Surmise vs Contrive - What's the difference?
surmise | contrive |
Thought, imagination, or conjecture, which may be based upon feeble or scanty evidence; suspicion; guess.
* Jonathan Swift
* 1919 ,
Reflection; thought; posit.
To conjecture, to opine or to posit with contestable premises.
To form by an exercise of ingenuity; to devise; to plan; to scheme; to plot.
* Hawthorne
* 1813 , Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice , Modern Library Edition (1995), page 154
* {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham), title=(The China Governess)
, chapter=10 To invent, to make devices; to form designs especially by improvisation.
To project, cast, or set forth, as in a projection of light.
As verbs the difference between surmise and contrive
is that surmise is while contrive is to form by an exercise of ingenuity; to devise; to plan; to scheme; to plot.surmise
English
Noun
(en noun)- surmises of jealousy or of envy
- No man ought to be charged with principles he actually disowns, unless his practices contradict his profession; not upon small surmises .
- The meeting had been devoid of incident. No word had been said to give me anything to think about, and any surmises I might make were unwarranted. I was intrigued.
- (Shakespeare)
Verb
(surmis)External links
* * ----contrive
English
Verb
(contriv)- Neither do thou imagine that I shall contrive aught against his life.
- I cannot bear the idea of two young women traveling post by themselves. It is highly improper. You must contrive to send somebody.
citation, passage=With a little manœuvring they contrived to meet on the doorstep which was […] in a boiling stream of passers-by, hurrying business people speeding past in a flurry of fumes and dust in the bright haze.}}