These words refer to things that are roughly similar but not exactly alike. Compare suggests that one thing is like another in some significant way, however unlike in others: a war that compares to the Korean conflict in its evident stalemate of constructive alternatives. In the imperative, the word may also be an invitation to regard two things side by side in order to note their differences as well as their similarities: Compare these examples of Rembrandt’s early and late styles. Resemble is not readily used in the imperative, but otherwise it is closely related to compare . Its stress, however, is on a closer likeness, indicating that on thing compares in a number of ways to something else. Also, the word carries a stronger visual suggestion than compare : children who resemble their mother; a girl who resembled someone I used to know; an argument that resembles an earlier but now discredited theory.

In many uses correspond is a more formal word for ideas suggested by resemble : an activist movement that corresponds to similar movements in the 1930s. The word has its own area of meaning, however, in suggesting things that are alike in that they match or complement each other: an availability of funds that seldom corresponds to the needs of units at work in the field. Parallel can also be used as a more formal substitute for resemble , but most often it suggests the separateness of two similar things: space research in Russia which parallels that in the United States; proposals that not only paralleled but actually preceded Darwin’s.

With approximate , the emphasis is on the roughness of the likeness: a bill that only approximated the demands of the opposition. The word may also suggest that one thing falls short of matching another in obvious fashions. Approach is like approximate in suggesting that one thing cannot measure up to something with which it is compared ; the special emphasis here, however, is on quantity or volume: share-market levels that only approached previous highs. Often, the word emphasizes a lower level: a book that approaches his others in quality.

Savour of suggests that one thing only vaguely compares to another in some almost elusive way. Thus the amount of similarity suggested is even less than for approximate and approach : a novel that savours of a feeble attempt to mimic Joyce; a northern port that nevertheless somehow savoured of the Mediterranean in its whitewashed houses and tiled roofs. While savour of can suggest equally well an advantageous or unfortunate likeness, the more pungent and colloquial smack of almost exclusively suggests an undesirable similarity: an offer that smacks of bribery. Both words tend to relate a single example to a larger category of things which it resembles, however distantly.