Vagary vs Vicissitude - What's the difference?
vagary | vicissitude |
An erratic, unpredictable occurrence or action.
* 1871 , , At Last: A Christmas In The West Indies , ch. 8:
An impulsive or illogical desire; a caprice or whim.
* 1905 , , War of the Classes , Preface:
Regular change or succession from one thing to another, or one part of a cycle to the next; alternation; mutual succession; interchange.
(often, in the plural) a change, especially in one's life or fortunes.
* 1667 , , Paradise Lost , vii, 351,
* 2003 , "US redeployments afoot in Asia", Christian Science Monitor , Nov. 18, Pg. 6.,
* Seneca
As nouns the difference between vagary and vicissitude
is that vagary is an erratic, unpredictable occurrence or action while vicissitude is regular change or succession from one thing to another, or one part of a cycle to the next; alternation; mutual succession; interchange.vagary
English
Noun
(vagaries)- It now turns out that the Pitch Lake, like most other things, owes its appearance on the surface to no convulsion or vagary at all, but to a most slow, orderly, and respectable process of nature, by which buried vegetable matter, which would have become peat, and finally brown coal, in a temperate climate, becomes, under the hot tropic soil, asphalt and oil.
- And then came the day when my socialism grew respectable,—still a vagary of youth, it was held, but romantically respectable.
Derived terms
* vagarity * vagariousSee also
* vagueryvicissitude
English
Noun
(en noun)- And God made.. the Stars, and set them in the firmament of Heaven to illuminate the Earth, and rule the day in their vicissitude ...
- The vicissitudes of war in Iraq cast a dreary backdrop for Donald Rumsfeld's first visit to Asian military allies since he became US Defense Secretary in 2001.
- Happy is the man who can endure the highest and lowest fortune. He who has endured such vicissitudes with equanimity has deprived misfortune of its power.