INCONSISTENT • FREE-TRANSLATOR.COM • Definition of Inconsistent

Translators

Dictionaries

Courses

Other

Home

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/ˌɪnkənsˈɪstənt/ Listen

adjective

Inconsistent adj.

Not consistent; showing inconsistency; irreconcilable; contradictory, or having contradictory implications; discordant; at variance, esp. as regards character, sentiment, or action; incompatible; incongruous. "Compositions of this nature... show that wisdom and virtue are far from being inconsistent with politeness and good humor."

Not exhibiting uniformity of sentiment, steadiness to principle, etc.; unequal; fickle; changeable. "Ah, how unjust to nature, and himself, Is thoughtless, thankless, inconsistent man."

Synonyms: Incompatible; incongruous; irreconcilable; discordant; repugnant; contradictory. Inconsistent, Incongruous, Incompatible. Things are incongruous when they are not suited to each other, so that their union is unbecoming; inconsistent when they are opposed to each other, so as render it improper or wrong; incompatible when they can not coexist, and it is therefore impossible to unite them. Habitual levity of mind is incongruous with the profession of a clergyman; it is inconsistent with his ordination vows; it is incompatible with his permanent usefulness. Incongruity attaches to the modes and qualities of things; incompatibility attaches to their essential attributes; inconsistency attaches to the actions, sentiments, etc., of men.

See images of 'Inconsistent'

Etymology of 'Inconsistent'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

Share |

"Inconsistent" Quotes from Famous Books

... imagine anything more inconsistent and self-delusive than these ravings of our friend? Farther on in this very lengthy epistle we come first of all once more to the ...

— Frederick Chopin as a Man and Musician - Volume 1-2, Complete • Frederick Niecks

... who encountered them in the hall of debate or in the field of battle. These fanatics brought to civil and military affairs a coolness of judgment and immutability of purpose which some writers have thought inconsistent with their religious zeal, but which were in fact the necessary effects of it. The intensity of their feelings on one subject made them tranquil on every other. One overpowering sentiment had subjected to itself ...

— The Best of the World's Classics, Vol. V (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland III • Various

... this campaign was the issuing of a Puritan manifesto in '84, consisting of a brief, well-written pamphlet of a hundred and fifty pages under the title "A Learned Discourse of Ecclesiastical Government," making the inconsistent claim of desiring a return to the Primitive and Scriptural model, and at the same time of advocating an original scheme, "one not yet handled." It was practically a demand for the Presbyterian system of pastorate and government. To this Dr. Bridges replies with a tremendous ...

— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson

— Secret Armies - The New Technique of Nazi Warfare • John L. Spivak

... the facts of the narrative thus point to Ticonderoga, and render it indisputable that this was the scene of the first of the many recorded conflicts on this memorable lake. We should not have entered into this discussion so fully, had not several writers, not well informed, expressed views wholly inconsistent with ...

— Voyages of Samuel de Champlain, Vol. 2 • Samuel de Champlain

More quotes...