incomportable 
portabile, incomportevole ; as in-* + comporta- 
lie. Intolerable; unbearable. 
It was no new device to shove men out of their places 
by contriving incomportable hardships to be put upon 
them Roger North, Examen, p. 39. 
inCOm P OSedt(in-kom-pozd'),a. [<toJ + H- 
posed.} Discomposed; disordered; disturbed, 
With faltering speech and visage incoii.po.ed. 
Miltm, P. L., ii. 989. 
3042 
incomprehensibly (in-kom-pre-hen'si-bli), adv. 
In an incomprehensible manner; to an extent 
or a degree which is incomprehensible. 
Thou art that incomprehensibly glorious and infinite 
self-existing Spirit, from eternity to eternity, in and from 
whom all things are. Bp. Hall, Holy Rapture. 
incomprehension (in-kom-pre-hen'shon), n. [< 
in-3 + comprehension.} Lack of comprehen- 
sion or understanding. Bacon. 
incomposite (in-kom-poz'it), a. [= Sp. incom- 
pueslo = Pg. incomposto, < L. incompositus, not 
well put together, < in- priv. + compositus, 
put together: see composite.} Not composite ; 
uncompounded; simple. incomposite numbers. 
Same as prime numbers. See prime. 
incompossibility (in-kgm-pos-i-bil'i-ti), n. 
[= Sp. incomposibilidad = Pg. incompossibili- 
dade = It. incompossibilita ; as incompossible + 
-ity: see Ability.} The state or condition of be- 
ing incompossible ; incapability of coexistence ; 
incompatibility. [Bare.] 
However, you grant there is not an incompossibility be- 
twixt large revenews and an humble sociablenesse ; yet 
you say it is rare. Bp. llnll, Def. of Humb. Remonst., 13. 
"It is yet unknown to men," Leibnitz says on one oc- 
casion, '-what is the reason of the incompossibility ol dif- 
ferent things" (i. e. the impossibility of different things 
existing together). E. Caird, Philos. of Kant, p. 83. 
incompossible (in-kom-pos'i-bl), a. [= F. 
incompossible = Sp. incomposible = Pg. incom- 
possivel = It. incompossibile ; as in- 3 + compos- 
sible.} Not possible to be or to be true toge- 
ther; incapable of coexistence; incompatible. 
[Bare.] 
Ambition and faith, believing God and seeking of our- 
selves, are incompetent, and totally incompossible. 
Jer. Taylor, Works (ed. 1835), I. 167. 
If there be any positive existences which are incompos- 
sible i. e. which cannot be combined without opposition 
and conflict . . . then it is obvious that all positive ex- 
istence cannot be combined in God. 
E. Caird, Philos. of Kant, p. 84. 
not including or comprising enough; unduly 
limited or restricted. 
A most incomprehensive&nd inaccurate title 
f- ^rton, Hist. Eng. Poetry, IV. 4. 
incomprehensively (in-kom-pre-hen[siv-li), 
a< J v _ Not comprehensively; to a limited ex- 
tent 
i nc0 niprehensiveness (in-kom-pre-hen'siv- 
nes ) n . The quality of being incomprehen- 
g j ve _ 
jncompressibility (in-kom-pres-i-bil'i-ti). n. 
[_ p7 i ncom pressibilM = Pg. incompfessibili- 
uuud; as incompressible + -ily: see -bility.} The 
quality of being incompressible or of resisting 
compression. 
incompressible (in-kom-pres'i-bl), a. [= F. 
incompressible = Pg. incompressivel ; as in- 8 + 
compressible.} Not compressible ; incapable of 
being reduced in volume by pressure. 
incompressibleness (in-kom-pres'i-bl-nes), . 
Incompressibility. 
incomputable (in-kpm-pu'ta-bl), a. [< ML. in- 
computabilis, not computable, < L. in- priv. + 
computabilis, computable : see computable.} Not 
computable; incapable of being computed or 
reckoned. 
inconcealable (in-kpn-se'la-bl), a. [< in-S + 
concealable.} Not to be concealed, hidden, or 
kept secret; unconcealable. 
The inconcealable imperfections of ourselves . . . will 
hourly prompt us our corruption. 
Sir T. Browne, Vulg. Err., vii. 10. 
priv. + compreltensux, pp. of comprehendere, 
comprehend: see comprehend.} Not compre- 
hended, or incomprehensible. 
Thou must prove immense, 
Incowjirchence in virtue. Marnton, Sophonisba, v. 2. 
incomprehensibility (in-kom-pre-hen-si-biri- 
ti), n. [= F. incomprehensibilite = Sp. incom- 
prensibilidad = Pg. incomprehensibilidade = It. 
incomprensibilita, < ML. incompreliensibilita(t^)s, 
< L. incomprehensibilis, that may not be seized: 
see incomprehensible.} The character of being 
incomprehensible, in either sense of that word. 
The constant, universal sense of all antiquity unani- 
mously confessing an incomprehensibility in many of the 
articles of the Christian faith. South, Sermons, III. 217. 
Incomprehensibility implies the negation of any limit in 
substantial presentiality or presence (as the Schools say) 
so far as affects the mode of the Divine existence in itself, 
as well as all things real and possible. The incomprehen- 
sibility of God is sometimes expressed by this formula, 
"God is in all and beyond all." . . . But incomprehensi- 
bility must not be confused with ubiquity, for the first is 
essential to God, the latter is contingent on the existence 
of place : in other words, on creation. 
Bp. Forbes, Explanation of the Nicene Creed, p. 50. 
incomprehensible (in-kom-pre-hen'si-bl), a. [< 
ME. ineomprelicnsibele, < OF. 'incomprehensible, 
F. incomprehensible = Pg. incomprehensivel = Sp. 
incompressible = It. incomprensibile, < L. incom- 
prehensibilis, that cannot be seized, or compre- 
hended, < in- priv. + compreJicnsibilis, compre- 
hensible: see comprehensible.} 1. Not to be 
comprehended or comprised within limits ; il- 
limitable. 
Presence everywhere is the sequel of an infinite and in- 
comprehensible substance. Hooker, Eccles. Polity, v. 65. 
The Father incomprehensible, the Son incomprehensible: 
and the Holy Ghost incomprehensible. . . . Also there are 
not three incomprehensible^, nor three uncreated: but one 
uncreated, and one incomprehetisible. Athanasian Creed. 
2. Not to be comprehended or understood; 
that cannot be grasped by the mind. That is in- 
comprehensible which may be known or believed as a fact, 
but of which the mode of existence or of operation, or of 
coining to pass, cannot be understood. 
Surely Socrates was right in his opinion, that philoso- 
phers are but a soberer sort of madmen, busying them- 
selves in things totally incomprehensible, or which, if they 
could be comprehended, would be found not worthy the 
trouble of discovery. Irving, Knickerbocker, p. 50. 
Strength is incomprehensible by weakness. 
Hawthorne, Seven Gables, xi. 
incomprehensibleness (in-kom-pre-hen'si-bl- 
nes), n. Incomprehensibility. 
The distance, obscurity, incomprehensibleness of the joys 
of another world. Stillingfteet, Works, IV. iv. 
F. inconcevabilite = It. inconcepibilita; as in- 
conceivable + -ity.} The quality of being in- 
conceivable. 
That inconceivability is the criterion of necessity is mani- 
festly erroneous. 
Hamilton, Note to Reid's Intellectual Powers, iv. 3. 
The inconceivability of its negation is the test by which 
we ascertain whether a given belief invariably exists or not. 
H. Spencer, Psychology (1856), 7. 
The history of science teems with inconceivabilities 
which have been conquered, and supposed necessary 
truths which have first ceased to be thought necessary, 
then to be thought true, and have finally come to be 
deemed impossible. 
J. S. MM, Examination of Hamilton, ix. 
The test Of inconceivability, the unimaginablencss or 
incredibility of the contradictory opposite of a proposi- 
tion, regarded as the absolute criterion of truth, or uni- 
versal postulate. This test had long been used and known 
by this name, but had been discredited, when brought 
again into notice by the advocacy of Herbert Spencer. 
The doctrine is : first, that there is a fixed set of first prin- 
ciples ; second, that recognition of the truth of these is at- 
tained by the principle of excluded middle, that if one 
proposition is false its opposite must be true ; and third, 
that inconceivability is a guaranty of impossibility, or at 
least of a congenital necessity of thought. To understand 
the real significance of the doctrine, it is to be remarked 
that it conflicts with the following opinions, more or less 
widely held : first, that there is no fixed set of first truths, 
but that reasoners must under different circumstances 
set out with different assumptions ; second, that the evi- 
dence of mathematical truth is a positive perception of 
relations, and not a feeling of dilemma or powerlessness ; 
third, that the principle of excluded middle plays but a 
small part in reasoning, and that even the principle of 
contradiction, with which the former is often confounded, 
is only of secondary importance; and fourth, that incon- 
ceivability, as ascertained by direct trial, is exceedingly de- 
ceptive evidence that a proposition is Impossible or likely 
long to remain incredible. 
inconceivable (in-kpn-se'va-bl), a. [= F. in- 
concevable = Sp. inconcebibte = Pg. inconcebivel 
= It. inconcepibile ; as in-3 + conceivable.} In- 
capable of being conceived, or realized in the 
imagination; incredible; inexplicable. An ex- 
pression which conveys no conception whatever, but is 
mere gibberish, is not called inconceivable, but unintelligi- 
ble. The word inconceivable (see also unconceivable) is used 
in the following senses in philosophy : (a) Involving a 
contradiction in terms, such as the idea of a non-existent 
being. 
The school philosophers, ... to solve the more mys- 
terious phsenomena of nature, nay and most of the familiar 
ones too, they scruple not to ... have recourse to agents 
that are not only invisible but inconceivable, at least to 
men that cannot admit any save rational and consistent 
notions. Boyle, Atmospheres of Consistent Bodies. 
A necessary truth ... is a truth . . . the opposite of 
which is inconceivable, contradictory, nonsensical, impos- 
sible ; more shortly, it is a truth in the fixing of which 
nature had only one alternative. . . . Nature could not 
inconcinnous 
have fixed that two straight lines should . . . enclose a 
space ; for this involves a contradiction. 
Ferrier, Institutes of iletaph., Int., 27. 
(ii) Unacceptable to the mind because involving a viola- 
tion of laws believed to be well established by positive 
evidence, as a perpetual motion. 
How two ethers can be diffused through all space, one 
of which acts upon the other, and by consequence is re- 
acted upon, without retarding, shattering, dispersing, and 
confounding one another's motions, is inconceivable. 
Newton, Opticks. 
A contradiction is inconceivable only when all experi- 
ence opposes itself to the formation of the contradictory 
conception. Lewes, Probs. of Life and Mind, I. xiii. 
The mistaking mere effects of association for ultimate 
facts, the negative of which is really, and not apparently 
only, inconceivable. 
Hodgson, Phil, of Reflection, II. vi. 6. 
(c) Unimaginable by man on account of an inseparable 
association, although not perhaps involving any contra- 
diction nor even physically impossible, as the perception 
of color without extension. [This is the sense in which 
Herbert Spencer professes to use the word exclusively.] 
For my part, I see evidently that it is not in my power 
to frame the idea of a body extended and moved, but I 
must withal give it some colour or other sensible quality 
which is acknowledged to exist only in the mind. In 
short, extension, figure, and motion, abstracted from all 
other qualities, are inconceivable. 
Bp. Berkeley, Principles of Human Knowledge, L S 10. 
A mere hypothesis . . . which, even as a hypothesis, is 
absolutely inconceivable. 
Dr. T. Brown, PhiL of the Human Mind, xxx. 
(d) Unimaginable to a particular person from novelty, as 
the idea that parallel straight lines meet at infinity. 
It seems inconceivable that A should move until B hath 
left its place. Olanville, Vanity of Dogmatizing, vi. 
We might be able to aim at some dim and seeming con- 
ception how matter might at first be made, and begin to 
exist, by the power of that eternal first Being ; but to give 
beginning and being to a spirit would be found a more 
inconceivable effect of omnipotent power. 
Locke, Human Understanding, IV. x. S 18. 
(e) Capable of being conceived only by a negative or rela- 
tive notion, such as the idea of infinity. 
We cannot think a quality existing absolutely, in or of 
itself. We are constrained to think it as inhering in 
some basis, substratum, hypostasis, or substance; but 
this substance cannot be conceived by us except nega- 
tively that is, as the unapparent, the inconceivable cor- 
relative of certain appearing qualities. 
Sir W. Hamilton, Discussions, App. I. (A). 
(/) Incredible ; not to be imagined as believed in by any 
man, as the supposition of an event undetermined by a 
cause. [This is the meaning which J. S. Mill undertakes 
to show is really attached to the word by Spencer.) 
Things are often said to be inconceivable which the mind 
is under no incapacity of representing to itself in an im- 
age. It is often said that we are unable to conceive as 
possible that which, in itself, we are perfectly well able 
to conceive : we are able it is admitted, to conceive an 
imaginary object, but unable to conceive it realized. This 
extends the term inconceivable to every combination of 
facts which to the mind simply contemplating it appears 
incredible. [Foot-note. I do not mean what is really in- 
credible.] J. S. Mill, Examination of Hamilton, vi. 
inconceivableness (in-kon-se'va-bl-nes), n. 
The quality of being inconceivable. 
An alleged fact is not therefore impossible because it is 
inconceivable, for the incompatible notions in which con- 
sists its inconceivableness need not each of them really 
belong to it in that fulness which involves their being in- 
compatible with each other. 
J. H. Newman, Gram, of Assent, p. 49. 
inconceivably (in-kon-se'va-bli), adv. In an 
inconceivable manner; beyond the power of 
conception. 
Without foundation, and placed inconceivably In empti- 
ness and darkness. Johnson, Vision of Theodore. 
So inconceivably minute a quantity as the one twenty- 
millionth of a grain. Darwin, Insectiv. Plants, p. 272. 
inconceptiblet (in-kpn-sep'ti-bl), a. [= Sp. in- 
conceptible ; as i- 3 -i- conceptible.} Inconceiv- 
able. 
It is inconceptible how any such man, that hath stood 
the shock of an eternal duration without corruption, . . . 
should after be corrupted. 
Sir U. Bale, Orig. of Mankind, p. 86. 
inconcemingt (in-kon-ser'ning), a. [< in- 3 + 
concerning.} Unimportant; trivial. 
Trifling and inconcerning matters. Fuller. 
inconcinnt, [= Sp. inconcino = It. inconcinno, 
< L. inconcinnus, inelegant: see inconcinnous.} 
Same as inconcinnous. 
Dissimilar and inconcinn molecules, i. e. atoms of differ- 
ent magnitude and figures. 
Cudworth, Intellectual System, p. 16. 
inconcinnity (in-kon-sin'i-ti), n. [< L. incon- 
cinnita(t-)s, inelegance, '< inconcinnus, inele- 
gant: see inconciiinous.} Lack of concinnity, 
congruousness, or proportion, or an instance of 
such lack ; unsuitableness. 
Such is the incimcinnity and insignificancy of Grotius's 
interpreting of the six seals. 
Dr. H. More, Mystery of Godliness, p. 184. 
inconcinnoust (in-kon-sin'us), a. [Also incon- 
cinn, q. v.; < L. inconcinnus, inelegant, < in- 
priv. + eoncinnus, well-ordered, elegant: see 
