| 词组 | consist in, consist of |
| 释义 | consist in, consist of The world of usage writers tends to be tidier than the real world, and in drawing the customary distinction between consist in "lie, reside (in)" and consist of "to be composed or made up (of)" they take advantage of that artificial tidiness. The distinction is, in fact, usual—most writers observe it and so should you—but the OED shows that historical practice has not been consistent, and our evidence shows that current practice, while more consistent than in the past, is still not perfectly so. Here is one example each of mainstream use: • The skill ... consists in making them talk like little fishes —Oliver Goldsmith, quoted in Boswell's Life of Samuel Johnson, 1791 • The committee... consists of a baker's dozen of academics —Simon 1980 It is easy to see that when the subject is singular and the noun following is plural, of is the right preposition: • The remaining two-thirds consists of extracts of speeches—Times Literary Supp., 5 Mar. 1970 But when consist appears with a singular noun on each side, there can be uncertainty. Sometimes the context is not sufficient to make it clear which meaning is intended: • ... a new look at what Shaw's "reality" consisted in — Times Literary Supp., 18 June 1971 Bernstein 1962 cites an example of consist of that he maintains should have been consist in, but most of the ambiguous or uncertain examples in our files are uses of consist in where consist of might have made more sense: • Hypallage may consist in simple jumbling of the words in a sentence —John Dirckx, The Language of Medicine, 2d ed., 1983 • Poe's reply consisted in a series of five articles — Nelson F. Adkins, Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America, 3d quarter, 1948 • ... for travelling, he said, was travelling in one part of the world as well as another: it consisted in being such a time from home, and in traversing so many leagues —Henry Fielding, Jonathan Wild, 1743 • ... a religious course that does not consist in memory work alone —Paul F. Klenke, Bulletin of the National Catholic Education Association, August 1949 Chambers 1985 says that consist in is more formal than consist of; this may account for some writers' being uncertain in handling it since it is likely to be less familiar. At any rate our evidence indicates that writers are more likely to stray from the usual and recommended idiom with consist in than with consist of. If you are uncertain, these two final mainstream examples may serve as points of reference: • The mistake that is made on television consists in believing that anyone can speak interestingly — Edwin Newman, PBS television program, 8 Mar. 1979 • ... the city seemed to me to consist of three areas — Stephen Spender, N.Y. Times Mag., 30 Oct. 1977 |
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