different between multitudinous vs infinite

English

Etymology

From (the stem of) Latin multit?d? +? -ous.

Adjective

multitudinous (comparative more multitudinous, superlative most multitudinous)

1. Existing in great numbers; innumerable. [from 17th c.]
   • 1876, John Quincy Adams, Diary entry dated 9 September, 1833 in Charles Francis Adams (editor), Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott, Volume 9, p. 14,^[1]

     In the multitudinous whimseys of a disabled mind and body, the thick-coming fancies often occur to me that the events which affect my life and adventures are specially shaped to disappoint my purposes.

   • 1934, George Orwell, Burmese Days, Chapter 14,^[2]

     Whichever way one looked one’s view was shut in by the multitudinous ranks of trees, and the tangled bushes and creepers that struggled round their bases like the sea round the piles of a pier.

2. Comprising a large number of parts.
   • 1625, Peter Heylin, Mikrokosmos: A Little Description of the Great World, Augmented and revised, Oxford, “The Grecian Iles,” p. 424,^[3]

     […] he feared no enemies but the Sea and the Earth; the one yeelding no safe harbour for such a Navie; the other not yeelding sufficient sustenance for so multitudinous an Armie.

   • 1882, Walt Whitman, Specimen Days & Collect, Philadelphia: Rees Welsh & Co., entry dated 26 August, 1879, p. 138,^[]

     […] looking up a long while at the grand high roof with its graceful and multitudinous work of iron rods, angles, gray colors, plays of light and shade, receding into dim outlines […]

   • 1916, Carl Sandburg, “Monotone” in Chicago Poems, New York: Henry Holt & Co., p. 118,^[4]

     The monotone of the rain is beautiful,

     And the sudden rise and slow relapse

     Of the long multitudinous rain.

3. Crowded with many people.
   • 1818, Percy Bysshe Shelley, The Revolt of Islam, London: C. & J. Ollier, Canto 12, Stanza I, p. 250,^[5]

     The transport of a fierce and monstrous gladness

     Spread thro’ the multitudinous streets, fast flying

     Upon the winds of fear […]

   • 1919, Max Beerbohm, “A. V. Laider” in Seven Men, London: William Heinemann, p. 142,^[6]

     In multitudinous London the memory of A. V. Laider and his trouble had soon passed from my mind.

4. Coming from or produced by a large number of beings or objects.
   • 1898, H. G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, Book One, Chapter 16,^[7]

     The multitudinous shouting confused his ears.

   • 1950, Mervyn Peake, Gormenghast, New York: Ballantine, 1968, Chapter 36, p. 261,^[8]

     […] she paused before she opened the doors of the salon, for a loud and confused noise came from within. It was of a kind that she had never heard before, so happy it was, so multitudinous, so abandoned—the sound of voices at play.

5. (obsolete) Of or relating to the multitude, of the common people.
   • c. 1607, William Shakespeare, Coriolanus, Act III, Scene 1,^[9]

     [you] that prefer

     A noble life before a long, and wish

     To jump a body with a dangerous physic

     That’s sure of death without it, at once pluck out

     The multitudinous tongue; let them not lick

     The sweet which is their poison […]

Synonyms

• myriad
• See also Thesaurus:manifold, Thesaurus:innumerable

Derived terms

• multitudinously

Related terms

• multitude

Translations

English

Etymology

From Latin inf?n?tus, from in- (“not”) + f?nis (“end”) + the perfect passive participle ending -itus.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /??nf?n?t/
• (US) IPA^(key): /??nf?n?t/, /??nf?n?t/
• Hyphenation: in?fi?nite

Adjective

infinite (comparative more infinite, superlative most infinite)

1. Indefinably large, countlessly great; immense. [from 14th c.]
   • 1735, Henry Brooke, Universal Beauty

     Whatever is finite, as finite, will admit of no comparative relation with infinity; for whatever is less than infinite is still infinitely distant from infinity; and lower than infinite distance the lowest or least cannot sink.

   • }}

     infinite riches in a little room
2. Boundless, endless, without end or limits; innumerable. [from 15th c.]

   • Great is our Lord, and of great power; his understanding is infinite.

3. (with plural noun) Infinitely many. [from 15th c.]
   • 2012, Helen Donelan, Karen Kear, Magnus Ramage, Online Communication and Collaboration: A Reader

     Huxley's theory says that if you provide infinite monkeys with infinite typewriters, some monkey somewhere will eventually create a masterpiece – a play by Shakespeare, a Platonic dialogue, or an economic treatise by Adam Smith.

4. (mathematics) Greater than any positive quantity or magnitude; limitless. [from 17th c.]
5. (set theory, of a set) Having infinitely many elements.

   • For any infinite set, there is a 1-1 correspondence between it and at least one of its proper subsets. For example, there is a 1-1 correspondence between the set of natural numbers and the set of squares of natural numbers, which is a proper subset of the set of natural numbers.

6. (grammar) Not limited by person or number. [from 19th c.]
7. (music) Capable of endless repetition; said of certain forms of the canon, also called perpetual fugues, constructed so that their ends lead to their beginnings.

Usage notes

Although the term is incomparable in the precise sense, it can be comparable both in mathematics and set theory to compare different degrees of infinity, and informally to denote yet a larger thing.

Poets (and particularly hymn-writers before the 20th century) would commonly rhyme the word as though pronounced [-??n??t] and church congregations still on occasion adopt that pronunciation.

Synonyms

• (indefinably large): immeasurable, inestimable, vast
• (without end or limits): amaranthine, boundless, endless, interminable, limitless, unbounded, unending, unlimited; see also Thesaurus:infinite or Thesaurus:eternal
• (infinitely many): countless; see also Thesaurus:innumerable

Antonyms

• finite
• infinitesimal
• limited

Hyponyms

• (set theory): countably infinite
• (set theory): uncountable

Derived terms

Related terms

• infinitive

Translations

Numeral

infinite

1. Infinitely many.

Noun

infinite (plural infinites)

1. Something that is infinite in nature.
   • 2004, Teun Koetsier, Luc Bergmans, Mathematics and the Divine: A Historical Study (page 449)

     Cautiously, Hobbes avoided asserting the equality of these infinites, and explicitly characterized the relation between them as non-inequality.

References

Italian

Adjective

infinite

1. feminine plural of infinito

Latin

Adjective

?nf?n?te

1. vocative masculine singular of ?nf?n?tus

References

• infinite in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• infinite in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• infinite in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré Latin-Français, Hachette