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Contrast   /kˈɑntræst/  /kəntrˈæst/   Listen
Contrast

noun
1.
The opposition or dissimilarity of things that are compared.  Synonym: direct contrast.  "By contrast"
2.
The act of distinguishing by comparing differences.
3.
A conceptual separation or distinction.  Synonyms: demarcation, dividing line, line.
4.
The perceptual effect of the juxtaposition of very different colors.
5.
The range of optical density and tone on a photographic negative or print (or the extent to which adjacent areas on a television screen differ in brightness).



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"Contrast" Quotes from Famous Books



... every one else, but practising his father's maxims upon him, and cheating him[1028]. JOHNSON. 'I am much pleased with this design; but I think there was no occasion to make the son honest at all. No; he should be a consummate rogue: the contrast between honesty and knavery would be the stronger. It should be contrived so that the father should be the only sufferer by the son's villainy, and thus there would ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 4 (of 6) • Boswell

... How elegant his manners, and how brilliant his wit! How soft and engaging the whole of his behaviour! But ah! was this the fruit of reverence and admiration? Might it not be no more than general gallantry? Oh that I were mistress of his heart! That he would lay his person at my feet! What a contrast between him and my former admirers! How doubly hateful does lord Martin, the lover favoured by my father now appear! But ah! who is this Damon? What is his fortune, and what his pretensions? His dress surely bespoke him a man of rank. His ...
— Damon and Delia - A Tale • William Godwin

... The contrast between them was strongly marked. Nita was pretty—extremely pretty, and looked as out of place in this land she was native to as Steve looked surely a part of it. But her charm was of that purely physical type which gains nothing from within. Her eyes were wide, child-like, and of a deep ...
— The Heart of Unaga • Ridgwell Cullum

... men, mounted and armed to the teeth, pursued the lonely road which leads from the utmost confines of the province of Sonora to the Presidio of Tubac. Their costume, the coarse equipment of their steeds, and the beauty of the latter, formed on the whole a striking contrast and seemed to indicate subalterns despatched by some rich proprietor, either to carry or ...
— Wood Rangers - The Trappers of Sonora • Mayne Reid

... contemplative reveries, and looking around me I see your prosperity, a nameless woe comes over my mind, because that very prosperity reminds me that I am not at home. The home of my fathers—the home of my heart—the home of my affections and of my cares, is in the most striking contrast with the prosperity I see here. And whence this striking contrast in the results, when there exists such a striking identity in the antecedents? Whence this afflicting departure ...
— Select Speeches of Kossuth • Kossuth

... condition upon which a place in the senate was obtained. A supreme inquisitorial power was, in the persons of the ephori, safely committed to a few men, who were drawn by lot, and without distinction, from every order of the people: and if a contrast to this, as well as to many other articles of the Spartan policy, be required, it may be found in the general history ...
— An Essay on the History of Civil Society, Eighth Edition • Adam Ferguson, L.L.D.

... into her blazing eyes; then before that burning glare his face began to redden consciously and his gaze dropped, wavering from her face to the little blouse so long outgrown that it strained far open across the girl's round throat, doubly white by contrast below the brown line where the clear ...
— Once to Every Man • Larry Evans

... between Diogenes—whom he kept in a constant sort of mild epileptic fit, from laughter, and wine going the wrong way (for whenever Diogenes raised his glass Blake shot him with some joke)—and the Captain who watched him with the most undisguised admiration. A singular contrast, the two men! Miller, though Blake was the torment of his life, relaxed after the first quarter of all hour; and our hero, by the same time, gave himself credit for being a much greater ass than he was, for having ever thought Blake's face ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes

... Hygelac. She is praised by contrast with the antitype, Thryth, just as Beowulf was praised by contrast ...
— Beowulf • Anonymous

... loved her earliest girlish hours with excessive delight, and perhaps it is the garish contrast of the youth of the young women of this time, energetic and, from the mid-Victorian standpoint certainly, so unwomanly, that prompts this gentle and refined woman to people her gracious solitudes of spirit ...
— Adventures in the Arts - Informal Chapters on Painters, Vaudeville, and Poets • Marsden Hartley

... their way to the mighty Shway Dagohn pagoda. Thence we journeyed up the Irawaddy, and having duly paid reverence to some of the nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine pagodas of Pagan—the outcast slaves of which city seemed a strange contrast to its otherwise absolute desertion—we continued our journey by steamer as far as Mandalay. Having endured the doubtful pleasure of a jaunt in a seatless, jolting bullock-carriage—the bruises from which ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 27, March 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various

... arrived from outer darkness—a big, powerful Death's Head moth with eyes aglow, the yellow skull displayed in startling contrast on his velvet-black body. ...
— Barbarians • Robert W. Chambers

... one, or hardly any one, who would not feel his exclusion from such rights, among men of his own blood, to be intolerable. But while every one admits the democratic ideal, most men who think and nearly all the wiser of those who think, perceive its one great obstacle to lie in the contrast between the idea and the action where the obstacle of complexity—whether due to varied interests, to separate origins, or even to mere ...
— On Something • H. Belloc

... table-land, abutting with a clean precipice against the sea. This is, indeed, characteristic of all those arctic glaciers which issue from central reservoirs, or mers de glace, upon the fords or bays, and is strikingly in contrast with the dependent or hanging ...
— The Ocean and its Wonders • R.M. Ballantyne

... in the picture. It was a handsome picture. They admitted it themselves. They had urged father to come along, but he had pleaded his business, as usual. As they studied the picture they would glance across at father and realize how little the picture lost by his absence. It lost nothing but the contrast. ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes

... scientific pugilist that ever entered a ring, only wanting strength to be, I won't say what. He appears to walk before me now, as he did that evening, with his white hat, white greatcoat, thin, genteel figure, springy step, and keen, determined eye. Crosses him—what a contrast!—grim, savage Shelton, who has a civil word for nobody, and a hard blow for anybody—hard! one blow, given with the proper play of his athletic arm, will unsense a giant. Yonder individual, who strolls about with his hands behind him, supporting his brown coat lappets, under-sized, and who ...
— Lavengro - The Scholar, The Gypsy, The Priest • George Borrow

... inclined plane for more fish, amid the sniggers of spectators, for Toby's march has no claim to magnificence. He tumbles himself unceremoniously off the platform, he clambers up and kisses Sutton (keeping his eye on the basket), and all for fish. It is curious to contrast the perfunctory affection with which Toby gets over the kiss and takes his reward, with the genuine fondness of his gaze after Sutton when he leaves—with some fish remaining for other seals. Toby is a willing worker; he would gladly have the performance ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 26, February 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various

... observations of the boatswain were calculated to make me feel rather small. However, I was not offended, and I often managed to pay Mr Jonathan back in his own coin, which made him like me all the more. A great contrast to him in character was the captain's steward, Billy Wise. Billy had been to sea all his life, but no training could make a sailor of him. He was devoted to the captain, whom he had followed from ship to ship, and who took him, I truly believe, from ...
— Marmaduke Merry - A Tale of Naval Adventures in Bygone Days • William H. G. Kingston

... would certainly do; but a real Church might be able to do more. It might make its Dark Ages something more than a seed-time; it might make them the very reverse of dark. It might present its more human ideal in such abrupt and attractive a contrast to the inhuman trend of the time, as to inspire men suddenly for one of the moral revolutions of history; so that men now living shall not taste of death until they have seen ...
— Gilbert Keith Chesterton • Maisie Ward

... Hereford came in, last of all, to say a ponderous grace and take his seat on the other side of the Sheriff—the prelate's fat body showing up in goodly contrast to the ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden

... court the walls of which are covered with beautiful mosaic decorations, betraying taste and skill. The motley crew of half-drunk officials, miserably dressed, degraded, poor, in this scene of past magnificence, called up thoughts of the contrast between the government of old Mitla and the present,—of past ...
— In Indian Mexico (1908) • Frederick Starr

... make a charming and refreshing picture in her pretty gown, and with a dainty lunch covering the objectionable table. Opposite to her sat the drab young woman, silently eating while she read hurriedly from a technical magazine. The contrast between the two was so great that it ...
— Miss Pat at School • Pemberton Ginther

... in which they are borne and struggled against is characterized by tenderness, meekness, humility, trust, and hope. It is instructive in this regard to read alternately the Stoics and St. Paul, and to contrast their magnanimous, but grim and stern resignation, with the jubilant tone in which, a hundred times over, and with a vast variety of gladsome utterance, he repeats the sentiment contained in those words, "As sorrowful, yet always rejoicing." As ours is the Christian theory ...
— A Manual of Moral Philosophy • Andrew Preston Peabody

... stomach, would have swallowed him up bodily. Captain Quod appeared in a venerable dresscoat of the Melton Hunt, made in the popular reign of Mr. Errington, whose much-stained and smeared silk facings bore testimony to the good cheer it had seen. As if in contrast to the light airiness of this garment, Quod had on a tremendously large shaggy brown waistcoat, with horn buttons, a double tier of pockets, and a nick out in front. With an unfair partiality his nether man was attired in a pair of shabby ...
— Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour • R. S. Surtees

... "Oyez! Oyez!" In contrast to Del's siren tones, Frona's were purest silver as they rippled down-island through the trees. "Oyez! Oyez! Open water! Open water! And wait a minute. ...
— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London

... that words like these are in striking contrast with the usual public opinion on the subject, as well as with the mere screeching over poverty in which sentimentalists are in the habit of indulging. But it is fair to say that they entirely coincide with my own experience. The sight which struck me most in Stepney was one which ...
— Stray Studies from England and Italy • John Richard Green

... face in her hands, gazing upon the drawing. It represented the head and shoulders of a winged female; the countenance was inflexible, grim, and cadaverous. The large, lurid eyes had an owlish stare; and the outspread pinions, black as night, made the wan face yet more livid by contrast. The extended hands were like those ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans

... deadly fight—yet brings to light no friend: In travail sore hope comes not to the birth— Fear hydra-headed terror still begets;— All fancies grim I see, and straight embrace, At hope I clutch, who still eludes my grasp; Her rainbow hues adored are but a frame That serve by contrast to make fear more dark. Severus haunts me—oh, I know his love, Yet hopeless love must mate with jealousy,— While Polyeucte, who has won what he has lost, Can meet no rival with an equal eye. The fruit of rivalry is ever hate ...
— Polyuecte • Pierre Corneille

... blending any of the distinguishing and essential peculiarities of both. Frequent instances have happened where common ewes have had twins by Ancon rams, when one exhibited the complete marks and features of the ewe, the other of the ram. The contrast has been rendered singularly striking, when one short-legged and one long-legged lamb, produced at a birth, have been seen sucking the dam at the same time."—'Philosophical Transactions', 1813, Pt. ...
— The Origin of Species - From 'The Westminster Review', April 1860 • Thomas H. Huxley

... be stronger than the contrast which this flat country and strand afford, compared with the mountains and rocky coast I have lately dwelt so much among. In fancy I return to a favourite spot, where I seemed to have retired from man and wretchedness; but the din of trade drags me back to all the care I left behind, ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft

... the internal situation of the United States, we deem it equally natural and becoming to compare the present period with that immediately antecedent to the operation of the government, and to contrast it with the calamities in which the state of war still involves several of the European nations, as the reflections deduced from both tend to justify, as well as to excite a warmer admiration of our free ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 5 (of 5) • John Marshall

... hero, whose inherent tendency to take note of and admire the wonderful works of God was increased by the unflagging enthusiasm and interesting running commentary of his companion, whose flow of language and eager sympathy formed a striking contrast to the profound silence and gravity of the Dyak youth, as well as to the pathetic and affectionate ...
— Blown to Bits - The Lonely Man of Rakata, the Malay Archipelago • R.M. Ballantyne

... himself entitled to a becoming position in society who had not distinguished himself by half a dozen criminal intrigues either with the wives or daughters of his acquaintances. When we contemplate for a moment the contrast between the abandoned court of that royal profligate, and that under which we have the happiness to live—the one, a sty of infamy, licentiousness, and corruption; the other, a well, undented of purity, virtue, and honor, to whose clear mind ...
— The Evil Eye; Or, The Black Spector - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton

... yell, "It's gra-and weather, Mr. Gourlay!" The men had not spoken for years. So to shout at poor Gourlay in his black hour, from the pinnacle of civic greatness, was a fine stroke: it was gloating, it was rubbing in the contrast. The words were innocent, but that was nothing; whatever the remark, for a declared enemy to address Gourlay in his shame was an insult: that was why Wilson addressed him. There was something in the very loudness of his tones that ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown

... Ess Kay's magnificent palace in New York, with its fountain court and splendid drawing rooms. I saw her "little cottage" at Newport, and the other "cottages" and castles I had grown accustomed to there; but somehow the startling contrast between these pictures and this only made me more content with ...
— Lady Betty Across the Water • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson

... old days of merry England, when the guests were in some sort not merely the inmates, but the messmates and temporary companions of mine Host, who was usually a personage of privileged freedom, comely presence, and good-humour. Patronized by him the characters of the company were placed in ready contrast; and they seldom failed, during the emptying of a six-hooped pot, to throw off reserve, and present themselves to each other, and to their landlord, with the freedom ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott

... pleased. She had half expected the old coat of she did not know how many years' make, and there was a fierce pang of pain in her heart as she imagined Frank's cool criticisms, and saw, in fancy, the contrast between the two men. So when Judge Markham alighted at the gate, and from her window she took in at a glance his tout ensemble, the revulsion of feeling was so great that the glad tears sprang to her eyes, and a brighter, happier look broke over her face than had been there ...
— Ethelyn's Mistake • Mary Jane Holmes

... stood wide open, and through it streamed the light of a roaring fire of wood. So powerful was the contrast between the ruddy light and the cold grey scene without, that to the approaching travellers it appeared as if the whole interior of the ...
— Wrecked but not Ruined • R.M. Ballantyne

... the occasion is interwoven with the Breton's existence as unalterably as sacred and profane elements are into the occasions of his religious festivals. A feast day well and piously begun is interspersed and concluded with a gaiety and abandon which by contrast strikes a note of profanity. Yet Brittany is quite the most devotedly religious of all the French provinces, and one may see the great cathedrals filled to their uttermost with congregations including as many men ...
— Legends & Romances of Brittany • Lewis Spence

... one comes to God in the right way, as Christ Himself declares, John 3, 16: God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Now contrast these thoughts with those that grow out of the former opinion, and they will be found to be the thoughts of the foul fiend, which must offend a man, causing him either to despair, or to become reckless and ungodly, since he can expect nothing good ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente

... have seized the happy opportunity of prohibiting for ever this cruel species of reprobated villainy.—That they did not do so, will for ever diminish the luster of their other proceedings, so highly extolled, and so justly distinguished for their intrinsic value. Let us for a moment contrast the sentiments and actions of the Europeans on this subject, with those of our own countrymen. In France the warmest and most animated exertions are making, in order to introduce the entire abolition of the slave trade; and in England many of the first characters of the country advocate the ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Vol. I. Jan. 1916 • Various

... many failures with which the old Congress stands charged during the eight years of its national control, the ordinances for the disposition and government of the western lands form a most pleasant and redeeming contrast. The Congress faced an absolutely new task. There were many precedents in history for colonial holding, varying from the policy of Greece, which allowed complete severance of home ties, to that of Spain, which regarded colonies ...
— The United States of America Part I • Ediwn Erle Sparks

... by the chair, tears were flowing from the blind eyes. Canon Nicholls belonged to a generation whose emotions were kept under stern control; the tears would have come more naturally from Mark. There was a strange contrast between the academic figure of the old man in its reserved and negative bearing, seriously annoyed with himself for betraying the suffering he was enduring, and yet unable to check the flow of tears, ...
— Great Possessions • Mrs. Wilfrid Ward

... In contrast with the quiet home and school work carried on by these two women and yet to the same end are the labors of such a country pastor as Mr. Collins. For a number of years, while carrying on regular church work at Troy, he has ...
— The American Missionary - Volume 49, No. 5, May 1895 • Various

... the Folio reading are—why the earth should be so described without immediate contrast with the sky; and—how the earth could be showing a tristful visage, and the sickness of its thought. I think, if the Poet indeed made the alterations and they are not mere blunders, he must have made ...
— The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark - A Study with the Text of the Folio of 1623 • George MacDonald

... to be wise. But he could serve under no flag except that which he had pledged his honor to uphold." Passing over the quiet assumption that the North was the United States of America, which sufficiently characterizes the view of the writer, let us turn to the contrast which would at once have suggested itself even if it had not been brought forward by the eulogist of Thomas. A greater than Thomas decided the question at the same time, and decided it the other way. To Lee's vision there was but one course open to a Virginian, and the pledge that he had given ...
— The Creed of the Old South 1865-1915 • Basil L. Gildersleeve

... and by no means inelegant middle apartment of the house, a little table stood spread, looking exceeding diminutive in contrast with the wide area and high ceiling of the room. Here Mr. Rhys with a very bright look established Eleanor, and proceeded to make amends for keeping her so long from Mrs. Balliol's table. Much to her astonishment there was a piece of broiled chicken and a dish of eggs nicely cooked, ...
— The Old Helmet, Volume II • Susan Warner

... established there in easy-chairs, with the city beneath and around us. After Dr. Leete had responded to numerous questions on my part, as to the ancient landmarks I missed and the new ones which had replaced them, he asked me what point of the contrast between the new and the old city ...
— Looking Backward - 2000-1887 • Edward Bellamy

... asked me only in a hurried way how I thought the dog Argus looked. I answered gravely and in a low tone so as not to disturb the sufferer, that as I had not seen him since Tuesday, when he was, for an elderly dog, in the best of health, he certainly presented a sad contrast, but that perhaps he was better than he had been some few hours before, and that the Recluse himself would be ...
— On Nothing & Kindred Subjects • Hilaire Belloc

... glimpsed him, and had never quite shaken the memory from his mind. For there was something marked, notable, unforgettable in that lean distinctiveness. Against the sleek form of the men they met and shook hands with, he flashed out—seemed in contrast fairly electric. She saw him, just ahead of her where the crowd was thickening in the door of the supper-room, making way for Clara through the press with that exasperating solicitude of his that was half ironic. And the large broadside offered by her elegant ...
— The Coast of Chance • Esther Chamberlain

... coins, which has been engraved with accurate attention in the valuable work of Mr. Nichols, the triangular helmets, uncouth diadems, and rudely expressed countenances of our Saxon Sovereigns, exhibit, when opposed to a plate of Roman coinage, a striking contrast to the nicely delineated features of the laurelled Caesars. In no instance of comparison does the Roman art appear more conspicuous. The great quantity of coins of that scientific people which have been found at Leicester, is an additional ...
— A Walk through Leicester - being a Guide to Strangers • Susanna Watts

... court the alliance of the avowed enemies of the existing social order. This is strikingly illustrated in the political condition of the great Southern Department of the Bouches-du-Rhone. This department offers a most instructive contrast ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert

... see that in one respect at all events the two kinds of capital, which George attempts to contrast, yield interest for a precisely similar reason. Both consist of a productive power or agency which is external to the borrower himself; and it makes no difference to him whether the auxiliary power borrowed inheres in living tissue, ...
— A Critical Examination of Socialism • William Hurrell Mallock

... Kirton, who was sailing into the room with Maude. A striking contrast the one presented to the other. Maude in pink silk and a pink wreath, her haughty face raised in pride, her dark eyes flashing, radiantly beautiful. The old dowager, broad as she was high, her face ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood

... sight for which institutions essentially democratic do not prepare a spectator of either sex, and must naturally place the opinions upon which a republic is founded, and the sentiments which support it, in strong contrast with a government based and upheld ...
— Wordsworth • F. W. H. Myers

... delightfully cool in contrast with the intense heat of the day, were spent on the river. The largest canoe of the village was fitted out with a broad, comfortable seat in the stern, upon which it was possible to recline lazily while several strong-armed ...
— Nedra • George Barr McCutcheon

... was now warm, and shining brightly, forming a wondrous contrast to the dark and dismal cellars; and it was with comparatively light feelings, that I made my way up to the tower, to survey the gardens. There, I found everything quiet, and, after a few minutes, went down to ...
— The House on the Borderland • William Hope Hodgson

... is no longer on the peg. His pipes and jar of tobacco are missing. A number of wedding presents are set on a table, some unopened. The interior of the room, with its snapping fire, forms a pleasant contrast to the gloomy exterior. The day is fading into dusk. MRS. BATHOLOMMEY is at the piano, playing the wedding march from "Lohengrin." Four little girls are grouped about her, singing ...
— The Return of Peter Grimm • David Belasco

... readiest and least laborious means of inclosing the required space. The character of these garden walls is illustrated in Pl. XC, and their construction with rough lumps of crude adobe shows also the contrast between the weak appearance of this work and the more substantial effect of the masonry of the adjoining unfinished house. At the Cibolan farming pueblos inclosing walls were usually made of stone, as were also those of Tusayan. Pl. LXX indicates the manner in which the material has been used ...
— Eighth Annual Report • Various

... and elegant was already formed; She possessed several talents in perfection, particularly those of Music and drawing: Her character was gay, open, and good-humoured; and the graceful simplicity of her dress and manners formed an advantageous contrast to the art and studied Coquetry of the Parisian Dames, whom I had just quitted. From the moment that I beheld her, I felt the most lively interest in her fate. I made many enquiries respecting ...
— The Monk; a romance • M. G. Lewis

... called him "kill-joy," "graveyard," or "death's head," in their evening festivities, but Peter only puffed at his pipe good-naturedly, making no retort, and if the truth had really been spoken, not a man would have changed him a particle. His silence and seriousness added the dash of contrast needed to make the evening perfect. All joked him. The most popular verse in a class-song Watts wrote, was devoted to burlesquing his soberness, the gang never tiring of singing at ...
— The Honorable Peter Stirling and What People Thought of Him • Paul Leicester Ford

... garden-party was bright, almost perilously bright even for June; but there was exhilaration in the sight of the blue sky, dappled with fleecy white clouds, which formed such an exquisite contrast to the velvety green of the landscape, and a delicious sense of luxury in strolling about in the sun, and feeling rid at last of the ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... made in her absence. Michel Angelo might have relished the knotty, muscular development of the arm I showed her first. If there is beauty and satisfaction in coarse brute strength, this member of my master's body was worthy of all praise. On another sheet I had drawn, by way of contrast, Annie's delicately small and fair, but round, arm and hand, which might have served in her infancy as models for those of one of Raphael's cherubs. She liked them both, and said that I should do as ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various

... of twice the pickle's length, and a towering goblet of beer; in her lap she held a shivering little hound; she was in the decorous keeping of an elderly maid, and had every effect of being a gracious Fraulein. A curious contrast to her Teutonic voracity was the temperance of a young Latin swell, imaginably from Trieste, who sat long over his small coffee and cigarette, and tranquilly mused upon the pages of an Italian newspaper. At another ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... other shades in gold and silver brocade. The embroidery is worked in satin stitch with gold and silver braid, silk and cord of the same material. The border can also be worked upon the material for the centre if it is not intended to contrast with it. The pattern can also be worked entirely in silk with satin stitch. The size of the border may, of course, be increased if desired, but the third pattern in the darkest shade must, in any case, form the ...
— Beeton's Book of Needlework • Isabella Beeton

... the borders of Gruenewald descend somewhat steeply, here and there breaking into crags; and this shaggy and trackless country stands in a bold contrast to the cultivated plain below. It was traversed at that period by two roads alone; one, the imperial highway, bound to Brandenau in Gerolstein, descended the slope obliquely and by the easiest gradients. The other ran like a fillet across the very forehead of the hills, dipping into savage gorges, ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... lightly chatting while they covertly listened. At the other end, with Irby and Mandeville at his two elbows, General Brodnax conversed with Kincaid and Bartleson, the weather-faded red and gray of whose uniforms showed in odd contrast to the smartness ...
— Kincaid's Battery • George W. Cable

... dejection was in strange contrast to his general hilarity. Silent and tearful, he stood upon an ice-bound rock, straining his eyes across the boundless vista of the mysterious territory. "It cannot be!" he exclaimed. "We must somehow have mistaken our bearings. True, we have ...
— Off on a Comet • Jules Verne

... figure neared them. It was indeed red up to the face, which seemed white in contrast. Yet only in general shape and action ...
— Wildfire • Zane Grey

... rebellion; in reference to myself, it is an error and missing of my true goal; and in reference to the straight standard and law of duty, it is, according to the last of the three words for sin in the text, 'iniquity,' or, literally, something twisted or distorted. It is thus brought into contrast with the right line of the plain, straight path in which we ought to walk. We have the same metaphor in our own language. We talk about things being right and wrong, by which we mean, in the one case, parallel with the rigid law of ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... marks contrast in attitude of Irish Members then and now. Still fighting for Home Rule they stopped short of no outrage upon order, systematically and successfully obstructing public business. Military Service Bill offers enticing opportunities ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, January 19, 1916 • Various

... read some of the treatises on medical galvanism that were published at about this period, and contrast their positive statements of cures effected and results anticipated with the position now attained by electricity ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 344, August 5, 1882 • Various

... or reason. An exact account of this conference remains, and may be regarded as a great curiosity. The members of the committee in their reasonings discover judgment, knowledge, elocution: Lord Broghill in particular exerts himself on this memorable occasion. But what a contrast when we pass to the protector's replies! After so singular a manner does nature distribute her talents, that, in a nation abounding with sense and learning, a man who, by superior personal merit alone, had made his way to supreme dignity, and had even obliged ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part E. - From Charles I. to Cromwell • David Hume

... his, a purser in the navy who lived at Southsea, was a Lieutenant Oxbelly, who, with the ship's company, which had been collected, received our hero as their captain and owner upon his arrival on board. There certainly was no small contrast between our hero's active slight figure and handsome person, set-off with a blue coat, something like the present yacht-club uniform, and that of his second in command, who waddled to the side to receive him. He was ...
— Mr. Midshipman Easy • Captain Frederick Marryat

... House" (Chapter X.) I was unacquainted with Mr. Percy Gardner's essay, "The Palaces of Homer" (Journal of Hellenic Studies, vol. iii. pp. 264- 282). Mr. Gardner says that Dasent's plan of the Scandinavian Hall "offers in most respects not likeness, but a striking contrast to the early Greek hall." Mr. Monro, who was not aware of the parallel which I had drawn between the Homeric and Icelandic houses, accepted it on evidence more recent than that of Sir George Dasent. Cf. his Odyssey, vol. ii. ...
— Homer and His Age • Andrew Lang

... of knowing him further. I had not formed the highest opinion of his liberality. But on entering the hall my friends and I soon forgot everything but the speaker. The dim-lit hall, the handful audience, the contrast of both with the illuminated chapel and ocean multitude assembled overhead, bespeak painfully the estimation in which the great cause of peace is held in Christendom. I wish all Christendom could have ...
— Captains of Industry - or, Men of Business Who Did Something Besides Making Money • James Parton

... creation legend. Here we find complete understanding of the woman's part; she is the one who gives life; she is the active partner. The Sky-father is represented as her agent, her helper. Why should this be? Contrast this idea with the patriarchal creation story of ...
— The Position of Woman in Primitive Society - A Study of the Matriarchy • C. Gasquoine Hartley

... Mr. Lukisch sat down in a rickety chair and gazed at the clock, face to face, with contemplative satisfaction. Stepfather Time would have been interested in the contrast between those two physiognomies. The clock's face, benign and bland, would have deceived him. But, innocent though he was in the ways of evil, the man's face might ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams

... what is best worth seeking, a man can not go wrong by "falling in love" with the works of a relatively limited number of authors who kindle him personally. It is all right to widen the field occasionally, for diversion, for contrast, for sharpening style, and for balancing of ideas, but strength comes of finding a main line and holding to it. No man can read a book with sympathetic understanding without taking from it something that makes him more complex and ...
— The Armed Forces Officer - Department of the Army Pamphlet 600-2 • U. S. Department of Defense

... full of prosaic detail, which myths studiously eschew: it abounds with practical instruction of the simplest and purest kind; whereas myths teach by allegory. Even in its miraculous element it stands to some extent in contrast with all mythologies, where the marvelous has ever a predominant character of grotesqueness which is absent from New Testament miracles. (This Strauss himself admits, Leben Jesu, 1-67.) Simple earnestness, fidelity, painstaking accuracy, pure love of truth, ...
— Fables of Infidelity and Facts of Faith - Being an Examination of the Evidences of Infidelity • Robert Patterson

... observe in this antinomy a very remarkable contrast. The very same grounds of proof which established in the thesis the existence of a supreme being, demonstrated in the antithesis—and with equal strictness—the non-existence of such a being. We found, first, that a necessary ...
— The Critique of Pure Reason • Immanuel Kant

... immense excitement. The dramatic contrast of the scene he had just left with that which he was witnessing overpowered him. He had seen one end of the chain of life, the dying bishop in the Tower, in his rags; now he was to see the other end, the Sovereign at whose will he was there, in all the magnificence of a pageant. The ...
— The King's Achievement • Robert Hugh Benson

... a happy hour, and the memory of it remained all the more vividly because of the contrast which it afforded to the dark days which followed. At twelve o'clock the same evening, Mr Bertrand took up his candle and went the usual tour of inspection through the house. He peered into the drawing-room, ...
— Sisters Three • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey

... of logic might be called essential, in contrast with the accidental general validity of such propositions as 'All men are mortal'. Propositions like Russell's 'axiom of reducibility' are not logical propositions, and this explains our feeling that, even if they ...
— Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus • Ludwig Wittgenstein

... covered abundantly with elegant drooping clusters of flowers, and as such it has been much admired. When planted out in a warmish greenhouse and allowed to twine at will around an upright pillar, it is seen to the best advantage, and, though not showy, makes a pleasing contrast with other gayly tinted flowers. It is so unlike any other ornamental plant in cultivation, that it ought to become more widely known than it appears ...
— Scientific American Supplement, Vol. XV., No. 388, June 9, 1883 • Various

... during the Jacksonian era from thirty to forty dollars, while that of the older Southern States like Virginia and Maryland was not half so great, and the average for the country as a whole fell much below that of the South. There was thus a marked contrast between the fortune of the average Middle States man and that ...
— Expansion and Conflict • William E. Dodd

... blocking the trail. Looking up, she saw they were at the head of a canyon that yawned beneath and widened its gray-walled, green-patched slopes down to a black forest of fir. The drab monotony of the foothills made contrast below the forest, and away in the distance, rosy and smoky, lay the desert. Retracting her gaze, Madeline saw pack-horses cross an open space a mile below, and she thought she saw the stag-hounds. Stewart's dark eyes searched the slopes high up along ...
— The Light of Western Stars • Zane Grey

... her sail dropped and her nose just touching the edge of the float, was quite hidden by this shadow of the island, which was all the darker in contrast with the brilliant moonlight lying on the water ...
— Wyn's Camping Days - or, The Outing of the Go-Ahead Club • Amy Bell Marlowe

... girls set off together. They made a contrast which must have been discernible to the eyes of all those who saw them: Aneta the very essence of elegance; Maggie spotlessly neat, but, compared to her companion, downright plain. Aneta was tall and slim; Maggie was short. Nevertheless, ...
— The School Queens • L. T. Meade

... generations been more firmly implanted in England than anywhere in Germany, except perhaps in Vienna, and, since those three years in Italy, Handel's musical outlook had become completely Italian, as his music shows. The few attempts which he made at German Church music present a curious contrast of style; one could hardly believe them to be the work of that Handel whom we have adopted as our own. German music at that date was provincial; Italian music was the music of the great world, because it was the music of ...
— Handel • Edward J. Dent

... of the sand-trap, the memory of Watson's Hotel, with its swinging punkahs, white-robed attendants, and the sallow-faced Armenian, rose up in my mind as vividly as a photograph, and I burst into a loud fit of laughter. The contrast was too absurd! ...
— The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition • Rudyard Kipling

... me to you. And now I recollect that my uncle must have paid his last visit to Edinburgh just before he made his will; and there he would see this young man filling his place in the world so well, while I was behaving so foolishly. The contrast must have struck him, and he certainly has put an end to everything between Mr. ...
— Mr. Hogarth's Will • Catherine Helen Spence

... point out, in contrast, the precious diplomas which were adorning his desk, the metal vases and other trophies won in the fairs by the descendants of his ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... little gossip, too, Le Prun's niece, is a charming creature—an exquisitely contrived contrast. By my word, this place deserves its name—is it not truly the Chateau ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various

... resemblance of its extremities to those of the Turtles may lead us to conjecture: its movements, however, must have been very awkward on land; and its long neck must have impeded its progress through the water, presenting a strong contrast to the organisation which so admirably fits the Ichthyosaurus to cut through the waves." As its respiratory organs were such that it must of necessity have required to obtain air frequently, we may conclude ...
— The Ancient Life History of the Earth • Henry Alleyne Nicholson

... towards her. It was very pale now, but Florence Raynor was thinking also how very handsome it was and in what contrast to that of the fellow who had ...
— Two Boys and a Fortune • Matthew White, Jr.

... act by no means Christianlike, he said to me: "Father, are not these Christians? and, if so, how can they do this?" I was obliged to satisfy him by making a distinction between the living and the dead faith, and the appreciation and estimation of the things of God in contrast to the inclination and affection for earthly things, which is so common among our Christians of long standing—to the great scandal of the new converts, as ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898: Volume XII, 1601-1604 • Edited by Blair and Robertson

... more striking or pretty than the contrast between James and Angela thus grouped. On the one hand, blond tresses, alabaster tints, rosy cheeks, infantile grace and elegance; on the other, the bronze tint, ebony locks, and manner ...
— A Romance of the West Indies • Eugene Sue

... stimulated by anxiety. One who understood the character of the individual, and who was acquainted with the past, might have suspected, by this indifference on the part of the Patroon, placed as it was in such a singular contrast to a sort of mysterious animation which enlivened a countenance whose ordinary expression was placid content, that the young suitor thought less than formerly of the assets of old Etienne, and more of the secret pleasure he found ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper

... Shelley is returned, and the letters, in the same parcel—but my letter goes by the post as you see. Is there contrast enough between the two rival female personages of 'Pomfret.' I fancy not. Helena should have been more 'demonstrative' than she appeared in Italy, to secure the 'new modulation' with Walter. But you will not think it a strong book, I am sure, with all the good ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett

... with their feet dangling over the edge of the ledge before the cave, they were at liberty to satisfy their longing to take their fill of the beauty outspread before them. Perhaps it was by contrast with the monotony of the forest that the scene below them seemed to them all to be the most beautiful that had ever gladdened the eyes of men. Imagine a valley about five miles in length, narrowing at each end, and opening out about the centre to a width of two miles, the sides of grass sloping ...
— In Search of the Okapi - A Story of Adventure in Central Africa • Ernest Glanville



Words linked to "Contrast" :   comparing, differentiate, tell apart, orbit, picture taking, distinction, photography, conflict, reach, point of no return, differentiation, compass, beholding, ambit, separate, comparison, counterpoint, tell, opposition, secern, severalize, foil, counterbalance, differ, oppose, oppositeness, secernate, seeing, visual perception, scope, severalise, Rubicon, distinguish, range



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