continge 
continget (kgn-tinj'), v. i. [< L. contingere, 
touch: see contingent.'} To touch ; reach ; hap- 
1228 
In cantinrient matter, an Indefinite is understood as a 
particular. ' Whateley, Logic, II. ii. 2. 
Contingent remainder, truth, etc. See the nouns. 
= Syn. 1 and 2. Chance, Casual, etc. See accidental. 
II. n. 1. An event dependent either upon 
. . . 
contingency, contingence (kon-tm jen-si, _ 
-jens), H. ; pi. contingencies, contingences (-siz, acc jdent or upon the will of a finite free agent; 
-jen-sez). [= F. contingence = Sp. Pg. contingen- an eveu t no t determinate by any rule. 
c! = It. contingenza, < ML. contingenUa, < L. con- Hjg underetomling could almos t pierce into future cm- 
tingcn(t-)s: see contingent.] 1. I he mode ot tingents. South, Sermons. 
existence of that which is contingent ; the pos- An cmtingents have t ] le i r necessary causes, but are 
sibility that that which happens might not have ca n e d contingents in respect of other events upon which 
happened; that mode of existence, or of com- they do not depend. Hobbes. 
ing to pass which does not involve necessity ; The conviction of this impossibility led men to give up 
a happening by chance or free will ; the being the prescience of God in respect ^" 
true of a proposition which would not under all Slr w - **"" 
circumstances be true. 
. 
2. That which falls to one in a division or ap- 
. . 
Their credulities assent unto any prognosticks which, portionment among a number; a quota; spe- 
nsidering the contingency in events, are only in the pre- cifically, the share or proportion ot troops to D6 
furnished by one of several contracting powers ; 
share actually furnished : as, the Turkish 
science of God. Sir T. Broume, Vulg. Err. 
I deny not but, for great causes, some opinions are to be 
quitted : but . . . how few do forsake any ; and when any 
do, oftentimes they choose the wrong side, am' 
take the righter, do it so by contingency. 
Jer. Taylor, Works (ed. 1835), Ded., I. 4. 
It is a blind contingence of events. 
Dryden, Amphitryon. 
Aristotle says, we are not ... to build certain rules 
upon the contingency of human actions. 
South, Works, I. i. 
The contingency of the future is thus really reduced to 
the necessity of the past. Sir W. Hamilton, Reid, note U. 
What is Contingency? It is the ideal admission that 
certain factors now present may be on any other occasion 
absent ; and when they are absent the result must be dif- 
ferent from what it is now. 
G. H. Lewes, Probs. of Life and Mind, I. i. 170 a. 
2. A casualty; an accident; a fortuitous event, 
or one which may or may not occur 
Cl 
arm 
Mir ....... ~ , , 
The remarkable position of the queen rendering her COntingentneSS (kon-tin' jent-nes), n. The 
death a most important contingency. llallam. state of being contingent ; fortuitousness. 
The superiority of force is often checked by the pro- COntinua, n. Plural of continuum. 
verbial contingencies of war. ^ ^ _ COntinuablC (kon-tin'u-a-bl), a. [= OF. con- 
"itions. tinwable, continual, = It'.' continuabile; as con- 
tinue + -able.] That may be continued. [Bare.] 
Their President seems a bad edition of a Polish King. 
He may be elected from four years to four years, for life. 
'd they'that contingent in the Crimean war. 
They sunk considerable sums into their own coffers, and 
refused to send their contingent to the emperor. 
Swift, Conduct of Allies. 
France has contributed no small contingent of those 
whose minds, even in their lightest moods, pure. 
Marg. Fuller, Woman in 19th Cent., p. 284. 
They were attacked by the rebels of the Gwalior con- 
tingent. W. H. Russell, Diary in India, II. 276. 
Future contingent, something which may or may not 
be brought about in the future by the voluntary action of 
a man or men : a phrase used in the discussion of divine 
prescience. 
contingently (kon-tin'jent-li), adv. Fortuitous- 
ly ; by possibility ; as may happen. 
Albeit there are many things which seem unto us to be 
as, "the point of contingency" J. Gregory. 
Sumner, True Grandeur of Nal 
If no blow is ever to be struck till we have a cut-and- 
dried scheme ready to meet every contingency, we shall 
never have any contingency to meet. 
E. A. Freeman, Amer. Lects., p. 444. ., 
. . , ,,. ,, Reason and experience prove to us that a chief magis- 
3f. A touching ; a falling together ;^ contact : trate 80 continuable is an officer for life. 
Jr./erson, Correspondence, II. 266. 
. con- 
?. conti- 
continuous 
_ tion 
_, ),"proVrppr?of"L" V coStei^re,' pp. "con- or cessation; not intermitting ; unceasing f con- 
tactus, touch, meet, attain to, happen : see tinuous. 
contact."] I. a. 1. Not existing or occurring 
through necessity ; due to chance or to a free 
agent ; accidentally existing or true ; hence, 
without a known or apparent cause or reason, 
or caused by something which would not in 
every case act ; dependent upon the will of a 
human being, or other finite free agent. 
continuation 
a course or series; permanence, as of habits, 
condition, or abode ; a state of lasting ; continu- 
ation; constancy; perseverance; duration. 
Patient continuance in well-doing. Rom. ii. 7. 
They are cloy'd 
With long continuance in a settled place. 
Shak., 1 Hen. VI., ii. 5. 
No more now, but desiring a Continuance of your Bless- 
ing and Prayers, I rest your dutiful Son, J. H. 
Hmcell, Letters, I. v. 32. 
Nature ... is entirely opposed to the continuance of 
paths through her forests. Harper's Mag., LXXI. 221. 
2. Uninterrupted succession or continuation; 
indefinite prolongation ; perpetuation. 
I make not love to the continuance of days, but to the 
goodness of them. Bacon, Death. 
They made suite to the GoV to have some portion of land 
given them for continuance, and not by yearly lotto. 
Bradford, Plymouth Plantation, p. 167. 
The brute immediately regards his own preservation or 
the continuance of his species. Addison, Spectator. 
3. Progression of time. 
In thy book all my members were written, which in con- 
tinuance were fashioned. Ps. cxxxix. 16. 
4. In law : (a) The deferring of a trial or hear- 
ing, or the fixing of a future day for the parties 
to a suit to appear or to be heard. Specifical- 
ly (&) In the United States, the deferring of 
a trial or suit from one stated term of the court 
to another. 
It is on account of the long intervals between terms that 
continuances (which now constitute the chief means of the 
" postponement swindle") are so eagerly sought. 
The Century, XXX. 331. 
5f. Continuity; resistance to a separation of 
parts; a holding together ; ductility. 
Wool, tow, cotton, and raw silk have, beside the desire 
of continuance in regard to the tenuity of their thread, a 
greediness of moisture. Bacon, Nat. Hist., 845. 
= Syn. 1 and 2. Continuity, etc. See continuation. 
continuant (kon-tin'u-ant), . [< L. continu- 
an(t-)s, ppr. of continuare, continue : see con- 
tinue.'} In math., a determinant all whose con- 
stituents vanish, except those in the principal 
diagonal and the two bordering minor diago- 
nals, while all those of one of these minor di- 
agonals are equal to negative unity: as, 
a 1 
1 b 
1 

He that is of a merry heart hath a continual feast. 
Prov. xv. 15. 
When any event takes place of which we do not discern 
Full of repentance, 
Continual meditations, tears, and sorrows. 
Shak., Hen. VIII., iv. 2. 
A sweet attractive kinde of grace, 
A full assurance given by lookes, 
Continuall comfort in a face. 
If. Roydon, Astrophel. 
the cause, [or] why it should have happened in this man- 2. Of frequent recurrence ; often repeated ; 
ner, or at^this moment rather than another, it is called a ver y frequent : as, the charitable man has con- 
tinual applications for alms. 
Yet because this widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, 
lest by her continual coming she weary me. Luke xviii. 5. 
Continual claim. See claimi. Continual fever, or 
continued fever, a fever which, while it may vary some- 
what in intensity, neither intermits nor exhibits such de- 
cided and regular fluctuations as characterize typical re- 
mittent fever. Continual proportionals, the terms of 
a geometrical progression. = Syn. Incessant, Perpetual, 
gent event, or an event without a cause : as, for ex- 
e, the falling of a leaf on a particular spot, or the 
turning up of a certain number when dice are thrown. 
Is. Taylor, Elements of Thought, p. 69. 
Mathematical propositions become inexact or contin- 
gent whenever they are applied to cases involving con- 
ditions not included in the terms. 
G. H. Lewes, Probs. of Life and Mind, II. ii. 60. 
Of all regions it [the antarctic] is the one where the 
physical conditions are most uniform and least under the 
influence of contingent circumstances. 
Thi 
depei 
.... etc. (see incessant), constant, uninterrupted, unintermit- 
J. Croll, Climate and Cosmology, p. 206. ted, interminable, endless. 
ings, as objects of scientific cognition, are contingent, Continually (kon-tin'u-al-i), adv. [< ME. con- 
ndent not grounds of their own existence. tinuely, -elliche; < continual ~r- -ty^.~\ 1. With- 
Adamson, Philos. of Kant, iii. ou t cessation or intermission ; unceasingly. 
2. Dependent upon a foreseen possibility ; pro- 
visionally liable to exist, happen, or take effect 
A count ry [Persia] where the open air continuall,/ in- 
vites abroad, adorned with almost perpetual verdure, 
in the future ; conditional : as, a contingent re- an d hemmed in by lofty blue mountains. 
mainder after the payment of debts ; a journey 
contingent upon the receipt of advices ; a con- 
tingent promise. 
If a contingent legacy be left to any one when he attains 
the age of twenty-one, and he dies before that time, it is 
a lapsed legacy. Blackstone, Com. 
She possessed only a contingent reversion of the crown. 
Prescott, Ferd. and Isa., i. 3. 
Contingent cause, a cause which may or may not act. 
It would puzzle the greatest philosopher ... to give 
any tolerable account how any knowledge whatsoever can 
N. A. Rev., CXL. 330. 
2. Very often; at regular or frequent inter- 
vals ; from time to time ; habitually. 
Thou shalt eat bread at my table continually. 
2 Sam. ix. 7. 
He comes continually to Piecorner ... to buy a saddle. 
Shak., 2 Hen. IV., ii. 1. 
If you are lost in his city (and you are pretty sure to 
be lost there, continually), a Venetian will go with you 
wherever you wish. Hotvells, Venetian Life, xx. 
= Syn. Continuously, constantly, incessantly, perpetually. 
. , , , . 
certainly and infallibly foresee an event through uncertain COntinUalneSS (kon-tin'u-al-nes), TO. The char- 
and contingent causes. TUlotnon, Sermons, xlviii. acter of being continual' " 
Contingent line, in dialing, the intersection of the plane continuance (kon-tin'u-ans), n. (X ME. contin- 
of the dial with a plane parallel to the equinoctial. Con- tin , IHrf < OF* "rnntimianre rnnliniifwrp Sr, 
tlngent matter, in logic, the matter of a proposition ' "'^ e ' T 4. / !, connnuence op. 
, , 
which is true, but not necessarily so. 
When is a proposition said to consist of matter contin- 
gentl Blundeville, Arte of Logicke (1599), iii. 3. 
T 4. 
(pbs.) It. contmuanza, < L. conttnttan(t-)s, con- 
turning: see continuant.'} 1. A holding on, re- 
mainiug, or abiding in a particular state, or in 
Also cumulant. 
continuatet (kon-tin'u-at), v. t. [< L. continua- 
tus, pp. of continuare, join together, make con- 
tinuous : see continue.] To join closely together. 
Abp. Potter. 
continuatet (kon-tin'u-at), a. [< L. continuatus, 
pp. : see the verb.] i. Immediately united ; 
closely joined. 
We are of him and in him, even as though our very flesh 
and bones should be made continuate with his. 
Hooker, Eccles. Polity, v. 56. 
A general cause, a continuate cause, an inseparable ac- 
cident, to all men, is discontent, care, misery. 
Burton, Anat. of Mel., p. 170. 
2. Uninterrupted; unbroken; continuing for 
an indefinite length of time ; continued. 
O, 'tis a dangerous and a dreadful thing 
To leave a sure pace on continuate earth. 
Chapman, Byron's Conspiracy, i. 1. 
Untirable and continuate goodness. Shak.,1. of A., i. 1. 
continuatelyt (kon-tin'u-at-li), adv. Continu- 
ously ; without interruption. 
The water ascends gently and by intermissions, but it 
falls continiMtely. Bp. Wilkins, Archimedes, xv. 
continuation (kon-tin-u-a'shon), n. [= F. con- 
tinuation = Sp. continuacion = Pg. continuaqao 
= It. continuazione, < L. continuatio(n-), < conti- 
nuare, pp. continuatus, continue: see continue.] 
1. The act or fact of continuing or prolonging ; 
extension of existence in a line or series. 
These things must needs be the works of Providence for 
the continuation of the species. Ray. 
Preventing the continuation of the royal line. 
Macaulay, Hist. Eng., xxiv. 
2. Extension or carrying on to a further point ; 
the thing continued: as, the continuation of a 
story. 3. Extension in space; a carrying on 
in length; prolongation: as, the continuation 
of a line in surveying. 4. In matJi., a process 
in fluxions equivalent to integration by parts. 
5. pi. Trousers. [Slang.] Continuation day. 
Same as canta mn ilai/ (which see, under contango). Con- 
tinuation Of days. In Scots law, the summons in a 
civil process formerly authorized the defender to be cited 
to appear on a certain day, with continuation of days, 
and he might be brought into court either on the day 
named or later, as the party chose, unless the diet were 
forced on by protestation. = Syn. Continuation, Continu- 
ance, Continuity, Continnonsness, prolongation, protrac- 
