ignatius Donnelly

... is, currents induced in the secondary wire of an induction coil due to the variation of microphonic currents in the primary wire—are not alternating currents. They do not follow the constant periodic law, and they are not true harmonic sine functions of the time. The microphonic currents ...
— Scientific American Supplement No. 822 - Volume XXXII, Number 822. Issue Date October 3, 1891 • Various

... of two volumes, written by a Frenchman and printed in English by different printers. As a result there was a wide variation in spelling. ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur

... diameter 786 millimeters, stroke making fifty revolutions per minute, which is also to work a Root blower and the accumulator pumps. Having regard to these very different demands upon the power of the engine, it will be provided with expansion gear, allowing a considerable variation in the cut-off. A single boiler of 70 to 75 square meters heating surface will be sufficient. The accumulator is intended to ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 492, June 6, 1885 • Various

... to watch the Bosche shelling before going over the ridge to Pozieres. I could then tell the sections he "strafed" most. I would be able to avoid them as much as possible. I watched for fully an hour; the variation in his target was barely perceptible. On one or two occasions he "swept" the ridge. I decided to make a start after the ...
— How I Filmed the War - A Record of the Extraordinary Experiences of the Man Who - Filmed the Great Somme Battles, etc. • Lieut. Geoffrey H. Malins

... is necessarily touched upon more or less in going over the etiology, symptoms, and treatment of the disease, and variation is the rule, for how could it be otherwise when subject and ...
— Appendicitis: The Etiology, Hygenic and Dietetic Treatment • John H. Tilden, M.D.

... full house of pretty maidens who came as "approvers"—a fanciful variation of "improvers" invented by Miss Huntingdon herself, and used whenever she spoke of "My young ladies," which she did all day long—or at least as often as she was called into the "down-stairs parlour," where (as in a nunnery) ordinary business ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett

... variation in the quantity of rain that falls in the same latitude, on the different sides of the same continent, and particularly of the same island. The mean fall of rain at Edinburgh, on the eastern coast, is 26 inches; while at Glasgow, on the western coast, in nearly the same latitude, ...
— The Rain Cloud - or, An Account of the Nature, Properties, Dangers and Uses of Rain • Anonymous

... from an overburdened soul, for like Gay he could tolerate no divergence from the straight line of duty, no variation from the traditional type, in any woman who was related to him. Men would be men, he was aware, but if any phrase so original as "women will be women" had been propounded to him, he would probably have retorted with philosophic cynicism, that "he did not see the ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow

... interested in Swain's exposition of deviation and variation and magnetic attraction and the various devices employed to counteract these influences, the Flinders bars, the soft-iron spheres, and the system of adjustable magnets located in the pedestal of the binnacle, that he had to be reminded by a mild exhibition of sisterly ...
— Alias The Lone Wolf • Louis Joseph Vance

... strange departure of the French heir fluttered here and there! Du Clercq[13] tells the story with some variation from the above outline, laying more stress on the popular appeal to the king for relief from Louis's transgressions as governor of Dauphine, and enlarging on the accusation that Louis was responsible for the death of La belle Agnes, "the first lady of ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam

... which is Isaiah's, was uppermost in Mark's mind, and his quotation of Malachi is, apparently, an afterthought, and is plainly merely introductory of the other, on which the stress lies. The remarkable variation in the Malachi quotation, which occurs in all three Evangelists, shows how completely they recognised the divinity of our Lord, in their making words which, in the original, are addressed by Jehovah to Himself, to be addressed by the Father to the Son. There is a difference ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Mark • Alexander Maclaren

... that peculiar monthly periodicity called menstruation, monthly sickness, monthlies, or being unwell. Although this usually occurs once in about four weeks, yet it may be a week less or a week longer; or, indeed, the variation may ...
— Treatise on the Diseases of Women • Lydia E. Pinkham

... the Sun, all the planets would be seen to follow their true paths round that body; their motion would invariably lie in the same direction, and any variation in their speed as they approached perihelion or aphelion would be real. But the planets, when observed from the Earth, which is itself in motion, appear to move irregularly. Sometimes they remain stationary ...
— The Astronomy of Milton's 'Paradise Lost' • Thomas Orchard

... soldiers, that they should take heed faithfully and courageously to do and execute the same. Their commissions were, for the substance of them, the same in form, though, as to name, title, place and degree of the captains, there might be some, but very small variation. And here let me give you an account of the matter and sum ...
— The Holy War • John Bunyan

... impossible for me to believe that fortuitous variation—variation all around the circle—could have resulted in the evolution of man. There must have been a predetermined tendency to variation in certain directions. To introduce chance into the world is to introduce chaos. No more would the waters of the interiors of the continents find ...
— Time and Change • John Burroughs

... as we could see from the mast-head, I determined to steer towards the bight to give it a closer examination, and to learn with more certainty its continuity or otherwise. At noon we were in latitude 76 deg. 32' S., longitude 166 deg. 12' E., dip 88 deg. 24' and variation ...
— The Worst Journey in the World, Volumes 1 and 2 - Antarctic 1910-1913 • Apsley Cherry-Garrard

... his drink. Dobigel was going to be uncomfortable for a while. Twelve-hour poison was a complex protein substance that could be varied in several thousand different ways, and only an antidote made from the right variation would work for each poison. If the antidote wasn't given, the victim died within twelve hours. And even if the antidote was given, getting over poison wasn't ...
— Heist Job on Thizar • Gordon Randall Garrett



Words linked to "Variation" :   replacement, perturbation, business cycle, organism, permutation, astronomy, deviation, vicissitude, transposition, modification, melodic theme, allomerism, switch, dancing, mongrel, concert dance, tide, type, difference, thing, activity, version, vary, lusus naturae, freak, libration, monster, ballet, bastard, partita, musical theme, trade cycle, departure, physical process, change, theme, alteration, angle, being, idea, terpsichore, substitution, monstrosity, uranology, biology, inversion, biological science, dance, process, pas seul, divergence, saltation



Copyright © 2024 Dictionary One.com