Constitute vs Comprise - What's the difference?
constitute | comprise |
To cause to stand; to establish; to enact.
* Jeremy Taylor
To make up; to compose; to form.
* Johnson
To appoint, depute, or elect to an office; to make and empower.
* William Wordsworth
To be made up of; to consist of (especially a comprehensive list of parts).
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However, the passive voice of comprise must be employed carefully to make sense. Phrases such as "animals and cages are comprised by zoos" or "pitchers, catchers, and fielders are comprised by baseball teams" highlight the difficulty.
*{{quote-news, year=2011, date=December 10, author=David Ornstein, work=BBC Sport
, title= To include, contain or embrace.
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To compose, to constitute. See usage note below.
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*1657 , (Isaac Barrow), (translation), Prop. XXX
*:"Seeing then the angles comprised of equal right lines are equal, we have found the angle FDE equal to the angle ABC."
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*:Three chairs of the steamer type, all maimed, comprised the furniture of this roof-garden, with (by way of local colour) on one of the copings a row of four red clay flower-pots filled with sun-baked dust from which gnarled and rusty stalks thrust themselves up like withered elfin limbs.
(lb) To include, contain, or be made up of ("open-ended", doesn't limit to the items listed; cf. compose , which is "closed" and limits to the items listed)
As verbs the difference between constitute and comprise
is that constitute is to cause to stand; to establish; to enact while comprise is to be made up of; to consist of (especially a comprehensive list of parts).As a noun constitute
is an established law.constitute
English
(Webster 1913)Verb
(constitut)- Laws appointed and constituted by lawful authority.
- Truth and reason constitute that intellectual gold that defies destruction.
- Me didst Thou constitute a priest of thine.
Synonyms
* establish, enact * make up, compose, formExternal links
* * ----comprise
English
Verb
(compris)However, the passive voice of comprise must be employed carefully to make sense. Phrases such as "animals and cages are comprised by zoos" or "pitchers, catchers, and fielders are comprised by baseball teams" highlight the difficulty.
Arsenal 1-0 Everton, passage=Arsenal were playing without a recognised full-back - their defence comprising four centre-halves - and the lack of width was hindering their progress.}}