PLURALITY • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Plurality

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/plərˈælɪti/ Listen

noun

Plurality n. (pl. pluralities)

The state of being plural, or consisting of more than one; a number consisting of two or more of the same kind; as, a plurality of worlds; the plurality of a verb.

The greater number; a majority; also, the greatest of several numbers; in elections, the excess of the votes given for one candidate over those given for another, or for any other, candidate. When there are more than two candidates, the one who receives the plurality of votes may have less than a majority. See Majority. "Take the plurality of the world, and they are neither wise nor good."

(Eccl.) See Plurality of benefices, below.

Plurality of benefices (Eccl.), the possession by one clergyman of more than one benefice or living. Each benefice thus held is called a plurality. (Eng.)

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Etymology of 'Plurality'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Plurality" Quotes from Famous Books

... same principle of submission, as applicable to the people of the North in our present emergency. In accordance with the plan adopted by the founders of our Government, and practically illustrated in the election of George Washington and his successors, the people by a plurality of votes elected to office and placed at the head of our political system as its highest authority and ruler, the present Chief Magistrate. From the day of his acknowledged election, party politics settled into the calm of acquiescence, and all loyal and true States and ...

— Continental Monthly, Vol. III, No IV, April 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... But this polemical motive can hardly have induced him to becloud an obvious text and invent interpretations which never occurred to any other ecclesiastical writer before or after his time. The conundrum can only be solved by the assumption that Augustine believed in a plurality of literal senses in the Bible and held that over and above (or notwithstanding) the sensus obvius every exegete is free to read as much truth into any given passage as possible, and that such ...

— Grace, Actual and Habitual • Joseph Pohle

... that one now started from the definition "qui vitam aeternam habet," and again from the definition "qui est super omnia et originem nescit." From the latter followed the absolute unity of God, from the former a plurality of Gods. Both could be so harmonised (see Tertull. adv. Prax. and Novat. de Trinit.) that one could assume that the God, qui est super omnia, might allow his monarchy to be administered by several persons, and might dispense the ...

— History of Dogma, Volume 1 (of 7) • Adolph Harnack

... outer door. Out of the drab recesses leaped dusky shadows. There seemed to be a large number of jostling men; perhaps only three or four were at hand by actual count; the insufficient lighting and their shocking and determined appearance lent them plurality. ...

— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts

... created one without Eve. Why? That the Sadducees might not assert the plurality of powers ...

— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various

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