con·stan·cy (k n st n-s )n. 1. Steadfastness, as in purpose or affection; faithfulness. 2. The condition or quality of being constant; changelessness. |
constancy [ˈkɒnstənsɪ]
Constancy
dyed-in-the-wool Confirmed, inveterate; complete, thorough, unmitigated, out-and-out. When wool is dyed before being made into yarn, its color is more firmly fixed and lasting. A variant of this expression appeared in Sir Thomas North’s translation of Plutarch’s Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans (1579):
He had … through institution and education (as it were) died in wool the manners of children.
hard-and-fast Ironclad, binding, strict, rigid, unbending. The literal, nautical sense of the term denotes a ship on shore or aground, stuck and immovable. It is probably this sense that gave rise to the figurative meaning in popular use today. Both the figurative and literal meanings date from the late 19th century.
man for all seasons A reliable, steadfast male; a man of principle who retains his integrity regardless of the situation. This expression alludes to a man who is unruffled by vicissitudes and who remains constant despite changing circumstances, like the weather. The phrase was popularized when Robert Bolt used it as the title of his dramatization of the life of Sir Thomas More (1960).
regular brick An agreeable, sincere male; a regular guy. This expression, referring to the solid, unvariegated constitution of a brick, describes a man who is genuinely amiable, unaffected, and reliable.
I don’t stick to declare Father Dick … was a regular brick. (Richard H. Barham, The Ingoldsby Legends, 1845)
through thick and thin Through difficulties or adversity, in spite of any or all obstacles; faithfully, unwaveringly. According to the OED, thick and thin was originally thicket and thin wood. Thus this expression denoted an actual physical obstacle, as in the following quotation from Spenser’s Faerie Queene:
His tireling jade he fiercely forth did push Through thick and thin, both over bank and bush.
Currently through thick and thin is used figuratively as well, referring to any conceivable obstacle, and in context, connoting faithfulness.
There’s five hundred men here to back you up through thick and thin. (T. H. Hall Caine, The Manxman, 1894)
true-blue Loyal, faithful; steadfast, staunch, unwavering, constant.
The Old Beau is true-blue, to the high-flown principles [of] King Edward’s First Protestant Church. (Edmund Hickeringill, Priest-craft, 1705)
The color blue has long been the symbol of truth and constancy. Some conjecture the association arose because of the renowned fastness of Coventry blue dye. According to the OED, true-blue was applied to the Scottish Presbyterian or Whig party of the 17th century, the Covenanters having assumed blue as their partisan color in opposition to the royal red. Their doing so may have been connected with Numbers 15:38 of the Bible, in which the Lord commands Moses to have the Israelites put a blue ribbon on the fringes of the borders of their garments as a reminder to keep His commandments.
| Noun | 1. | constancy - the quality of being enduring and free from change or variation; "early mariners relied on the constancy of the trade winds" unchangeability, unchangeableness, unchangingness, changelessness - the quality of being unchangeable; having a marked tendency to remain unchanged invariance - the nature of a quantity or property or function that remains unchanged when a given transformation is applied to it; "the invariance of the configuration under translation" metastability - the quality of a physical system that persists in its existing equilibrium when undisturbed (or only slightly disturbed) but able to pass to a more stable equilibrium when sufficiently disturbed monotony - constancy of tone or pitch or inflection changefulness, inconstancy - the quality of being changeable and variable |
| 2. | constancy - (psychology) the tendency for perceived objects to give rise to very similar perceptual experiences in spite of wide variations in the conditions of observation perception - the process of perceiving brightness constancy - the tendency for a visual object to be perceived as having the same brightness under widely different conditions of illumination color constancy, colour constancy - the tendency for a color to look the same under widely different viewing conditions shape constancy - the tendency to perceive the shape of a rigid object as constant despite differences in the viewing angle (and consequent differences in the shape of the pattern projected on the retina of the eye) size constancy - the tendency to perceive the veridical size of a familiar object despite differences in their distance (and consequent differences in the size of the pattern projected on the retina of the eye) psychological science, psychology - the science of mental life | |
| 3. | constancy - faithfulness and dependability in personal attachments (especially sexual fidelity) faithfulness, fidelity - the quality of being faithful |
constancy
"But I am constant as the northern star"
"Of whose true-fixed and resting quality"
"There is no fellow in the firmament" [William Shakespeare Julius Caesar]
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