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Poise vs Elegance - What's the difference?

poise | elegance |

As nouns the difference between poise and elegance

is that poise is weight; an amount of weight, the amount something weighs while elegance is grace, refinement, and beauty in movement, appearance, or manners.

As a verb poise

is to hang in equilibrium; to be balanced or suspended; hence, to be in suspense or doubt.

poise

English

Noun

(-)
  • (obsolete) Weight; an amount of weight, the amount something weighs.
  • * 1590 , Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene , I.xii:
    • as an huge rockie clift, / Whose false foundation waues haue washt away, / With dreadfull poyse is from the mayneland rift, / [...] So downe he fell [...].
  • The weight, or mass of metal, used in weighing, to balance the substance weighed.
  • That which causes a balance; a counterweight.
  • * Dryden
    • Men of unbounded imagination often want the poise of judgment.
  • A state of balance, equilibrium or stability
    • (Bentley)
  • composure; freedom from embarrassment or affectation
  • mien; bearing or deportment of the head or body
  • A condition of hovering, or being suspended
  • (physics) A cgs unit of dynamic viscosity equal to one dyne-second per square centimeter.
    • (wikipedia poise)

    Derived terms

    * centipoise

    Verb

    (pois)
  • (obsolete) To hang in equilibrium; to be balanced or suspended; hence, to be in suspense or doubt.
  • * Longfellow
    • The slender, graceful spars / Poise aloft in air.
  • (obsolete) To counterpoise; to counterbalance.
  • * Shakespeare
    • one scale of reason to poise another of sensuality
  • * Dryden
    • to poise with solid sense a sprightly wit
  • (obsolete) To be of a given weight; to weigh.
  • (obsolete) To add weight to, to weigh down.
  • *, II.2:
    • Every man poiseth upon his fellowes sinne, and elevates his owne.
  • * 1597 , William Shakespeare, Romeo & Juliet , I.2:
    • you saw her faire none els being by, / Her selfe poysd with her selfe in either eye.
  • To hold (something) in equilibrium, to hold balanced and ready; to carry (something) ready to be used.
    • I poised the crowbar in my hand, and waited.
    to poise the scales of a balance
  • * Dryden
    • Nor yet was earth suspended in the sky; / Nor poised , did on her own foundation lie.
  • To keep (something) in equilibrium; to hold suspended or balanced.
    • The rock was poised precariously on the edge of the cliff.
  • To ascertain, as if by balancing; to weigh.
  • * South
    • He cannot sincerely consider the strength, poise the weight, and discern the evidence.

    elegance

    English

    (wikipedia elegance)

    Noun

    (en-noun)
  • Grace, refinement, and beauty in movement, appearance, or manners
    • The bride was elegance personified.
  • Restraint and grace of style
    • The simple dress had a quiet elegance .
  • The beauty of an idea characterized by minimalism and intuitiveness while preserving exactness and precision
    • The proof of the theorem had a pleasing elegance .
  • (countable) A refinement or luxury
  • * {{quote-book, year=1852, author=Various, title=Young Americans Abroad, chapter=, edition= citation
    • , passage=As to the comforts and elegances of life, we have enough of them for our good. }}
  • * {{quote-book, year=1881, author=Isaac D'Israeli, title=Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1, chapter=, edition= citation
    • , passage=At Rome, when Sallust was the fashionable writer, short sentences, uncommon words, and an obscure brevity, were affected as so many elegances . }}
  • * {{quote-book, year=1909, author=E. Phillips Oppenheim, title=The Governors, chapter=10, edition= citation
    • , passage=Phineas Duge

    Related terms

    * elegant