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Vary   /vˈɛri/   Listen
verb
Vary  v. t.  (past & past part. varied; pres. part. varying)  
1.
To change the aspect of; to alter in form, appearance, substance, position, or the like; to make different by a partial change; to modify; as, to vary the properties, proportions, or nature of a thing; to vary a posture or an attitude; to vary one's dress or opinions. "Shall we vary our device at will, Even as new occasion appears?"
2.
To change to something else; to transmute; to exchange; to alternate. "Gods, that never change their state, Vary oft their love and hate." "We are to vary the customs according to the time and country where the scene of action lies."
3.
To make of different kinds; to make different from one another; to diversify; to variegate. "God hath varied their inclinations." "God hath here Varied his bounty so with new delights."
4.
(Mus.) To embellish; to change fancifully; to present under new aspects, as of form, key, measure, etc. See Variation, 4.


Vary  v. i.  
1.
To alter, or be altered, in any manner; to suffer a partial change; to become different; to be modified; as, colors vary in different lights. "That each from other differs, first confess; Next, that he varies from himself no less."
2.
To differ, or be different; to be unlike or diverse; as, the laws of France vary from those of England.
3.
To alter or change in succession; to alternate; as, one mathematical quantity varies inversely as another. "While fear and anger, with alternate grace, Pant in her breast, and vary in her face."
4.
To deviate; to depart; to swerve; followed by from; as, to vary from the law, or from reason.
5.
To disagree; to be at variance or in dissension; as, men vary in opinion. "The rich jewel which we vary for."


noun
Vary  n.  Alteration; change. (Obs.)





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Vary" Quotes from Famous Books



... Since therefore the body of every man is composed of several substances, each of them ought to have a principle of action really distinct from the principle of each of the others. He will have the action of every principle to be spontaneous. Now this must vary the effects ad infinitum, and confound them. For the impression of the neighbouring bodies must needs put some constraint upon the natural spontaneity ...
— Theodicy - Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil • G. W. Leibniz
... labelled Liberal or Labour or Tory or Democratic or anti-Democratic or anything at all. All these things were to vary with the immediate occasions. I know it sounds like Lloyd George, but there were at least two very important differences between the Fact and the Prime Minister. One was that the Fact employed experts who always made a very thorough and scientific investigation ...
— Potterism - A Tragi-Farcical Tract • Rose Macaulay
... such tubes a few molecules may traverse more than a hundred times the mean free path, with a correspondingly increased velocity, until they are arrested by collisions. Indeed, the molecular free path may vary in one and the same tube, and at one and the same degree ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 795, March 28, 1891 • Various
... doubt you have already learned. When their first makers got them to go at all the feat seemed so remarkable that the fact they did not keep good time was entirely lost sight of. But just you let our clocks or watches vary a minute or two a week, and we are quite out of humor with them, never taking into consideration how we jolt them about and subject them to heat, cold, and irregular winding. Where can you find any other piece of machinery ...
— Christopher and the Clockmakers • Sara Ware Bassett
... out the numbers in turn, except Sonya and Alyosha. To vary the monotony, they have invented in the course of time a number of synonyms and comic nicknames. Seven, for instance, is called the "ovenrake," eleven the "sticks," seventy-seven "Semyon Semyonitch," ninety "grandfather," and so on. The game ...
— The Cook's Wedding and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov


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